Tuesday, September 10th. At the airport, heading to Italy in a few minutes.
It may sound weird, but what I feel the most right now and during the past two or three weeks, despite all the excitement about the fact that my life is about to change once again, is relief. I am relieved to know I am leaving home. I am relieved these four months I had free are over.
To a certain extent, I knew I was going to go through this. It has happened before. I just did not know how hard it was going to hit me this time.
Looking back at it to try to briefly write down here how it all went, I remember having a great month and a half vacation, where I was happy to be back home and see everyone I missed while I was away. I went to eat at my favorite restaurants. I travelled around: From Sao Paulo to Rio de Janeiro, from Ubatuba to Campos do Jordao and Ilha Bela. I needed that time to relax. I had just graduated from college. I was done with a very important period of my life.
Well, after passing by those first weeks, I found myself in a profound, severe and endless state of mind wandering, preventing myself, then, from living the present, to only feel that agony of brainstorming with my own mind about some life uncertainties I have today. Yes, a little hard to explain, and perhaps even harder to relate to anything I can think of. There is a quote in my language, though, that says: "Mente vazia oficina do diabo," which I can assimilate to the "doing nothing is doing ill," in English. Fact is, I had absolutely nothing major to distract my mind, such as school or work; leaving plenty of room and time for me to think, over think, under think.. oh well, you name it. I had, in addition to that, a clear difficulty in dealing with my parents at home. After 4 years of independency and self-sufficiency, I have to admit I no longer know how to properly fit into the family environment. My parents haven't changed a bit since I was young, but I, in turn, have changed too much. And I am leaving today, after 4 months being back home, with the feeling that I was not able to adapt to them again. Makes me feel a little upset that things sometimes were not so peaceful among us, specially because I know it was not their fault. They are still the same. It is me, a new grown up Isa, that I am not so sure they know too much about.
In the meantime, and as a kind of self-defense tool, I came up with all sorts of activities I could do in order to keep the "bad thoughts" away. I tried watching movies. I spent endless hours reading books, articles and magazines. I watched the news on TV; all of them. I travelled to the beach whenever possible. I decided to take an Italian intensive course for a total of two months. I worked out a lot. Gym in the morning and park to run and lay down on the grass in the afternoon.
To say that it was not as bad as it is sounding like it was, I can at least state that I got to learn more about myself - how to handle my fears and preoccupations, the way I face the day-to-day problems, my behavior towards people I have close contact with, etc. I believe that if I try to summarize it all, I would say I have gained a whole new perspective on my personal life, coupled with more self-consciousness/awareness. I am also leaving my country 6kg (13 pounds) skinnier than compared to when I arrived (oh, America, look at what you did to me..!), definitely mastering a little more Italian and absolutely updated with the latest world news and events. See, nothing can be 100% negative in life. There are always something positive you can get out of it, no matter how impossible it might sound at the time.
Now, the reason I said I am relieved my 4 month vacation is over is because I literally hate doing nothing. I need to feel productive, I need to keep the mind busy. And gladly enough, it is all about to change tomorrow. I could not have been more excited. I am supposed to arrive in Malpensa Airport tomorrow around 3pm. Then, if everything goes right, a friend will be there to help me get to an office, which is 65km (40 miles) away, to finally sign my housing contract and grab my keys. After that, the next destination will be my apartment. Obviously, though, I have no clue how to get there or anything, but I think this is all part of the adventure. Other than that, I have a two-day orientation on the 17th and 18th, and official classes start on the 23th. And this is it. That is all I know will happen. After that, only being there for me to figure out how my new life will look like. I believe I cannot emphasize enough the importance I give to this "I have no idea what will happen next " in my life. I mean, how easy and boring would it be if we had everything already planned out? Plus, how much can you grow when you are out of your comfort zone or when you have to find out how to solve a problem or a certain situation by your own? At least this is how I like to think about.
On a final note, one big factor that makes me excited about going to study in Milan is that it came to mind that it will be so much harder and more intense this time!! In the sense that, even though all the experience I had by living on campus at RMU represented its challenges, it was not real life. It simply was not. I always felt like I was on a big country club, where I would see cop cars drive around every 5 minutes, I had food within walking distance and classrooms were 30 seconds far from my room. Now I am going to be living out there, in the middle of a big city, having to cook myself breakfast, lunch and dinner, catching the bus, metro and/or train to go to class, and everything else. Well, bring it on. I am so ready for it!
Oh, and on a second final note, I plan to write on my blog more often than before. According to the first post I wrote here, one of the reasons I decided to create a blog is because I want to get older and have something I can refer to and remember about my past, while also keeping my family and friends updated on whatever might me going on with me. Having said that, lets see if I can get used to write here every one or two weeks, so we can have a pretty good overview of these next two years of my life.
New place, new people, new culture, new environment. Milan, here I go.
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