Day 0 - 29/08/2022 - Liverpool - London - San Francisco

“How long are you staying at the United States of America for, ma’am?”

“I’m staying until the 28th of September.”

“And what have you come to the United States for?”

I point at my Disneyland jumper, which an open-armed Mickey Mouse: “Disneyland, Universal Studios, to see LA, because my friend has moved back there, and also just chilling around San Francisco and Santa Clara.”

“Where will you be staying?”

“At my friends’ house in Santa Clara.”

“What do your friends do?”

“They’re retired, and…”

“I’m confused, you just told me you’re staying with friends and now you’re telling me they’re retired?”

I immediately thought back to one of the best friends I have ever had, Gill, whom I met while we were both doing our MAs when I was 21 and she was in her late 50s and retired. Only ageism would allow you to see the two as somehow incompatible.

“I’m staying with the parents, who are retired, their daughters are my age. One is a hairdresser, the other one works for a company that makes office furniture, and the other one, as far as I could understand, works for a company that helps companies through the process of becoming public.”

My heartbeat started slowing down ever so slightly as I realised that she was no longer looking at me as if I had suddenly declared that I was carrying bags of cocaine in my suitcase. It must have been clear that I understood so little of what my friends did that I was unlikely to have come here in the pursuit of some under-the-table deal to work as part of their companies.

“How do you know your friends?”

“I met them in an exchange programme with my high school in Portugal when I was sixteen.”

“Do you have a job?”

“Yes, I’m an academic and I just finished a contract as a Research Assistant at a university and I’m about to start a new one at the University of Liverpool, and I’m very excited.”

Silence. Her hand moved to the stamp and with a loud “clang” and a quieter “Have a nice stay” I was no longer feeling like I always do whenever the alarm rings as I’m exciting a store (I know I haven’t stolen anything, but I also know that I’m about to be treated as if I have).

As someone who loved California when she first visited at 16, but who since then has grown to appreciate Europe enough to never want to leave it, I couldn’t help but feel a little amused at the assumption that anyone arriving in the US would inevitably be willing to go through desperate measures to stay forever. Regardless — and I can only apologise to my friends for this — I was very sure of where I wanted to stay for my 30 days. And now I have only to wonder at how this wonderful family, who first took me in 15 years ago, continues to allow me to show up at their doorstep after all this time.