They say when you get home is when it first hits you, all that you have seen and experienced. I hope that's true... of course I don't know if I could handle it. It may completely knock me over.
Here's a pic of the door at home where Mom has been sticking all of my postcards from the last year:
There are only a few missing since I'd gone to a few more places since she took this pic... and Luxembourg may never make it up there since I lost the postcard somewhere. Oh well. Maybe I'll make my own postcard from a picture I took, lol...It's going to be sad coming home. It's a lot of work, a lot of change... moving. I have a feeling that moving back home will be more of a shock to me than moving here. I am going to have to leave all of my friends I met here... Rike, Jenny, the Annas, Liane, Julia, Lea the Aussie... and so many more. Fortunately enough I have all of these memories to take with me. All of my friends, all of my experiences here have made this trip unforgettable!
I hope I can just fall back into my other life. Yeah, my other life. If I can just go back to it as the other me, that is, as soon as I set foot in the United States, my home, something will change inside to make me not forget everything that happened in Europe, not forget everyone I met, no... but change to where I can keep the experiences isolated somehow. Of course I want to use the knowledge and experience gained here in my "other" life as well, but I just think trying to hold on to too much of "this" life will make things unnecessarily painful in the "other" one. I'm just scared of how the person I've become will fit back into the life that has changed, as I have changed since I've been away.
So I guess it'll be like coming here... just doing it. Just jumping in and moving forward each day, hopefully not falling down, hopefully not skinning my knees up too badly. And as time goes by, things will be ok.
Cheers,
Cait
P.S. I got new shoes yesterday and I painted my toenails for the first time since I've been here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
