I had been looking forwad to this trip for months.  The months had dwindled, and found me here, on an airplane heading straight for the city that I had longed for since high school:  Taipei. 

The sights, the smells, the people.  I had been dreaming of this since before I had settled down and had children.  I had talked to Jordan, my husband of twenty years, and explained to him the nature of this longing of adventure and new experiences. 

It had originally been a family vacation, but Jordan's boss had called him back to camp for an extra two weeks, and Lorelei and Eleandra, my 18 year old twin girls, had been invited to their friend's cabin out by the lake for spring break.  Jacob, age 16, and Davin, age 15, had a Scout camp that they didn't want to miss - apparently the Girl Guides were going to be camping with them - and Kendra, age 14, and Cora, age 13, were going to the camp as well.

My preteen boys - Cody, age 12, Calvin, age 10 and Garrity, age 9 - were staying at my sister-in-law's house with their cousins.

My youngest children - Sarah, age 8, Mathew, age 7 and Colette, at the tender age of five - were staying with my brother, his wife and their six kids on the farm.

I know that a brood of twelve kids might seem a little much, but I had always wanted a large family, and so did Jordan.  And money wasn't as tight as you'd think; Jordan was a chemical engineer as well as a mining technitian in the oil field, and I was a chemistry teacher at the local French Immersion high school where I had graduated.

And now, I was going to enjoy the remainder of the fifteen hour flight before exploring the one place on Earth where I could finally become myself again.. The "me" I had to leave behind twenty years ago.