One Brave Daughter — No Quiet Desperation!

My wife and I always thought we were going to have a daughter. When we were dating we imagined our daughter and of course came up with a name, Marina. I was driven that a daughter was in order as I loved my girlfriend so much I wanted to have a little version of her or part of her as my daughter. Sometimes when you find something special it just seems more of the same would make for a better and more complete World. We even enjoyed once, while visiting Mexico, playing one day with a little girl that really inspired us and caused us to by the prettiest red Mexican dress. We were ready.

We were super fortunate to have had our first two children that were healthy and amazing little boys. To date they have grown up to be young men I am very proud of and I’m confident will make a very positive mark on this World. Their smiles, kindness and intellect is unique and amazing to experience every time I get to be around them. Both of them are in college now so I don’t get to be around them daily, but fortunately they love their mother and I enough to want to visit and have us visit often. We no doubt made many mistakes raising those boys but the stew of parenting we utilized worked well.

In 2006 we were finally granted our wish. My wife was pregnant and we always found out if we were having a boy or girl before giving birth. I guess neither one of us like surprises. This time we had the doctor put the result of the test in an envelope and we went to a restaurant where we could steal away in a quiet corner to see if we were going to get our Marina. The joy of finding out we were going to have our little girl was amazing. The fact we had two amazing boys we loved dearly to look over our little girl seemed to be the best family grouping one could wish for. Marina was born April 10th, the same day that her grandmother was born. What a blessing to have had our baby girl born and boy did she love her brothers as she grew up.

Marina has lived up to our every expectation as a beautiful, smart and independent girl. She’s been a 4 time national champion in her chosen sport of competitive cheer. She’s smart and with an inquisitive drive to understand kindness in this world. She’s even a super fan of one of my favorite sports of Formula One auto racing. What I didn’t see coming was her drive to explore and see the World as nuanced and understand that her birth country, the United States, was not the center of the world but just a small part of it. Coming of age in a country going through political, racial and social turmoil caused her to look for other parts of the World that would fit her need to see kindness and intelligent social interaction. I wasn’t prepare for what would happen next.

Daughter and Dad walking together down Beale Street in Memphis

Marina decided to do an exchange program. Initially she was thinking of going to England or Ireland since she didn’t speak any foreign languages and she really liked the concept of those countries. Maybe she’d bump into Harry Styles or Lando Norris. While working through this possibility in her head she met a girl from Spain who was doing an exchange year in Marina’s school. They quickly became friends as how many 15 year old girls in middle America are formula one fans? She also gleaned some incite into how people from other areas of the world see her home country as well as what those other countries might be like.

Spain it was then. As bazaar as it was to think of having a daughter spend an entire school year, at the age of 16, was we couldn’t help get caught up in the excitement. Her mother and I dug into how to make it happen. The immense work it was to get the paper work, passport and visas was exhausting and often frustrating work. There were often tears when there was consideration it might not happen. Almost at the last minute we received everything we needed for her to get on that plane and get on her first true adventure of her life.

Then reality hit us hard. I can’t speak for her mother but I will say that I’ve been through heartache in my life. That really gut wrenching pain that you just feel like there’s nothing you can do to feel joy again. I was not going to see my baby girl for almost a year. It’s not natural for that to happen when your daughter is 16 and loves her father. The joy I felt every morning when she’d come downstairs and I saw her for the first time of the day. Her voice sounded so angelic when she’d say the words “good morning daddy”. That wasn’t going to be a daily natural event. To add insult to injury, the day she was leaving I had to be on a business trip. I had to say goodbye to her over FaceTime in front of a Dallas office building. While she boarded the plane and started her journey I was in executive meetings doing everything within my power not to completely break down but to participate. My heart was breaking and I was scared for my baby girl traveling halfway around the world. I spoke to her when she was in Germany and then followed her movements after landing in her new home country of Spain. She was there safely but she was gone.

Those feelings I had were natural but from this vantage point I consider to be a bit selfish. I kept them from her most of the time prior to her leaving but did once break down the day before I had to leave on my business trip and just cried in her arms. A father being comforted by his daughter. But the amazing thing was that she was so resolute to go on this adventure. Even my selfish behavior didn’t make her consider backing off. She was going to go on this adventure and even hid her own concerns and fears.

My Marina is now 8 weeks into her adventure. Until earlier this year she didn’t even speak Spanish and she was also going into a region where they sometime utilize a dialect called Gallician which seems to be a combination of Portuguese, Spanish, and Gaelic. She’s with an amazing family that includes that special girl that became her friend. She’s loving the country, the society and has built a group of friends to have a robust social life. Marina is a perfectionist when it comes to school and grades but she was thrust into a private catholic school that teaches in Spanish and an educate system that is more robust that anything she’s experienced in her home country. Of all things that have come close to breaking her spirit, the thought of failing a class was it. Not the fact that for weeks she could truly communicate or that food was so much different and establishing new friendships. Marina fought hard through massive anxiety and learning struggles to get what would be an equivalent to a B average! Who does that? My brave daughter does that and I have so may high hopes for her to be the contributor to this World that will be a small part of a big change.

I tell this story because it perfectly encapsulates the theme of this website/blog. Marina going off to Spain as a high school girl, barely knowing the language and only a few people, is a prime example of the concept of No Quiet Desperation! We can all draw inspiration from this incredible young girl I call my daughter Marina.