One Week

Yesterday we had our first classmate leave for home. It’s really incredible how quickly I went from seeing him every day, traveling with him, and then all of a sudden he’s gone. Before he left, we all took turns going around the table, talking about the many memories we had made together, and some of our favorite moments. The whole thing was a great send off, in my view, and at least two people cried. It’s all a little heartbreaking, especially since I know this will be happening with everyone in our program in exactly a week from today! Ugh, it’s so strange and so real to think about.

Over this next week, we have a lot to do in relation to getting school work done (final papers, reflections, journals, etc.) But we also have a lot to do to prep for returning home! Whether it be cleaning our apartment to get ready for the people for next semester, having our final goodbye dinner with all the professors, or writing thank you notes for everyone (including my internship supervisors), I can already tell it’s going to be an emotional week. But it’s also a great week for looking back on everything that I’ve done, everything I’ve seen, and everything I’ve experienced since that first fateful day in September when I arrived in Dublin. There’s so much that has happened, and so many ways in which I feel my perspective on myself and on the world has been irrevocably changed. In a good way, of course.

I feel like I have realized that I had strength within me that I had never recognized (or had to recognize) until I found myself in a foreign country, with complete strangers, and having to find my way and build myself a life here. I have travelled to Scotland, Britain, Spain, Holland, and Northern Ireland in the past three months, and many other cities within Ireland itself. Not only has this made me more comfortable in airports and in travelling as a whole, but it also has shown me that I truly enjoy travelling and building memories with friends through new experiences. It’s easy to go off on your own sometimes, but it’s not always as easy to rely on others to help you our when you need it and to teach you new things about new places, which is why I have enjoyed absolutely every one of the things I have done with my friends here. I truly believe that the people that I have met and the places I have been to have led me to where I am now and have pushed me to grow in so many amazing, wonderful ways.

As they say, no regrets.