May 21, 2016
Opelika, Alabama

On the wall in the back of my closet was a shelf holding a box of sympathy cards that would remain there for ten more minutes as the last items in my room were shoveled out in the direction of a new home. I reached for them with one hand while holding open a trash bag with the other. I took a few in my hand and glanced over them with no purpose of considering them longer than three seconds before disposing of them for good.

I threw that handful away and glanced about my closet before taking the next stack. Today was moving day, a mere twelve hours after I had tossed my graduation cap in the air on a very expensive high school football field after receiving my diploma. There were thumbtack holes in the walls from posters and pictures I had plastered to them to cover up the ugly aged gold our landlord had forbidden us to paint over. There was a stain from who-knows-what on the carpet our landlord would surely find inexcusable. Some kind of shoe mark colored a black streak on the wall from casually throwing shoes into the closet instead of designating a rightful spot for them.

I took the whole box of sympathy cards that would turn seven years old in November down from the shelf. I flipped through them with no real point but to either upset myself or make sure no birthday cards with unclaimed cash had somehow gotten thrown into the mix. I could hear my mom singing something painfully honkytonk in her bedroom as I exited my closet and went into my bathroom. I took a seat on the toilet with the lid down because that was the only remaining furniture in the apartment besides the washer and dryer. But the washer and dryer were too near the country music for me take that seat.

If I’m honest, I didn’t expect to keep any of the cards because I truthfully hadn't even wanted them when I first acquired them. I didn’t know half the people who’d sent them because they weren’t necessarily for me. Sympathy cards just weren’t enough when you lose someone you love, and nothing anyone tries to do when tragedy strikes is. They were a lot of excuses for an event that just isn’t fair. The motives behind the cards were admirable, but paper and words from someone else’s heart we not going to help me find relief. There was a part of me that hates them so totally because they weren’t authentic; they were mass-produced items for people to sign, hoping the pre-written sentiments printed by Hallmark were good enough, but they just weren't.

I took a deep breath, flipping through the cards at a steady, exhausted pace. I hadn’t touched them since I’d put them in this box six-and-a-half years ago, but I knew what each one contained upon passing every torn-open envelope.

To my uneasy surprise, I did find an unopened card. The sealed lip faced me; the envelope was oversized and packed tight. I pulled it from the stack and set it aside on the counter while I dropped every other letter on the floor. I turned the unopened envelope over to see if there was a return address, but the only thing written on that side was, Open on graduation day.

I recognized the handwriting immediately, though I hadn’t seen it in almost seven years. The strokes were tall, slender, close together, almost like brush strokes. The writing slanted to the right just slightly, and the cursive was flawless because he’d preferred to write that way, so he’d practiced often to the point where he would write drafts upon drafts of whatever he’d been working on so that his handwriting would look flawless.

I felt the tears burning in the back of my throat before I even had reason to explain them. I stood from the toilet and closed and locked the bathroom door because this was a heavily private matter. My knees were too weak––they buckled beneath me, and I slid down the door, my teeth clenched with anxious tension.

I got a feeling in my stomach, the kind you get when you sense you’re about to get bad news. But I didn’t know what could be in the envelope that could be worse than the reality of what had already happened.

Still I hesitated.

A taste like dread filled my mouth as I ran my fingers over my father’s handwriting on the envelope.

It was possible this only favored his handwriting because it had been so long since I had seen the real thing, but that argument did nothing for me, and I knew there was no fooling myself into believing this was not exactly what it was.

It was also possible that I had overlooked this letter for almost seven years, ignored the only thing I owned written from my dad to me, which was plausible, considering I hadn’t looked in this box for exactly that long.

It was possible Mom had slipped the letter in the stack, knowing I may not see it until now.

It was also possible no one had seen this letter except my dad.

My stomach suddenly turned at the thought of my own father allowing this, planning this even. I didn’t want to admit to myself that I didn’t want to open the letter, and a scene from almost seven years ago came to my mind. A scene of eleven-year-old me fighting against my relatives as they dragged me down the aisle of a church building toward a light blue casket. A scene that marked the day I became tirelessly frustrated. A scene that started over my life, living as the shadow of a great man instead of as a girl who could be herself. Everything I did starting from that moment determined if I was doing enough to honor him, if people could speak on his behalf and tell me he was proud of me, if I was the person he would even want me to be.

I was back in that church as I held that letter, standing behind doors that hid the blue casket from my eyes. And I knew that I had to open the letter, just as my family had known that I had to see what was in the blue casket.

With suddenly weak fingers, I pried open the seal, careful not to rip the paper because this was the only letter I wanted. I pulled out a few folded sheets of notebook paper, a small envelope with the words bank info written on it in Dad’s handwriting, and a small stack of about a dozen index cards with numbers written on the unlined sides. I didn’t check the lined sides yet. I set everything aside and opened the folded notebook paper, which had Read this first written across it. I smoothed out the papers on my knee and counted a total of four pages, front only.

I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, then opened them, and read:

September 15, 2009
Mandy,
By the time you open this letter, I imagine I will be long gone. I doubt I will even make it to your twelfth birthday this December. I’m going to miss a lot, I know. Teaching you to drive (unless you count those times in empty parking lots, which I do). Your graduations, however many of those you’ll have because you’re so smart. Walking you down the aisle on your wedding day.
I’ve written this letter an uncountable number of times because I want you to be happy when you read it, and I want you to imagine that I am happy, but goodbyes are just so hard. But as I sit here writing it, I am happy. For the first time in a long time I feel relieved because I am doing something good and not just laying in a hospital bed waiting. I want you to feel as content when you read this as you look right now sitting in the chair overlooking the courtyard from my hospital room, writing something I’m sure will make you a bestselling author. Be happy because I’ve arranged something for you. You must promise me—no matter where either of us is—that you will do it all.
I’ve messed up so much in my life when it comes to taking care of you. But no more. I am mending it now.
As you know, this is not my first battle with cancer. As a teenager, I had bone cancer, which threatened to––but did not—take my life. My only wish then is the same wish I have today: for my family to be taken care of. With about $2000 from graduation and one wish, I deposited $6000 into a savings account for my family. When it appeared I would live, I got a job. Of all I earned from easy odd jobs throughout college, I put half in the account for my kids to inherit. In my career, I’ve added to it monthly, changing the name from mine to yours.
And what a great day that was.
I have a friend named Paul Jameson, and you will find him to be very useful to you. I trust him more than anyone in the world. You don’t know him. He lives in London as a television producer. And you will meet him.
The money in the savings account is for one purpose only. Not for college or an apartment or to gather dust after you graduate. That money will be left in my insurance, which your uncle is in charge of.
This money is for you to take and travel with.
I included with this letter the information about the savings account. Move all the money into a checking account and get a debit card. And then buy a first class ticket with it.
I want you to see at least the things I saw when I was your age, and then more. I want you to see all the places we won’t be able to see together.
Also included with this letter is an itinerary of sorts. For six weeks, disappear. Beginning June , 2016, you will follow the itinerary wherever it leads. You'll spend three full days in each destination, and you'll travel every fourth day. With each destination, I have given you at least three tasks you must complete while you are there.
As I write this, I hope you continue to write as you do now. I see how passionate you are when you put a pen to paper. I don't have to ever read any of it, since you would never let me read it in the first place, but I trust you. You get it. I hope this holds true in six years. In sixteen. In sixty.
As for what happens at home when you leave, don’t worry about it. If you're as lost as I felt when I was your age, you must go. You're not doing anything wrong by trying to find yourself. Let me be the one to tell you if no one else has, that it's okay to not know who you are yet. The feeling of expectations as you begin a new chapter of your life will weigh you down.
So drop them, all right?
Don’t worry about the people, the expectations, or even about the rest of your life. You can't live like that. You have to just go. Don’t be afraid.
You can't take me with you, but it's okay. I’ll have the best seat in the house to watch you as you take on the world.
Don’t forget I’m always on your side, Mandy girl.
Go.
I love you more than anything.
Dad

I read over the words Don’t worry about the people until tears finally fell from my eyes and prevented me from reading anymore. I frantically pushed them away because there was so much more I had to see from this letter. I set his words aside and picked up the envelope with the bank information. The bank was local, and I could go there now if I hurried. I flipped through statements to find the balance from seven years ago.

My eyes filled with tears all over again, my bottom lip trembling, as I located the balance as of September 2009.

$28,432.76

I had never seen a number that big outside of a math textbook, and I felt my heart pounding in my chest. I tried to breathe slowly, but there was no way for me to control it once I was laughing and crying at the same time. I shoved all the account information back in its envelope, my hands shaking, and I picked up the index cards next just to find out where I was going.

London, England. Dublin, Ireland. Amsterdam. Berlin. Prague. Salzburg. Venice. Rome. Florence. Nice. Barcelona. Paris.

All in six weeks.

I held my breath for a few seconds, trying to calm down, trying to rationalize this. June was a week away. Was this practical? I had a passport, I had an itinerary, and now I had the money. But what about time? What about plane tickets and hotels, let alone convincing Mom this was something I had to do?

Mom.

I scrambled to my feet, gathering all the components of that one letter into its envelope, and bolted to find her.

I found her beyond the painful sounds of a banjo and a southern drawl, sitting on the front porch, humming something that was surely circa 2003 Martina McBride, sipping a Coke Zero.

“Is your closet done?” she asked me, looking up at me from under the brim of an Auburn University baseball cap.

“We have to go the bank. Right now,” I told her, pushing excess tears out of my face.

She stood, looking concerned, noting the contents in my hands. “Why? What’s that?”

I couldn’t find my words, and I felt everything coming strangely to a halt. I couldn’t explain this to her because this was completely illogical. My dead father wanted to send me on a trip he’d already paid for around the world––what a thought. It made no sense.

“Mandy,” she said quietly.

I looked at her as she reached up and wiped away a tear when it reached my chin.

“I know,” she added, which surprised me. “Let’s go to the bank.”