I didn’t really blog in December because I kept waiting for something climactic to happen after completing my first semester of college. My friends and I did celebrate with Insomnia Cookies, but there wasn’t any big punctuating event to end what I thought was a major milestone–only some aggressive Iowan winds, a final few essays, and an hour-long exam. 

I suppose the most significant feature of my December was my journey to get home for the holidays. A flight from Iowa to Washington, D.C. is only a couple of hours, but I wanted to avoid the price and mental anguish of airport travel. Fortunately, I have a friend who drives from Iowa City to Ohio every school break, and he was willing to let me conquer the passenger side of his car. All we had to do was survive frustrating Chicago traffic and surrender an hour to the time zone barrier. From Ohio, my parents picked me up and drove me back to our hometown. 

I haven’t been home since I originally moved onto campus last August, and it’s honestly been a bit surreal being back. Every street and building is viewed through a lens of distant, bittersweet nostalgia: I’m not used to seeing these familiar sights in the context that they’re not really my permanent “home” anymore. I feel like the part of me who knew this area so well–the part tied to my childhood and teenage years–now exists mostly just in the past, vaguely dulled by the very beginning of a new life in Iowa. So many places here prompt a memory that can never be replicated or continued ever again; they’re unreachable. This feeling, which I’m sure will only grow more prominent as time goes on, was what I was terrified of after graduation. 

I was worried that I’d lose my “home” in Virginia, especially if Iowa City didn’t start to feel like “home” right away, either. But this is not necessarily something to resist. Part of the early college experience is to say goodbye to childhood and welcome new possibilities, to grow as a person as you grow up. I can’t deny the ache I feel when I’m reminded of an old friend whose family doesn’t live here anymore, nor the pain of reuniting with my familiar bedroom while knowing I’ll have to leave it again in only a couple of weeks. But I can enjoy reminiscing about the past without letting it stop me from being excited about the future. 

Maybe I don’t really need a big punctuating or climactic event, after all. I think what I really just needed was the simplicity of relaxing at home and remembering what it meant–and still means–to me. 

Until next time!