Dinner consisted of freshly-roasted peppers and eggplant dip, but I only ate to get to dessert. Still with a mouthful of food, I sprinted out the house toward the ancient apricot tree firmly rooted in front of my grandparents' Romanian country home. My eyes hungrily searched the highest branches, finally resting upon a plump, ripe apricot, ready to burst into my salivating mouth. While my grandmother was harvesting fresh mint for lemonade, I utilized the unsupervised freedom to climb the...

“Click click, click click.” The radio was hardly audible, but the signal light continued to flash as I sat through the most painful and eternal red light of my life. My stomach churned as I realized I had forgotten how to form words in Romanian, the only language my mother truly understands, and furthermore, I didn’t possess coherent thoughts to form them. The red light finally changed and my foot instinctively released the brake pedal. Years upon years of...