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by Jennifer Erie (Author), Maria MacAndrew (Editor)
I followed the path I was told would lead to stability and purpose. I went to college and fought my way out of Queens, shaped by a first-generation American upbringing in a Haitian household led by a single mother who modeled resilience long before I had the language for it. I learned early how to survive, how to adapt, and how to find joy anyway on New York City streets and in dreaming beyond my zip code. That resilience carried me into a career in global diplomacy. I built a life serving on the frontlines of USAID and working across Africa and Southeast Asia to advance public health outcomes and resilience. For years, the vision was coming together. I finally reached the bridge to the life I had spent decades building. Then the bridge collapsed.
This is not a story about a single failure. It is a memoir of endurance inside systems that quietly work against the people who serve them. As a Black woman in the Foreign Service, I navigated global health crises, shrinking aid budgets, institutional burnout, and the unspoken costs of leadership. At the same time, I became a caregiver to my mother as she entered dementia, returning emotionally and physically to the role that first shaped me. I loved through pain, carried responsibility while depleted, and continued to lead even as grief took hold. It was an education in how grief, responsibility, and leadership coexist. But this is also a story about living. About friendship, laughter, late nights, music, and learning how to belong in places far from home. About falling in love along the way, and about discovering parts of myself that only emerged when I allowed joy to exist alongside duty. This book examines what happens when leadership demands certainty while life offers none. When diplomacy is dismantled. When careers fracture. When caregiving collides with duty. When the second act arrives without warning. It is also a story of movement, curiosity, and wonder. It is about learning cultures through food, language, rhythm, and people. It is about how travel can be both an escape and an education. And it is about discovering that while escape is an illusion, building a life of meaning and purpose is not.
This memoir is for:
- Women who refuse to be defined by where they come from or what the system predicts.
- First-generation Americans and children of immigrants carving their own paths.
- Young people navigating identity, ambition, and uncertain futures.
- Caregivers carrying loss while still being expected to perform.
- Travelers and the curious at heart who want to experience the beauty of cultures and glimpse the raw unscripted reality of life in the Foreign Service.
- Anyone seeking to understand the deep fulfillment of a life rooted in service, resilience, and purpose.
