I've still been writing - pages and pages in my journal filled with memories, conclusions (finally!), ponderings, revelations. I've finally figured out a lot of things about the kind of person I want to be and the kind of life I want to be. And I'm more at peace with myself than I have been in about two years. It's a great feeling.
That said (and done), I leave all this to go back to the good ol' USofA in less than 48 hours. Incredible. It flew by.
I'm done here. What an ... amazingbewilderingexcitingdepressing thing.
Home has been calling to me. The world has not stopped turning with my absence. I've been searching for summer jobs, figuring out housing for next year, applying for financial aid, registering for classes... It's so surreal to have been dealing with all of these more or less mundane things while I've been writing papers for my tutor at Oxford University, catching flights to France, etc.
Surreal is most definitely my word of choice for describing all this. It still doesn't seem real.
I have a life to return to and build, revelations and personal decisions to now put into practice. And I'm incredibly excited to do so.
But.
It's incredibly saddening to think that tomorrow is my last full day living here, to think that I will no longer wake up to my flatmates bustling about in the kitchen, to think that I will no longer have to wait 7 hours for one load of laundry, to think that I will no longer admire the Thames on my walk to the city centre, to think that I will no longer go to Sainsbury's for crumpets, chocolate bars, clementines, and 3 for 4 orange juice specials, to think that I will no longer walk up and down Cornmarket Street listening to the musicians strewn about and watching the man play his violin as he balances on a bike atop a tightrope, to think that I will no longer be able to stand in line at Moo-moo's debating over what flavor milkshake to purchase, to think that I will no longer come home and make dinner with my flatmates, to think that I will no longer be able to go to the Red Lion (a pub) with my friends, three of us sharing a pitcher of some ridiculously fruity drink, to think that I will no longer be sleeping without a top sheet, to think that all these small details that have composed my life for the last three and a half months will now be a thing of the past.
Beyond the schooling process (of which, in retrospect, I've grown rather fond), I'll miss the life I've built here. It was a life. This place has become home, a place I call my own. And I'm leaving it soon.
Back to reality, I suppose.
Bittersweet.
