The email finally arrived. Paris, November 2004. The familiar beep caught my attention and a swift alt+tab led me directly into Outlook. This was the email I had been waiting for during the previous couple of weeks. The sender, a French Professor from Ecole Polytechnique with whom I had discussed the possibility of doing my research internship in the US. He had sent an email to a colleague in Pittsburg and the American guy was willing to accept me. No funding was offered, so it would be kind of an unconventional bet, but still there it was: my first opportunity to go to the US. My heart skipped a beat. A dream was in the making, it was no longer that far away, no longer science-fiction. I thought of my first day of university in Madrid, of how I took the “cercanias” train that morning, and of the long and winding road that started in Aranjuez and led to Carnegie Mellon. Minutes later, the chill was still there, running up and down my spine. Those are the moments that can change a life. A couple of months later, the offer from Hopkins would arrive and this episode would become little more than an anecdote. Still, it left an everlasting impression in my heart.

I remember that I felt a little bit overwhelmed at the time, so I decided to lie down on my bed and relax listening to some music. Springsteen felt just right. I threw in a dvd from his concert in Barcelona and this song came up: “The Promised Land”. Beautiful coincidences. My mind started to wander away, I thought of how different this music would sound if I finally made it to the US, wondered if sometime into the future a different me, made to evolve by the whims of destiny, would indeed experience the song in a more authentic, a more genuine way. The coin was tossed and life brought me here, to Baltimore. Today, when I listen to this song, I can’t help thinking about that good old chap, lying stupefied on his bed, both innocent and brave enough to dream. His heart had skipped a beat.

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