the day care syndrome

(most of the group celebrating mere and mike's birthdays)

today is the last day we're all together in Venice before people all go their separate ways as the semester closes. we had a slide show and a slew of "most likely to___" awards. we had dinner. i said my first goodbye. and like a little kid who cried when her parents left her at day care against her will in the morning, i'm now throwing a proverbial tantrum a la that same little girl who decides day care isn't that bad when it's time to finally go home at the end of the day.

it's not that i don't want to go home, it's just that i really like being here. there are so many things i'm going to miss--the perpetual piano playing, fresh food markets, the fact that i cook, coffee, bar da gino visits, being a regular at san travaso and ai cugnai, speaking italian, traveling by train, the nearly constant whistling coming from the kitchen, trips to the billa, the crazy old people and their equally eccentric dogs, the fact that i know the habitual location of any given street vendor, the amazing people with whom i live, the vaporetto noises, the gondolieri singing & yelling, sitting in the window and reading, having house parties on the patio, having the entirety of europe at my disposal for weekend trips...the list could go on for pages.

it's also not that i dislike america. i mean i nearly left less than a week into this trip, i had such a hard time adjusting. but after four months here, i think i've realized i can survive and even succeed here more so than at home. like i told tristan, who says where you start is where you're supposed to stay?

regardless...after four months of constant cohabitation with 24 other people, i have no idea what i'm going to do when i can't walk down the hall and see any one of the 24 whenever we feel like hanging out, stressing, going out, etc. what we've all realized in the past day or two, though, is that we're all going back to wake in the fall. we'll be able to see each other as often as we make the effort. it's venice that we won't be able to see again (for a year? for a few years? forever?). and so we've all been trying to figure out how you take with you not just the gifts for friends and all the clothes you've bought over the semester, but more importantly, the intangible things. we know the pictures and the stories will never do it justice.

although leaving will inevitably be harder than coming, i know i don't have a choice (unless mom and dad are suddenly ok with me giving up my summer internship, not finishing my degree, and living a ocean away...). and so the next 24 hours will be full of last goodbyes, last coffee runs, last grocery store trips, last traghetto rides, last pictures, last memories. and after that, i will get on that first airplane to paris. and then the one to jfk. and finally the one to raleigh. and then drive 3 hours to charlotte. and after all that, i'll appreciate this place, these people, this experience all from a distance and hopefully that will be enough.