A little disclaimer, this post is still about Italy, but more so about my life since I've been back. It kind of shows how my life has changed since I guess I changed?
So now that it's been almost two years since I left for Italy, and I have had a lot of time to think about the "what-ifs" and the "I shoulda, coulda, woulda's" and quite frankly those are overrated. I finally stopped regretting all the little mistakes I made, and started to realize they actually made me grow.
Some days I wish it were the end of December 2013, not December 2015. A lot has happened in two short years. Without a doubt going to Italy is what I consider the turning point of my adolescent years, because since then so much has changed. I gained a sense of independence and responsibility that had I stayed in America my junior year I would have never learned. Picture this, a typical teen with no sense of money is suddenly given a large amount of spending cash and told "hey here is this money, and it's all you're getting for the next 6 months, spend it wisely." Suddenly I found myself turning down activities to afford things later on down the road. I started questioning whether I truly needed those shoes or if I would rather use that money to go out to dinner with friends later on in the week. This mindset greatly prepared me for what college would be like. Livin' la dolce (broke) vita. Sure I splurged then and I sure as hell still splurge now, but had I not gone to Italy, I would have gone off to college still sheltered and not have had the slightest sense of the value of money.
It's honestly crazy to think that I left nearly two years ago. In a way, it all still feels like a dream to me. I'll find myself going through random pictures I took overseas and think "what I give to spend just one more day in Italy". Sad, but being true to myself, that is hands down the coolest feat I have to my teen years and I know the nostalgia won't stop until I do something as equally great or even bigger.
Since I've gotten back from Italy, I never really had time to assimilate myself back into my "old" life. The morning after I got back to the States I started summer school to make up for having missed 11th grade english. Not even a full 24 hours after being home I was already sitting in a classroom practically speaking and writing in a language that felt slightly foreign to me at this point. I found it hard getting back into my old routine, sure I hung out with friends a ton, I even got a summer job. But it just didn't feel right. This summer class was only about 5 weeks long, it was five days a week from 8 to 2 of basically just English 11. At the end of the course, I re-registerd back into my old high school, and I finally started feeling normal-ish again. I started talking to the friends I made overseas less, and practically cut-off all of the wonderful Italians that took me under their wings. And having lost my connection with everyone and just talking to the people in my life "pre-Italy" made it feel as if I hadn't actually gone, and that the six months I spent overseas was really just an extremely vivid dream. Quite frankly, I was ok with Italy feeling like a dream, because I finally felt normal again.
Senior year was not the easiest I can assure you. I was doing almost two years of high school mashed into one; and I had Holli Wolter as my english teacher (I look at this more of a blessing than a curse as some people would lol). Having Wolter as an english teacher made me work harder than ever, I pulled countless all-nighters working on essays and never once did I get above an 85 on a paper, which sounds bad, but a B in her class was literally an A in pretty much any other English teachers standards. Moving on, having Wolter senior year made me work harder than I had any other year which actually helped bring my up GPA, since I never actually dealt with "senioritis". Not that I could afford not doing my work, I only had two and a half years worth of high school for colleges to look at.
When March finally rolled around, I had heard back from two of the thee schools I applied to and was almost certain I knew where I was going, and what I'd be doing. Not actually, but at the moment I did. Towards the end of March, I stayed home because I hadn't been feeling well (I never really missed much school in High School, and if I did I was always really sick), which just happened to be the day that George Washington was releasing their regular decisions. It wasn't long after I got my acceptance letter that I put my down payment down? I don't really remember what it's called but all I know is that it was 800 dollars and that it meant I committed. Any way, knowing where I was officially going to school was probably the highlight of all senior year, as it should because all your hard-ish work finally paid off and now we are one step closer to adulthood yay!!! Not actually because becoming an adult sounds terrifying to me. Backtracking a little, I wondered for days, and weeks how I managed to get into a pretty up there school seeing as I had a decent but not a great looking GPA and not a lot of extracurriculars. Then it hit me. Italy. The only reason why I had a perfect streak of college acceptance letters, was because of Italy. The fact that I managed to somehow snag an acceptance letter to my reach school is mind boggling, but it was because of Italy.
The summer after graduation, Jess and Jamie came to Virginia and we spent a couple of days wondering around DC doing whatever came to mind, and at night we would talk about how weird life has been since getting back from Italy and it felt nice having people that went through the same thing that I did, and for once I didn't feel like Italy was a dream because it was very real in that week they spent with me. After they left, I went on a short vacation to Qatar to see some family, and realized that traveling alone isn't so bad. It's actually more fun than traveling in a group.
Senior year was not the easiest I can assure you. I was doing almost two years of high school mashed into one; and I had Holli Wolter as my english teacher (I look at this more of a blessing than a curse as some people would lol). Having Wolter as an english teacher made me work harder than ever, I pulled countless all-nighters working on essays and never once did I get above an 85 on a paper, which sounds bad, but a B in her class was literally an A in pretty much any other English teachers standards. Moving on, having Wolter senior year made me work harder than I had any other year which actually helped bring my up GPA, since I never actually dealt with "senioritis". Not that I could afford not doing my work, I only had two and a half years worth of high school for colleges to look at.
When March finally rolled around, I had heard back from two of the thee schools I applied to and was almost certain I knew where I was going, and what I'd be doing. Not actually, but at the moment I did. Towards the end of March, I stayed home because I hadn't been feeling well (I never really missed much school in High School, and if I did I was always really sick), which just happened to be the day that George Washington was releasing their regular decisions. It wasn't long after I got my acceptance letter that I put my down payment down? I don't really remember what it's called but all I know is that it was 800 dollars and that it meant I committed. Any way, knowing where I was officially going to school was probably the highlight of all senior year, as it should because all your hard-ish work finally paid off and now we are one step closer to adulthood yay!!! Not actually because becoming an adult sounds terrifying to me. Backtracking a little, I wondered for days, and weeks how I managed to get into a pretty up there school seeing as I had a decent but not a great looking GPA and not a lot of extracurriculars. Then it hit me. Italy. The only reason why I had a perfect streak of college acceptance letters, was because of Italy. The fact that I managed to somehow snag an acceptance letter to my reach school is mind boggling, but it was because of Italy.
The summer after graduation, Jess and Jamie came to Virginia and we spent a couple of days wondering around DC doing whatever came to mind, and at night we would talk about how weird life has been since getting back from Italy and it felt nice having people that went through the same thing that I did, and for once I didn't feel like Italy was a dream because it was very real in that week they spent with me. After they left, I went on a short vacation to Qatar to see some family, and realized that traveling alone isn't so bad. It's actually more fun than traveling in a group.
Anyway, point of this blog post was kind of lost somewhere along the lines of I can't remember what I actually meant to write and just wrote. Let's be real, regardless of how patchy this post is, I know the only reason why I'm only writing this post because I am extremely jealous of my 16-year-old self. And that's a little pathetic lol... So,
Italy, you're driving me wild, wild, wild.
And on that note, goodbye Italy blog! You were fun, buuuuut its time to say bye!
