Africa Post 2: Nostalgia for the Familiar, Urge for the Foreign

When I person is preparing to leave a place I believe they go through two main stages of emotion; excitement and fear. If you're me, you experience both of these stages daily and they change by the minute. In the past few weeks I've celebrated graduations, weddings, all a wonderful reminder of the things I am grateful for in life, but they also remind me that time is passing quickly.

It's a bit pretentious to treat this endeavor as a life-altering experience before it happens. It's a bit pretentious to write a blog like this as though I have some meaningful insight into how the world works because I took one trip outside of the United States midwest. I am discovering more and more that I am just an almost-twenty year old girl with an open heart, willing hands, and a journal. So rather than treat this as an area of sharing my 'expertise', I hope this becomes a place where I can share my experience so I don't become one of those broken records reciting, "this one time when I was in Africa". It also insures that I document this trip for personal and professional (hah, I wish) purposes. 

Therefore, I must be honest and say that although I am incredibly blessed with this opportunity to accomplish one of the biggest items on my bucket list, it is not as easy emotionally as I assumed it would be. I had expected the logistics to be the most difficult part, yet those just seemed to fall into place. That's kind of the story of my life, though. For the moment I seem to have everything figured out. There are so many wonderful things going on right here, it's hard to leave knowing that when I return things will not be the same. The idea of opening up my world to new sights and ideas that may change everything is absolutely terrifying, but it's also the reason why this is so exciting. 

Change is not bad, in fact in most of my experiences, change has been very, very good. The apprehension I feel is very similar to what I felt after graduating high school. As I completed my first year and returned home for my last summer, I can't help but notice that things have changed. Maybe more obviously, people have changed. But there is no way I should be surprised or upset, because I have changed too. I was comfortable in my circle of friends, school, and community, but I would not be content had I stayed here. College has challenged me in many different ways. It has made me grow and develop as a person. Hopefully a better one.

Even though some things are different, the core values of the people I love are still the same. Despite different journeys we are embarking on, I still feel at home in the presence of people who care about me. Knowing that this is the last time that most of these people will be in the same area is probably what makes it so hard to leave. Yet in the right perspective, I see it as an opportunity to have a piece of home in Oklahoma City, Chicago, Minneapolis, Jacksonville, Santa-Barbara, Ames, St. Louis, Uganda, and more. Family and friends are what makes a home, not the physical space they occupy.

As I type out and come to terms with my anxieties surrounding this adventure, I find it much easier to focus on the task ahead of me. I realize this bit of fear means that I am pursuing something worthwhile. So I guess this means I'm excited again.