Only 119 days, 4 hours, 21 minutes, and 33 seconds until I’ll be waiting in line, with my stomach in my chest, to board a double decker plane at Logan Airport and head across the Atlantic, where I will spend three months in a wildly unfamiliar place with a bunch of random strangers. What? No, I’m not nervous at all.
Actually, I’m lying, I’m TERRIFIED.
I will be spending Fall 2016 studying abroad in Galway, Ireland. I chose my destination pretty much the same way I chose Trinity as my collage: my gut feeling. Maybe it’s the 50% Irish in me, NUI Galway’s highly praised “mountaineering club”, or maybe it’s Ireland’s romantic villages and beautiful cliff-lined shore that influenced my decision…. But most of it was pure instinct.
So, in late August, I’ll be packing my bags for one of the biggest adventures of my life thus far. I’ll be the first to admit that I get cold feet. Whether it was going to my first sleepover, summer camp, or even coming to Trinity College as a freshman- I have always been super nervous about leaving home and in a broader sense, growing up. I’m momma’s girl and daddy’s angel; I’m the little-baby-sister to my siblings. I’ve lived in the same room in the same house on the same street my entire life. I even got a little upset when General Mills turned Trix Cereal from a fun fruit shaped snack to just another boring, round breakfast food (those of you who know what I’m talking about HAVE to agree with me on this one). So why the heck did I decide to throw myself in the deep end of a pool, with barely any idea how to swim?
Because I want to push myself out of my comfort zone.
There are very few times in life where you’ll have the opportunity to put life on hold and travel solo to a brand new place with brand new food and brand new people. Soon, I’ll *hopefully* have a full-time job, a rent to pay, and a thousand other responsibilities as an adult. This is one of the last chances I’ll have as a kid (so what if I’m 20? I’m certainly still a child) to be thrown into a totally new environment. I’ll be forced to walk on my own two feet, use my own voice, and develop my own array of thoughts, ideas, and perspectives.
So, am I a little scared of the unknown future ahead of me in this next chapter of my life? Absolutely. It would be unnatural if I wasn’t. Will that keep me from pushing my boundaries, exploring new territories, and discovering new little obscure things about myself? No way. It’s completely natural to be a little afraid of taking a semester abroad, but I promise you that every second of cold feet will be worth it in the end.