This year, I'm going to have a weird birthday and some bittersweet goodbyes
So, it's the big 2-1 for me tomorrow! I can finally go to Vegas like I've always wanted to (well at least since 2009 when The Hangover came out). This brings me to a point of reflection on the year.....And I guess I'm paying slightly greater attention to the past 5 months. I'm certain that I've experienced the highest of highs and the lowest of lows (thus far) in my life the past 365 days. After spending last summer working full-time, taking summer school, and being at the hospital for all the time in-between, I was feeling pretty beat-up. Then the bleak idea of giving up my apartment and spending the next few months commuting, had my family, friends, and coworkers solely keeping my spirits up (special shout-out to my dad for doing virtually anything he physically could to make the transition to commuting easier). And looking forward to leaving for my adventure, of course. Which leads me to the highs.....
Like how I was telling a friend here about Southside the other day and just talking about it gave me butterflies and goosebumps and the whole bit. Or remembering basically the whole month of May (from leaving Sweden, hanging out with Ian in Stuttgart, experiencing Köln and Düsseldorf with the drupa team, one unfathomable night in München, and then embarking on the great Italian adventure at the end of the month) was like a dream.
Sometimes I just can't believe this is my life. My life here is ridiculous. Last night I was at a party between and in abandoned train carts. Like, WHAT!? Me and my friends are always casually comparing travel stories and I step back and think...is this real life? At times it really is like a fairy tale storybook. Or at least a 3 minute long Taylor Swift song. I've had so many "pinch me" moments. What I'm trying to say is I do a lot of happy dances when I'm alone in my flat, okay!?
I know moving back to Canada is going to feel surreal and hit me like a ton of bricks. I absolutely love my life here but, I mean, I do miss home. I miss my family and the buzz of the city and specific foods and my bed and rooftops and driving and basically every person/thing that I don't have with me here. But knowing that everything is waiting upon my arrival back home makes it so much easier to be away from. I know I'll be back soon. When I almost started to feel homesick it quickly became excitement to go home mixed with the sadness of leaving Germany. I just started to take in that I won't see some of these places as they are now, ever again. This goodbye has a more permanent, indefinite quality to it.
I knew it was going to be bittersweet to say goodbye, but I wasn't prepared for it to be more bitter than sweet. From now on I'm in uncharted territory. I don't know how to say goodbye to a place I call home, without knowing if I'll ever come back.
Before this exchange I thought I would be happy staying in Toronto for the rest of my life. And after all of my travels over the past 5 months, yeah, I have to say that I'm still madly in love with Toronto...but there's so much more world out there. There's no way I'd be content staying stuck in the same city I was born in for my whole life. I never thought I would be suffocated by the thought of staying in Toronto.
Although I wasn't with my family this weekend, not being with them for a (not so) random date in July was definitely worth the past 5 months and the month I still have ahead of me. So cheers to the next 21 years. Life is crazy. Where the fuck will I be next year, let alone 21 more years from now.....
So yeah anyways, tomorrow's my birthday and I feel all weird about it. Birthdays are weird. Goodbyes are weird. Life is weird. And also amazing. That's what makes it interesting, I guess. I hope I always think my life is amazing. Maybe one day I'll even be okay with goodbyes, too.
2087
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