A better mindframe

Okay so let’s be honest, whenever I talk to a friend about how I occasionally miss home and that I sometimes get bored, I am oftentimes abruptly cut off with  responses along the lines of ” You’re living in the South of France for a year, don’t complain”…. why yes I am aware of my geographical location thank you very much, however, this past month has definitely been the hardest month for me during this period abroad.

” Dear Eileen, … I often question myself why and what am I doing here. At least once or twice a day I wonder wwwwwwhy the hell am I in another country where they don’t speak English, where they sneeze into their hands( which I find 10000% disgusting) -as I write that my classmate literally just sneezed into their hands eww!!- and where eating horse, snails and other godforsaken insects of the sea are perfectly acceptable”

That was an excerpt, written about a week prior, from a letter I hadn’t yet addressed and I am so glad that I waited before writing this blog considering that now I’ve had to reflect and that i’m in a better mind frame. I think I had started to become bored as the newness had worn off and I was still in touch with my best friends via group chat and hearing about how they’re all getting accepted into universities, and also how other exchange student’s families were visiting them and I was getting sick of French. But honestly I wouldn’t want to be in any other place right now at this point in my life.

I have an aaammmmazing second host family, I can actually converse with people, I can watch the sunrise every morning with palm trees seen from my loft space, I have the cutest dog, I’m learning something new and I’m doing all of this while I am barely 18 years old. An old soul once told me ” really, what is one year in your entire lifetime, il faut profiter maintenant” and those words really put life into perspective because really.. it is ONLY one year that I have to be here with these oppourtunities. Once I leave, even if I come back nothing will be the same. I won’t go to school and catch the bus with all my friends, no more soirees, and I’ll just be a visitor, not an inhabitant.

And so it’s for these revelations I need to realize that every day is an amazing gift. I can do anything, I can change a life and I. simply. can. I am so gratefully, and truly happy. I still have a lot of learning to do in my last 5ish months but who I am becoming is slowly shaping up and I like what I see.