This week has been a bad one. Like one of those weeks where it seems like no matter who you talk to, everyone is just not having it. This week concluded the first semester of my sophomore year, and my finals brought it all to a mediocre close.

It’s the same semester I jumped right off a plane from Japan where I spent my entire summer, and right into a new house off campus and straight into classes. Since last May, I have spent roughly 10 days total at home with my family, and two days after finals, I am getting on a plane to spend my entire winter break in Naples, Italy. I will return at midnight, the night before classes begin.

And this week really sucked.

The idea of not being home for so long began to weigh down on my shoulders. My dream of spending Christmas in Italy was suddenly becoming muddled with the lamest excuse: I was homesick. And that was coupled with being mad at how pathetic that I was for being too homesick to be excited for Christmas in Italy. It was a nauseating inception of emotions.

Today, however, I woke up knowing I would have one full day at home before I left for my trip. What I didn’t know, is that the day would be made up of a recipe; a crazy, confusing, sticky(?), perfect recipe.

My morning started with me, crouched like a dirty cave troll who’s allergic to sunlight in the corner of the couch. It was 9:30, so naturally I had just woken up. I was abruptly shaken out of my trash-person stupor when the front door flew open and my little brother ran straight into the kitchen, pulling out pots, pans and pasta.

Now a normal sister may wonder why her high school brother has come home in the middle of the day to, what looks like, frantically cook enough pasta to feed the entire Gay Man’s Chorus of San Francisco.

Well to be honest, I am a normal sister, but my brother isn’t quite in the same frame of mind. So I did the natural thing our relationship calls for and started helping him out. It turns out the reason for this pasta fiasco was so he could feed his entire class of 45 kids for their Christmas party. I worked alongside him silently (silently messing it all up but it’s the sentiment that counts), and come to the conclusion that the reason I’m so bitter and cold is because Tony took all the warmth and kindness from our genetic build up.

Excuses for our poor choices make the world go ‘round.

After that, I decided to get my life together externally (put on real people clothes) and go visit my mom at work. My mom is a full-day kindergarten teacher, and I thought I’d pay her a visit since I was still feeling guilty about abandoning her for the break. I thought I would just stop by, say hello, and then be on my way to run a few errands for my trip.

What a mistake this was.

I walked into the door of room 102 to find a woman who I’m sure was once my mother sitting at a way too small table, covered in Christmas ornaments, glitter, and germs, I presume. Children were running amuck, hands sticky, faces glistening with some unidentified bodily fluid. It was Christmas party day.

Immediately, Teacher Paula had me swept up into a slew of projects with the kids. Within minutes, I was painting noses red, putting reindeer ears on the heads of children, and rushing them down to a loaded, joy-filled assembly with the rest of the school. I looked to my mother, the educator, dancing down a student-made catwalk while sporting the ugliest Christmas outfit I’d ever seen, and to my sister, the future educator, elbow-deep in Elmer's glue, creating a giant paper tree in preparation for school’s beginning after winter break. I found myself feeling peaceful in all of this strange and confusing chaos, and hopeful that I may some day posses a power similar to that of putting a smile on young faces and knowledge in tiny little heads.

I left the building with red-painted fingers, glitter on my shoes, and frosting on my butt because I chose an unfortunate place to sit.

Pro tip: there is no safe place to sit in a kindergarten classroom.

Later this evening, I went over to my Aunt’s house where the entire family was waiting for me. They decided to host a “Christmas for Jacque” evening in which I opened gifts while we all sang along to the Michael Buble Christmas special. My two favorite things: me, and Michael Buble.

Dad was making Dad jokes, Auntie was making everyone eat way more than they were comfortable with, and the dog with the lazy eye was getting way too close to me and sparked my allergies to an unbearable point. Above all this, however, there was a slightly heavy feeling of sadness, mixed with excitement. My family was happy for me to be going on another adventure, and yet we all felt the gaps forming between the closeness we once had, and the ones that will never be completely filled again like they once were.

But the thing about this feeling is that it also feels okay. We grow up, we start to live, and the ones who lived for us have to let us go. And it’s also okay to miss home. It’s okay to be an adult for 75 straight days living and adventuring around Japan, and then come home and destroy the bathroom and eat all the chips like you did when you were 14. Most importantly, it’s okay to be sad, unsure, and nervous about all of this. As I’m sitting on my couch right now surrounded by the people I love most in this world, I know that everything will always, at the very least, be okay.

So tomorrow I’m getting on a plane to spend Christmas break in Italy, and my family will stay in Portland. I might shed a tear or two when I wake up on Christmas morning when I realize there aren’t four people wearing ridiculous pajamas waiting for me next to a fake tree (we keep it bougie).

I’ll get over that real quick, though, when I walk outside and realize “lol wait I’m in Italy suckers”

We all have days like today that come just in time to rescue us from the weeks that threaten to pull us under. My advice is to reflect upon these days through a writing, and then share it with your family in a very indirect and detached way (most likely Facebook) ...and then go to Italy for 20 days.