LitPick Review
Terry A. Repak’s Circling Home: What I Learned by Living Elsewhere engages the reader through her unique memoir as a mother of two young children who travels with Stefan, her husband and CDC epidemiologist, to Abidjan, Ivory Coast in West Africa. After living in Africa until the age of six with his refugee Polish parents, Stefan fulfills his dream of helping people during the AIDS crisis in the early nineties. Terry decides to put her writing career on hold to care for her newly adopted young daughter and accompany Stefan as he works for the CDC. After a hard year adjusting to the food and climate, Terry finds herself and her family thriving in relationships and confidence. She deepens her experience with a French class amid political uprisings against foreigners in Africa, followed by trips to France, Uganda, Ghana, and Nigeria. After many years in Abidjan, Terry and her family return home to the United States and settle in Atlanta, Georgia as Stefan continues to work for the CDC. Both of Terry’s children experience some challenges adjusting to life in America after growing up in Africa. The family enjoys reconnecting with their extended family while living in Atlanta until Stefan accepts a position for the CDC AIDS program in Tanzania. Terry navigates the teenage years of her children. She travels to Madagascar which leads to writing a monthly column profiling the lives of people living in Tanzania with HIV. She summits the mountains of Meru and Kilimanjaro, developing friendships with several women. The family returns home to Atlanta for a short season before Stefan accepts a position with the WHO in Geneva, Switzerland. Terry’s discovers free time as her children are now grown and beginning their adult journeys. The majestic views of lakes and mountains provide a change for Terry as she is no longer busy caring for young children. She enjoys many hikes and travels to Israel. Stefan takes a job for a University in Seattle, and Stefan and Terry settle in the peaceful city. Terry teaches English to English Language Learners and focuses on writing books. She continues her love of hiking with Mount Rainier. Circling Home exemplifies the genres of memoir, travel, and adventure.
Opinion:
Terry A. Repak’ Circling Home: What I Learned by Living Elsewhere is narrated in first person language. This narration provides a deep sense of the personal challenges and joys of traveling through Africa, America, Europe, and the Middle East. The various travel settings are anchored by the AIDS, HIV, and Hepatitis public health crises supported by the work of the CDC and the WHO. Furthermore, Terry’s first hand recollection provides a unique perspective to these health matters as she develops long lasting relationships with the people in each community she encounters. The theme of relationships and the ever-changing ebb and flow of those relationships provide a sense of maturity as Terry navigates life. Her maturity is solidified as her children grow. The challenges of moving her children to different continents and supporting an adopted child’s need for identity and control are mainstays to a sense growth in motherhood. Also woven into her friendships, travel, and immediate family, are the relationships and changes with her extended family back in America. There is constant pull for Terry to emotionally support her family in the US while also focusing on her present life and travels. Terry is able to move from her professional career to raising her family, to engaging with cultures, to writing, to vast travel, and to hiking amazing mountains in her fascinating memoir. Circling Home is a relatable journey for new mothers, experienced mothers, adventurers, travelers, mountain enthusiasts, history buffs of Africa, and students of public health.
