Swapping stories with my new friend Emily Janzen during my freshman year of college, I told her of a lively red-headed Italian girl I had known in Kabul of whom I’d been jealous because she was allowed to bring cookies for lunch Every. Single. Day. “Wait!” Emily interrupted, “An Italian girl named Patricia? Was her last name Novelli??” We couldn’t believe it. Could it be the same girl? I dug out an old picture of Patricia and me learning to knit in Brownies in second grade. Emily took one look and confirmed that yes, indeed, we had known the same exact Patricia – me in Afghanistan in second grade, and Emily in Kenya in fourth grade!
Every now and then through the years after that, Emily and I would tell people our crazy tale of knowing the same girl on two continents long before we had met each other. The story came up again at Christmas this last year, and our girls encouraged us to find this famous Patricia. We had searched before, but there are a few Patricia Novellis out there, and 40+ years can make you question every possibility. But this time Kendra did more sleuthing and finally we knew we had the right Patricia. There she was - the same bright eyes, big smile, and yes, red hair.
Emily and I sent Patricia a message explaining that we not only both knew her, but that we ourselves had met in college and had married brothers! Off the message went accompanied with a picture of us. We didn’t have to wait long before the reply, “Oh my word!!! This has made me skip a heartbeat…and to believe you are now sisters in law…this has literally made my day…no, my year!”
This was followed by a flurry of “remember when…?”, pictures, and a phone call. Seeing that same picture that had confirmed her identity all those years ago was especially meaningful to Patricia since the crocheting she had learned in Brownies has been one of the few constants in her life through its ups and downs.
We were able to put the pieces together – Our family had to leave shortly before the Soviet invasion in 1979, and Patricia’s family had been evacuated by the UN for whom they worked a few months after the invasion. Both our families went straight to Africa – ours to Sierra Leone and hers to Kenya where she had met Emily. Both of us had stayed in Africa for only one year and then moved back to our “home” countries – she to Italy and me to America where we found ourselves not exactly fitting in. Then it was one last move to round of our childhoods – she to England and me to Pakistan.
Now a few months after reconnecting, Emily has just visited Patricia this summer in England, and Patricia hopes to visit us both in the U.S. next summer!
But our connection is not just about discovering long-lost friends and being the “coincidence ladies” as Patricia’s son calls us; there is something more there. We three are far-flung pieces of a puzzle, collected and connected over continents and decades, completing a unique and special picture of our childhoods.
I don’t know anyone else in the international community born and raised in Kabul. I don’t know another who only saw Afghanistan through the rosy glow of childhood until its bewildering descent into relentless war. I don’t know any other little girl who watched Afghanistan slip into a memory through a window on a plane bound for rocky adjustments in Africa as we tried to sort out in our minds and hearts what had just happened to us.
It was Emily’s warm welcome to Kenya that Patricia remembers “with huge fondness”, a comforting balm that helped her through the upheaval of the move and that inspired her to search for Emily several times in the following years to no avail. Years later it was Emily’s enthusiastic friendship and understanding of moving back to the States from Kenya that helped me through the struggle of moving from the edge of war in Pakistan to the edge of a wheat field in Kansas.
When you’ve lived a globe-trotting childhood, few are those who understand your experiences and share your memories. Few and rare and beautiful.