As I sit on the 4, heading to Emmaüs to work the Saturday morning shift at the store, I start to get sad. It took me a bit to mentally pin down the sourse of this sadness, and once I found it, it wasn't really something I wanted to dwell on: I have 8 weeks left. 8. Weeks. What happened to the 4 months I had here? Key word, had.
I love life here: the 8eme is full of life all night long, slowly singing (ok, more like shouting and honking) me to sleep each night; my new Friday afternoon tradition with friends, sitting along the Seine en plein air with du soleil at Point Neuf, eating strawberries and camembert with fresh baguettes; even the dirty, fast, sometimes frustratingly annoying metro, yes, I even love you; the feeling of living in what I have actually come to learn is a small city with a "big city complex"; my inability to blend in with the Parisiens due to my inability to m'integrer into the fashion scene here no longer bothers me; I''ll miss my Emmaüs family (only to them am I "Obama", "Wahington Post", or "That one girl who should be Polish, but isn't"--hahaha gotta love culturally-based nicknames); no longer hearing the phrases "entre gimmets" or "j'ajoute une petite paranthèse" (with the appropriate hand gestures, bien sûr) in class will take some getting used to when back in the States. But you know what I'll miss the most and what I love the most about my life here? It's the confidence I've gained with my language skills. When I leave Paris, my worst fear is that my fluency will stay behind, not following me onto the plane, gone when I take that first step onto American soil, leaving me with a feeling of emptiness. I'm being selfish, I know, but I'd really just like to keep this one piece of me for always, but alas, c'est pas possible.
But should I really look at the glass half empty like that? No, I tell myself. I have some many other parts of me that will remain when I get back to the States that I have found here in Paris. I need to remember that even if the glass is half empty, that means it's also half full. I'm not quite sure what my glass is half full of at the moment, but I'm figuring it out.
Love from the city I love,
Sarah
I love life here: the 8eme is full of life all night long, slowly singing (ok, more like shouting and honking) me to sleep each night; my new Friday afternoon tradition with friends, sitting along the Seine en plein air with du soleil at Point Neuf, eating strawberries and camembert with fresh baguettes; even the dirty, fast, sometimes frustratingly annoying metro, yes, I even love you; the feeling of living in what I have actually come to learn is a small city with a "big city complex"; my inability to blend in with the Parisiens due to my inability to m'integrer into the fashion scene here no longer bothers me; I''ll miss my Emmaüs family (only to them am I "Obama", "Wahington Post", or "That one girl who should be Polish, but isn't"--hahaha gotta love culturally-based nicknames); no longer hearing the phrases "entre gimmets" or "j'ajoute une petite paranthèse" (with the appropriate hand gestures, bien sûr) in class will take some getting used to when back in the States. But you know what I'll miss the most and what I love the most about my life here? It's the confidence I've gained with my language skills. When I leave Paris, my worst fear is that my fluency will stay behind, not following me onto the plane, gone when I take that first step onto American soil, leaving me with a feeling of emptiness. I'm being selfish, I know, but I'd really just like to keep this one piece of me for always, but alas, c'est pas possible.
But should I really look at the glass half empty like that? No, I tell myself. I have some many other parts of me that will remain when I get back to the States that I have found here in Paris. I need to remember that even if the glass is half empty, that means it's also half full. I'm not quite sure what my glass is half full of at the moment, but I'm figuring it out.
Love from the city I love,
Sarah
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