I sit here in the petite kitchen of my 8th arrondissement apartment eating a 2 minute dinner, drinking a glass of cheap red wine, and reading
Le Deuxieme Sexe by Simone de Beauvoir. As I sit, I start to contemplate the last 4 months: Living in a foreign country, learning a new language, separating myself from everything that I knew and took comfort in. Learning what it means to be on my own all over again. I feel good when I think about it. I feel content when I look back. But now is a time for changing, and I must look forward as well. What is to come? I have plans but no definite answers. Only time will tell whether my assumptions will prove correct. Will I be as content looking back 4 months from now as I am right now?
I hope so.
Being abroad for 4 months, I didn't realize how much I missed my hometown. But oh how the memories of the first 18 years of my life came flooding back as I drove through town for the first time since January. When I left there was snow on the ground, now the grass is green and summer is edging its way in. The smell of the grass and the wild flowers and the dirt being churned by tractors, the smell of diesel engines and river water remind me of what it was like to be a kid when Beaver Crossing was my world and I knew nothing of what lay beyond. No New York City. No Washington DC. No Paris. Driving thirty minutes to Lincoln was a big day and visiting family an hour and a half west was a vacation. It feels good to remember the innocent child I used to be when I played on the streets of this town. Oh Beaver Crossing, how I missed you!
