Four Weeks and Counting

Well Friends,

Spain is awaiting my arrival. In exactly one month from today I will be boarding the steel bird for my trip to the land of legalized marijuana. Oh, and then Spain too. I can honestly say for the first time that I am EXCITED.

Up until my drive home from school last night I could only see what I would be leaving at SNC and at home while I was away. I will be missing my sisters, my parents, my brother, my friends, my room, my stuff, English. I won't get to celebrate my brother's birthday, the thrill of recruitment, watching my sisters grow into their place in the sorority. I'll miss dances and parties, an Ugly pageant, an Ugly picking, initiation and other sorority celebrations. I won't get to celebrate Easter with my family or be fully initiated into American culture for my 21st birthday. All of this and more had me dreading my departure. But now, I am only thinking about the great things that everyone in the States will be missing while I'm in Spain:

Living in a city that is more than 500 years old, traveling to a new city or country every weekend, becoming fluent in a new language in the land where it originated in. Celebrating Easter and my 21st birthday with the Popa en Roma! Living with a new family. learning about he world, actually living in it! Toledo, Madrid, Sevilla, Barcelona, Granada, Florence, Rome, Amsterdam, Valencia, London, hmmm, where else could I visit? There are museums to visit, streets to explore, tapas to taste, new friends to meet and serious adventures to be had.

I won't lie, I'm TERRIFIED to leave. I don't speak Spanish well. The closest I've come to international travel is Mexico. I've never been away from home for more than 10 days. I am not the best at meeting new people. I'm shy. I tend not to know what to say in 75% of social settings and am pretty sure that will only get worse when I have to do it in a foreign language. I follow the rules a little too much most of the time. I don't know anything about Spain and will probably be a 'dumb American' for the better part of my time there.

But WHO CARES! I am going to Spain. I am finally starting to grow up and live the life that I grew up wanting. Saint Norbert is a great place, but let's be real, life is just beginning. There's a world outside of Wisconsin and it's about damn time I start living in it!!