Day 111 – Short and unsatisfying

I am truly awful at lying but I still manage to do it convincingly to you, blog. Maybe it’s because you don’t have a face, or maybe it’s because I just feel so far removed from my (three? four?) readers. But for some reason it’s possible for me to lie to you blatantly. Well, I do it with good intentions. I had so much time on my hands – of course I was going to update about Italy! I should have done it the following day.
Anyway, I’ve been feeling really kind of anxious these past few days. My time here is running out, I’m in the middle of exams, I’m making last minute travel plans, and my bank account is shriveling up faster than the Wicked Witch of the West in a water park. (Sorry if that was cheesy.) I feel like I’m losing control. Things are slipping out of my hands as I’m trying to hold on to them – minutes, memories, essays, and pound notes alike. It’s as though I’m trying to slow down, but everything is speeding up and surging ahead around me, and I’m just caught up in the stampede. We’re stampeding toward the end of this semester and being abroad, yes, towards the summer and home and family and sun and warmth and making money instead of spending it. I’m stampeding toward my 21st birthday. My sister is graduating high school and going to college. I’m going to be a senior. I’m going to be a SENIOR. I was just a senior in high school. They warned me it would fly, whoever they is, and I heeded their warnings. I savoured everything, I captured memories, I didn’t take experiences for granted. But I don’t want it to end. I’m ultimately stampeding towards the unknown. There’s a cliff up ahead that I’ll be parachuting off. It’s like a video game. I’ll have to parachute off and try to land on the ledges below that are marked “Employment” or “Grad School.” I’m on my first and last life though. And I don’t even know what to do with it.
I’m probably being overdramatic but that’s the way I’ve been feeling lately. Ever since that guy who started talking to me in the bar laughed and told me that being an English professor wasn’t a real job. Not that the opinion of a stranger should really matter to me – especially a Portuguese man who insults my life’s plan as his pick up line – but still. It makes me remember the hairdresser who, after engaging in the obligatory small talk with me, said “a professor? Why the heck would you wanna do that?” And I had no answer. Just because there’s nothing else. What else is there to do? What else could I be? What do I want? Where do I want to end up? What am I doing with my life?
Well this is overall a really emo and self-pity infested post but maybe I should just post it before I forget and/or get sidetracked. I will update about Italy, hopefully soon, maybe tomorrow, or maybe after my last two tests are done next week. And I will tell you about my goings on since Italy. But I will warn you in an attempt to be completely honest. The next 45 days are going to fly. And in my attempt to keep up with them, I may leave you behind.
Realistically/Idealistically conflictedly yours,
Amanda