things I want

- to lie with cat on my stomach and watch TV for an unhealthy amount of
hours
- to run barefoot outside in the backyard, dodging those prickly bushes
- drag the canoe down the embankment to the river and spend hours
fighting the current until my arms are sore
- to clean the kitchen, empty the dishwasher
- to not feel less capable because I speak only one language
- Tim Hortons, specifically a maple dip doughnut
- to go for walks with my family, alternatively chasing my brother and
the frisbee
- listen at night from my bedroom and hear nothing but the nightly
orchestra of crickets
- to close my eyes and know exactly where I am because of the curve and
bumps of the road
- to be home

I find myself wanting to sleep more because time passes quicker that
way. When I sleep I don't have to think about how much it hurts to think
about home. The past few days have been excruciating. It doesn't feel
quite real. Like, I know I will be home in just over 48 hours, but I've
been homesick so much the past few months this just feels like another
phase, and then I will have to get over it, to move on, then another
adventure until I remember again.

I remember my plane landing in Yangon and thinking, "What is it going to
feel like when the plane touches down in Toronto?" That felt like a
lifetime ago, but it feels more real than going home.

Home.

- - -

Oddly, I feel like I've been mentally home for a while now, figuring out
school things and camp things. Realizing that I will be moving into my
house in Kingston in a week is an odd thought. Won't I always be away
from the familiar?

But thus ends this chapter of my life.

I want to write something inspiring or thoughtful or meaningful on my
last day abroad but nothing is really coming to mind other than I
freaking can't wait to see my family, to use my phone as an actual phone
again, and be someplace I understand.

I think the whole reflection/understanding of this crazy semester will
take time. A long time.

It will be really tempting, I think, when I get home, to not want to
talk about it. They warned us, the last few days on the ship, that we
will be very annoying when we get home, the person who keeps name
dropping all the places they've been to. I don't want to be that person,
and I'm afraid that's going to result in me shutting down all
conversations about my travels, even if someone is genuinely curious. Or
maybe because I don't think I can put it into words for myself, I don't
want to try for others.

They also told us on the ship about "re-entry". The frustration that
accompanies going home, the shock of returning to your home culture.
Right now that seems absurd, but I suppose I will be watching for that.

- - -

I just want to skip the next 48 hours. I want to skip the nine hour
layover and eight hour plane ride.

I want to be in that moment of walking through the door in the airport
hauling all my stuff with me and see my family's faces when they see me.
I want the tears that will happen in that moment, I'm sure.

I want an awful lot of things, don't I?

- - -

Okay, enough of this. I think I will try to write one more entry before
I leave for camp, but then this blog will fade out of existence, being
that I am no longer stupendously at sea! And stupendously at home/school
just doesn't have the same ring to it I think.

Thanks again to all who have come with me so far. I'll see you soon.