Two years ago, I chose to leave the country and study abroad. I stationed myself in Sagunto, Spain. Whenever I got the chance, I was able to take a backpack and travel quite an amount of Western Europe. And let me tell you, that year ruined any desire for idleness in me. Because of it, I find myself in an incurable wanderlust.
It is a state of mind that I do not want to leave, that I dare not leave. Because of it, I want to keep going to places I have never been before. I want to see things I have never seen before, taste things I have never tasted before, meet people I have never met before, feel things I have never felt before and be someone I have never been before. I want to somehow find a way to gain the entire world, whilst still able to keep my soul.
I want the things I see and do to keep strengthening my soul—because whatever that means, Lord knows that it happened this past year. I crave to see different lives occurring around me for the sake feeling alive. I want to explore for the sake of discovering new freedoms—because this life was not meant for us to stand still.
When I am asked how my year abroad was, I find myself either at a loss for words or lacking in the correct ones. I can see how that can confuse an audience. Sometimes the people around you won’t understand your journey. They don’t need to, it’s not for them.
They tell you time and time again how difficult it is adjusting back to the life you had before you went so far from home. It’s called “reverse culture shock” and it sucks. You arrive back in the motherland; you’ve said your bittersweet goodbyes to the country you’ve called home for the past year. It’ll hit you a little on the plane, but not nearly as hard as when you’ve finished completely unpacking and then make the mistake of beginning to go through pictures.
I remember touching down at my home airport and thinking, "finally." I got back, had all the food I’d been missing for months, saw family and a few friends and told them stories here and there. Then, I had to take a look at the two large pieces of luggage, a backpacking backpack and a ukulele case sitting on my room floor waiting to be unpacked. I could blame it on jet lag fatigue or laziness, or both, but in all honesty, I just didn’t want to move on just yet.
It’s a terrible feeling, having to adjust back to home, a concept that is usually in reverse. You forget that life has actually gone on without you and things have occurred in the lives of people around you—it’s not just you that’s changed. However, the crazy thing is that everything is somehow the same amidst all its differences, and it may just be you that has changed the most.
For quite some time, you have had to force yourself to make comfort in discomfort. In that, you have made a life in a foreign world. You will also have become so invested in it, that a home stability will pale in comparison to the adventures you have had and still want to have.
“I am not the same having seen the moon shine on the other side of the world." --Mary Anne Radmacher
And I don’t want to be.
