Farewell, Old Friend

This is the official retirement of "so there I was..." It was a good blog. It did what I asked of it, even though I neglected it. It contains so much of the last two years, but at the same time lacks so much. It was there when I was frustrated, happy, bored, amused and verbose. Sometimes even angry. Sometimes even happy.

But one month from today, I will be eating hot dogs and drinking root beer and watching fireworks for the first time in two years. I will be jet lagged (I fly home July 3), but home.

I can't say these two years went by quickly. Perhaps, once I am home and the tiny details of my time in Bulgaria are blurred together in the stories I will tell over and over, it will seem like a blip. But sitting here, in this apartment, looking at my last month of service fill up with good-byes and final grades and last-minute trips, it seems like I have been here forever. I was 22 when I stepped off that plane, and now I am 25. That, dear friends, is no small chunk of time.

I am daunted by the prospect of starting over, again. I am daunted about trying to find a real job and move to a more permanent home (at least home-city) and set up a life. But I am ready to do it. I am ready to jump into the unknown again. I came to Bulgaria for the challenge, and I have taken all I can from it. I, in short, am burned out. Burned out, burned out, burned out.

For the past few weeks, I have been overwhelmed with moments where I want to be sitting on a plane, and moments when I just want to live this lifestyle forever. I want to leave, but I don't want to leave. I like being a foreigner, but I don't like being a foreigner. I like my solitude and freedom, but I miss living with people and having more constraints. I am so utterly ambivalent towards this month that I can hardly stand it.

So with this ambivalence, let me relate my one certain truth. This is my goodbye. I am signing off. It was good knowing you, and may this honest, rambling, sporadic and gap-filled blog represent my time in Bulgaria, out there in cyberspace, for years to come.