Four years ago, I wrote this post while I procrastinated packing for my first year in Spain.  If you read the post, you can read between the lines (or not between the lines- very obviously) that I was nervous and worried and excited about my impending trip to Spain.  That post feels like a long time ago, and to be exact, it was written almost exactly four years ago.  It not only feels like a long time in terms of time, but it feels like miles and worlds and hours away from who I was in that moment.  Things feel different now, but they feel different in a good way.  Four years later and I am not scared to be heading back to Madrid to start, what is now, the beginning of my FIFTH year in Spain.  If you took me back to that lonely moment on September 6, 2015, I would have never guessed in a million years that I would be writing this post later down the line, and if you told my parents that I would be writing this post down the line, maybe they would have never let me go.  Over 4 years later and things are so different- I am typing this from my kitchen waiting to get ready to go to the airport. I just had a big waffle breakfast (per my request) with my parents, my Mom’s friend, Jean, Teddy, and Jean’s dog-Auggie.  Everyone is out, but my Mom is upstairs, Teddy is asleep in the dog bed on the floor, there is someone outside mowing the lawn, all of the windows are open and the light and air and breeze are streaming in.  I do feel sad on some level about going back- my parents asked me if I was excited- but excited isn’t really the word.  These past 6 weeks have been really great (even Santiago, but I am so glad that’s over), and like my Mom said, I am unbelievably lucky to be able to have a summer where I wake up and go for runs or long walks with my parents, spend the day by the pool, or reading, or doing what I want, and then end the day with a home-cooked meal around the table with my family.  If you ask me where in the world I feel 100% ME, I would tell you in my kitchen.  But real life is not waking up whenever I want, swimming, seeing friends, and just hanging out.  This is one of the best parts of my life, but I have another life too, and although I feel sad about it, it’s time to go back and get to it and to start living that other life that I have created.  So… here’s to the fifth year!

I’ll be back next week with some other thoughts on going back to Spain.