Walking the Line

Most times, coming back is harder than going there. For me, it's always been harder to come back than it has been to go. Leaving to go somewhere new is exciting and fun. It's better than pretty much anything else in the world for me. That excitement, the idea that you never know what is waiting for you, that ANYTHING could happen, is my favorite drug. I will lay in my bed, inventing story after story of what could happen, what would be crazy and fun and wild. I know, in the back of my mind, that it will never be the way I think it's going to be. But I don't really care. Because it is so fun to imagine, to think about the unexpected.

I left Paris on the first of September. I didn't even let myself think about what was waiting for me when I got back here because I couldn't handle the idea that my life would have gaping unfilled holes- that my old friends had graduated and my new friends would be far away. My family... My family has been over 2,000 miles away from me for the last 3 and a half years. But they were in the same country. And I could call my mom anytime I wanted to for the first two years I was in college. Even in Paris, because of my parent's good long distance plan, we would talk every Sunday evening. My family is in Italy. I haven't talked to them on the phone in more than two weeks. I know I'm supposed to be a grown-up. I'm 21 years old, about to report for jury duty. I can drink, smoke, buy porn, enlist, vote and all the other things that you can do when you're an adult. I've had a bank account in two countries. I have a social security number in the US, Spain, France, and Italy. I am supposed to be an adult. But I really just miss my mom.

I also spent the last few months head over heels in love. I have several gaping holes. Parts missing from my life. And everywhere I see signs that say that I should live life to the fullest! Do everything now! You never know when you're going to die... or the world will end! Well. If there's a future, I need to graduate from college and get a good job. If there's not a future, what the fuck am I doing, freezing in Massachusetts isolated from my family and my boyfriend?

It's not really about that. Missing everyone is a huge part of why I am feeling down. It's also about feeling really lame a lot of the time. Feeling like I don't know how to do this whole college thing. Feeling like I'll never really know what it is that I want to do. Feeling like no language is mine, no country is mine, no experience is mine. I cry a lot for no particular reason because I am tired and more than a little isolated. I miss every person I've ever had to leave. I miss my parents and my little brother. I miss Edouard.

I don't feel comfortable here. I feel like a foreigner, I feel judged, and I don't really know how to talk to people here.

Culture Shock blows.