I am writing
this as I wait for the boarding of my 10-hour flight to Amsterdam. Which is a
connecting flight to Vienna. From where I will take a 6-hour bus ride to
Zagreb. And then a 7-hour ride to Mostar. Home. For a seemingly never-ending
trip, home must be worth the effort. Without a doubt it is.
Though I am a
little conflicted, because home feels a bit foreign. I actually wouldn’t know
yet. I have not made it back; I just went away… Now is a time to come back, and
it already feels so foreign. The people are home wherever they are, I know
that. My mom’s hug will heal every wound from the ups and downs of this
turbulent semester, but will I be an outsider walking through the very streets
I grew up in? What if my favorite barista doesn’t recognize me anymore?
My mom sent me a picture of my room yesterday,
and it felt like I was there a lifetime ago. My uncomfortable dorm bed became
the place I lay with my worries and dreams at the end of the day. I read
somewhere it takes the human body seven to ten years to regenerate all its
cells; I wonder how much time needs to pass before a bed forgets the person
that used to indent it every night, and just goes back to a flat surface. I’ve
found comfort in so many small and wonderful things at college, like cookies for
lunch, or a sunny Portland day, or in big friendships. It’s my first time
moving, so maybe this always happens.
Is my college
experiencing just a connecting flight in the grand scheme of things? And home
is just the origin airport. So where am I headed? How many concepts of home
will I change before I decide – this is it. I don’t have a strong message for
you today. Just a lot of rambling. I guess that happens when you are running on
0 hours of sleep. I’m trying to beat jet lag by sleeping through my flight. I’m
just a girl afraid of growing up honestly, and letting go of home as the one
and only version of home has been the strangest component of growing up yet. Home might just be something safe and fami
