Self-Discoveries

Something about this place is magical. Usually I can remember every one of my dreams, but I can't remember a single dream since I got here-- that is such a blessing for me because back home I would have nightmares every night where I'd wake up crying. I sleep like a baby here.

There are so many things inside of me that I want to tell all you readers. It's like everyday I hear about the same old stuff back home and it seems like some things never change. But, I feel like I am in the right place at the right time and I am constantly changing. I was talking to my Australian buddy, Tegan, for a long time last night and we were saying how it will be so weird to go back home and realize that no one else has changed, but we are totally different people than we were even a month ago. The way I see things is no longer through the veiled eyes of the way people tell me to see things, it's completely and utterly myself. It's like I can't see enough. Each day I want to see more and do more. I know back at home my family would tell me that I just need to be content and grateful with what I have, but I think that's all wrong. It's important to recognize how lucky you are, but it's never okay to give up searching and desiring to see and try new things. What would be the point of living, then? I don't want to live a boring life, I'm sorry. I'm learning what I am capable of and I will never settle for less than that again. I'm over that for myself. I used to think I knew what I wanted for myself, and now I have absolutely no clue. It's both terrifying and exciting all rolled into one. What I do know is that seeing things for yourself is the best thing that you can do to learn about yourself and what you are capable of. After studying abroad I really think that it will be impossible for me to take anyone's "words for it" again. Maybe that sounds stubborn and selfish, but I think it's the best thing that has ever happened to me.

It's like I'm flying everyday. In my Irish literature class we watched a movie called, "The Wind that Shakes the Barley." I can't describe it to you... you have to see it for yourself. I was crying at the end of it because the beauty was too much for me. My professor, Matt Campbell (a real life Irishman), looked at me with tear-stained, red and blotchy eyes and asked if I was crying or if I had a cold. I said both and he laughed. I was the only other person who was totally moved by the movie in my class besides him, I think. And I'm realizing that my whole life people have told me that I'm too sensitive, but I'm realizing now that it's the Irish in me. It's the whimsical search for love and the beauty in people that makes me this way. Never before have I been this proud to be Irish. Every one was telling the main character to give up fighting for independence from Britain because he should be happy with what he had, but he refused to give in. He refused to believe the lies that things couldn't be better than they already are and then he died for what he believed in. In my opinion, there's no better way to go than that. Call it stubborn and stupid, but I call it liberating and refreshing.

I'm soaking up the text in my Shakespeare and Renaissance Drama class. I swear... I don't know why I was denying myself the one pleasure that I have always fought for: reading and writing. I just sit there and read my plays, and it sounds gay, but I sit there while reading and laugh and cry to myself. The characters are so wisely pieced together and in our classes, were encouraged to explore and analyze the depths of their character. I love analyzing. My mom calls it analysis paralysis, but it's what of the things I love. I had to write a short response to the play, The Spanish Tragedy, and my teacher handed me back my response with his notes and it said, "This is fine, Lindsay. You engage with the play and its requirements really well, and as such have left me with little to criticize. A rare feat!" That's all he wrote. I couldn't be prouder of myself. Call me crazy, but I feel affirmed for the first time in a long time.

I love it here. For all you that told me I'd miss home, you're wrong. Sure, I miss my family and friends, but I am so positively happy that for the first time in a long time, I'm right where I need to be.