Hello Goodbye

I’m really bad at goodbyes. I’ve been putting off a final blog post because it’s one more thing that tells me my time is done here in London this semester. Of all the preparation and things that I planned for before studying abroad, somehow saying goodbye to the friends I’ve made was just not something I thought about doing. I didn’t expect to feel so much like I’ve settled into a home and a family. Tearing myself away from that is really difficult.

Today I checked out of Nido Spitalfields, which has truly felt like home these past four months. I am spending another 10 days or so traveling, so a post-departure blog post will have to wait a bit. But the great thing is that I don’t have to say goodbye just yet to London. It is still an end that I don’t quite want to face though; the end of an experience that I’ve come to believe is the best decision I’ve ever made for myself. People always use the term “life-changing,” but that seems so casually used, so obvious! Of course your life is going to change with each new experience you have! But I would say it’s been person-changing. I do feel like a different person from the one that stepped off the plane at Heathrow in January, a better person. Though I’m devastated to let this experience end, I am also going to be so happy to be home, and I’ve never felt so blessed to feel that torn between two places I love so much.

We ended our time as IES students the other day with a farewell event at the Waldorf Hilton for high tea, which was just so absurdly swanky and British. But in all seriousness, while I sat there something big hit me: I felt like I had been waiting my entire life to be sitting right there at high tea. In my first blog post, I talked about my little-girl dreams of London, and in that moment I felt like I had finally made it. And more, I’ve made it home.