I'll be home for Christmas

"I'm dreaming tonight of a place I love, even more than I usually do.. And although I know it's a long road back, I promise you, I'll be home for Christmas. You can count on me. Please have snow and mistletoe and presents by the tree."

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There are 23 days until I go home for my winter break. Since the number 23 is my lucky number, I felt as though it is necessary to share my excitement for returning to the place I love most. I can say that now, you know, that Summersville is the place I love most. I've seen so many beautiful places, but for once in my life, I am able to say that my tiny town is where I would rather be.

No matter how far away you run, you'll always remember where you belong, and at the end of the day, it's important to know that it's okay to return to the place you started from. I've struggled with that concept my whole life. Growing up, I used to tell my mother how badly I wanted to get as far away from my hometown as possible and she always knew that one day I truly would. My life took me 4,345 miles before I realized that being in a town where everyone knows your name isn't so bad.

You are never aware of something's worth, until you don't have it anymore. I may not be cut out for the country life the way my family is, but this weekend during Thanksgiving, there is no place I would rather be than sitting in my grandmother's kitchen surrounded by food that she worked hard to prepare. Thanksgiving never meant much to me before now, but not being able to celebrate it made me remember everything that I loved most about it. The thing I love most about my grandmother is how soft her skin is. From all the Sunday's that I held her hand at church to the many times that I've kissed her cheek, her skin is what I think about when I try to paint a picture in my head of what Thanksgiving would be like from an outside perspective. That's what I'm doing. I'm on the outside looking in and as strange as you may find it to be, my grandmother's hands are what I remember most. They have prepared every Thanksgiving meal that I can think of, they've stirred mashed potatoes, set the table, and poured sweet tea into glass after glass for every dinner than I unknowingly took advantage of. I didn't realize just how much I would wish that I could hold my grandmother's hand as we prayed to bless the meal, or how much I wish I could take a slice of my mother's annual chocolate pie that I always hated. And as my eyes tear up thinking about how I can't race my brother to the dinner table, I understand what Thanksgiving was always meant to be about.

If you never get anything else out of these blogs, please listen to me when I tell you to enjoy what you have in your life. You may want more and it is okay to want more, but never for a second take for granted what you already have.

I haven't hugged my mother in 67 days. In over two months, I haven't seen my dogs, slept in my bed, seen my home, or laughed at my grandfather for watching reruns of Bonanza at a volume much louder than my grandmother would prefer. The day I left, I watched my grandfather cry more tears in 5 minutes that I had ever seen him cry in my entire life. He truly thought that in that moment, after I walked out the door, he may never have the chance to see me again. With his poor health, I came within inches of canceling everything and staying home. I even talked with my mother in a hospital parking garage a few weeks prior to my departure and asked her if I was about to make a mistake.

Leaving was not as easy as it may seem, but the reward has been worth the price. I'm 21 years old and have already lived a life beyond my wildest imagination. It's not every day that a girl from Summersville, Kentucky, a town with literally one gas station and no stoplights, has the ability to say that she followed her dream for 4,345 miles and never forgot how to find her way back. Someone told me a few weeks ago that my life should be a movie (probably one you'd find at the bottom of the 5 dollar movie bin at Walmart, but a movie nonetheless) and a part of me can agree to that. Movies are fictitious and usually have no grasp of realism... which is basically how I feel. None of this seems real to me, even after being here as long as I have been. I still feel like I'm going to wake up and the life I'm living will still be nothing more than an idea in my head.

My "little" brother and I circa Christmas 2010

I'm going home, my friends.
Before I confuse people, know that I'm not going to stay. I'm not leaving Spain early. I'm not dropping out. I'm not pregnant. I haven't been kicked out of my program, expelled from the university, or forced to leave my host family. My grades are perfect, my director's love me, and Granada is an overwhelmingly convenient place to live. The reason I'm going home is because I realized what is more important in my life... something much more valuable than my own dreams. . . . My family.

My grandfather has a countdown going. "Ca will be home in 25 days." "Ca only has 24 more days." "When Ca comes home I'll have to take her to get something good to eat." How could I ever choose to spend Christmas in Europe when I have people at home that miss me much more than Rome, Prague, or Berlin ever could? I can't put up a Christmas tree in Paris and London isn't going to feed me my grandmother's homemade lasagna. I could have spent Christmas in Dublin or Helsinki, but when it was all said and done, I chose Summersville. If you have to ask me why I chose a town that has no stoplights as the place where I wanted to spend Christmas, then you must have failed to read the beginning of this blog.

I have 23 days, 11 hours, 44 minutes, and 20 seconds from this moment before I get to walk through the airport in Louisville and see the people I love most standing there waiting for me. That, ladies and gentleman, will be worth more than anything Europe could ever give me.