I’ve realized that the amount I write is inversely proportional to how exciting my life is. I haven’t been keeping up with this blog lately because my life’s been a fast-paced confusing whirlwind for the past few weeks. My… er…. gentleman caller is back in college in Worcester, so I’ve been trying to balance seeing him, spending enough time with my family, working/babysitting, and getting everything ready for my trip to Vietnam and China. I feel so unprepared to leave, which is odd because I’ve been getting the paperwork ready for months. Every time I try to pack I feel a tightness in my chest and it becomes hard to breathe. You might think I’m exaggerating, but it’s true. Yesterday I went food shopping with my mom and I kept running “errands” in the store so that she wouldn’t see my eyes welling up with tears. I don’t know what is wrong with me! I can’t complain, especially not to my mom, because I’m the one who made all these decisions to live far away for three months (far away? almost as far away as one can go without leaving this planet.) Also, even though she denies it, I feel like I’m a financial burden on my mother. Well, I know I am a strain on her pocketbook, so to speak, but she doesn’t like it when I call myself a “burden.” Ugh. I know everyone is sad to see me go and it pains me to see them that way. I think my mom is going to drive me to Logan Airport by herself on Friday because my sister has volleyball practice. That’s going to be really tough to say goodbye to her. I really hope we don’t cry, but I don’t know if I can resist. I can already feel the tears right now!
I never thought I would be this worked up about leaving. Part of it is definitely saying goodbye to Andrew (fine, I guess I can admit that he’s my boyfriend.) I’m not so upset about leaving my friends because I know that we’ll stay close even though the distance is large. It’s a lot tougher to leave my sister, Molly, because she doesn’t like talking on the phone. Today she said she would be too busy with her school work to talk to me in China, which made me feel bad, but my mom said Molly just acts like she doesn’t care to cope with the fact that she’ll miss me. I just feel horrible, like I’m burdening everyone else so that I can have a good time abroad…. and I feel even worse now that I’m worried whether I’ll actually have a good time!
The rational part of me says it’s silly to worry about having fun in China – of course I will! I made at least 3 lifelong friends last time, even though I had pictured myself sitting alone studying characters pre-departure. The more pessimistic, cynical side of my rationality says that I might possibly be very lonely – this study abroad program has only 24 students unlike last time’s over 100, so making friends might be harder and getting sick of people easier. On the other hand, I’m already sort of friendly with a few people in the group. My optimistic side is thinking of the bar / club scene in Beijing, and my pessimistic side reminds me that I shouldn’t spend so much money on cover charges this time.
I just put on Space Oddity and my cat is jammin out with me. This is great. I’m going to miss her too!
