Some thoughts

Sometimes I just get really overwhelmed with excitement about this whole thing.

Like today, when I was talking with one of my favourite professors, about how soon this is all going to become a reality for me. It's less than a month until I leave on a plane for six whole months in England. It's something I have been dreaming about since I was 13, and something I've known was a possible reality for the past year, but the fact that this is ACTUALLY going to happen? It's unreal. Totally unreal. And when I land, I have no idea how I'm going to process that I'm actually in England, and will be there for months. This sounds really cheesy and sappy and all that, but I really am just so, so, so excited.

I'm trying really hard not to let my expectations from daydreaming for seven years about British and European adventures cloud my experience, though. It's all well and good to imagine the amazing things that could possibly happen, but I'm a little concerned that when things don't match up to what I've always wanted (because they never do, I've travelled enough to know that for sure haha), I'm going to get bogged down in that disappointment and not appreciate the experience I will be having. Which is kind of ridiculous to worry about NOW but I'm hoping that if I keep reminding mysel of that, my OCD crazy self will be able to still have a fantastic time, even when things don't go according to plan.

Part of why I think I'm alternating between excited, terrified, nervous, anxious (in a good way) and impatient is that I've only known that this is REALLY happening for about five weeks. My friends who were accepted to other programs have had months or almost a year to know that they're going abroad, and to mentally prepare, research all the different things that need to be researched, and get ready to go. I'll have had ten weeks when all is said and done and I'm on a plane. So amongst the insanity of hell week and finals week, I'm getting inundated with emails with information from York and Arcadia during the last four weeks of prep time, and I'm having to do all this reading and learning about the specifics and practical matters of living in York and traveling abroad.

I guess I feel like I'm overly mentally prepared in that this is what I've been dreaming of for years, but at the same time, I feel like I'm totally not prepared psychologically because it doesn't feel real. It's all very strange and confusing. And unnecessary when I'm trying to finish Junior I.S. and final papers!!