WHAT I'VE LEARNED: 2014 in review

Yesterday morning, I woke up at 8 AM in a single bed in a condo in Florida. As I write this, I am in a single bed, but in my dormitory in England. In between these two spaces, a new year has risen, or so says the calendar. At however many feet over the Atlantic, when it was midnight in America and past midnight in England, everything was transient and surreal.

That's sort of how I feel about 2014 in general: transient and surreal. In the span of 2014, I have lived in three places: Bowling Green, Avon Lake, and Keele, England. Each of these places I have called home, each place I have left and will leave and my life will continue this way until I graduate in 2016 (minus England), bouncing back and forth between two places that have contributed to me growing up. This year, I have learned to appreciate the surreal and transient nature of travel. One morning, I was in England. By the evening, I was in Tampa, Florida. Throughout all the travel of the past year - from NYC to Florida to Indianapolis to England - it has struck me nearly every single time that I am one fortunate individual to see so much of the world.

Spent the day with family; Tiffin, OH | Aug 2014

Me, Shanna and Rachel in Times Square | Jan 2014

Poolside view, Orlando, FL | Mar 2014

Parade the Circle; Cleveland, OH | Jun 2014

Me, Shanna & Rachel at the Children's Museum; Indianapolis, IN | Aug 2014

I think travel is a great privilege. Even within Ohio - and Cleveland itself - there is so much to see. From the rural plains to the Cleveland metropolis, there is much to do, much to see. This year, I learned to appreciate where I came from, and more importantly, who I came from. I became closer with my family, spending many Monday nights with my parents, brother, sister-in-law and niece eating dinner, drinking tea and sharing many, many stories (and laughs). I understood homesickness in a completely different way. When I'm at BGSU, my mom is literally a phone call away - when I miss her or my dad or my brothers or my dog, I can call her and ask if I can come home, or if she can come see me. But here, in England, I am so far from my family that many days pass when I don't even get to call my mom, due to the time difference or clashing schedules. Though I miss my family every day (every minute of every day), I know they are with me and that it is only with their love and support that I am even able to be abroad at all.

My little home; Keele, England | Oct 2014

Travel has taught me a lot (as it teaches any person who encounters a lot of travel). This blog isn't one that is going to tell its three readers that leaving home is the only way you can learn things about yourself. You can learn about yourself from anywhere. I have been studying abroad for months, now, and don't feel like I've learned anything about myself that I didn't already know. Like, I hate when people hang out without me, but I also love my time alone. I'm tricky and complex like that. Also, that I can only really rely on myself in most situations and always have a plan. It's hard for me to make friends, nearly impossible to garner the courage to talk to someone first, and I love to make people laugh. I put a lot of pressure on myself academically and will procrastinate as long as possible.

I think that studying abroad has forced me to be aware of these things inside myself, but I think that I knew these things in Ohio and have been forced and will continue to be forced to recognize both my flaws and my strengths.

Galway, Ireland | Oct 2014

But a lot of this year taught me about people, and how they live and act and how these people see me. A lot of my friendships changed over the course of the year. Some grew stronger, some were brand new, some ended, some grew distant. I don't think I've ever had a friend I regretted knowing, and I wish I were more patient with my friends and less sensitive about little things. I've grown up so much this year, I think, especially in terms of my patience and impatience, but I still have a ways to go. I wish I weren't jealous and needy and distant and sensitive and sarcastic sometimes but I understand now that friends can and will love you through your moods. Or they should. (And more often than not, they do.)

Candid Mags girls reunited; London, England | Nov 2014

Just a few of my friends abroad; Keele, England | Nov 2014

This was a year of family, friends, travel, learning, and books. This year, I read 70 books, which to me seems like not a lot but it is quite a lot of books and I am looking forward to all the new things I will read in this year. My goal is 100 in 2015 and it feels feasible. I hope that this year bodes well for me, for reading and writing and all the rest.

Sunset; Longboat Key, FL | Dec 2014

All my best and all my love in 2015.

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Abroad Chronicles, I: IN A DAY OR SO

(Other possible titles for this post included, "The Visa Story," "The British Consulate: Exposed," "Why I'm Losing Hair at Twenty," and "?!")

I don't know when I decided I was going to be studying abroad in England for an entire school year, but along the way, through growth spurts and weddings and friendships and schools, somehow, in my little pea brain, the idea (copied, of course, from my older brother, Pat) solidified. I chose to come to Bowling Green and stay there, despite my desires for a different type of college experience, because financially, Bowling Green is the only school that I would be able to study abroad for a year without going a million dollars in debt on top of my student loans.

I started this whole process my freshman year, attended this study abroad fair that BG's education abroad team held in the student union and received ten thick books from different study abroad agencies that my mom and I read through during Christmas break, though we never came to a decision then, and my thoughts were not focused so much on the coming future and possibilities in another country, rather, they were centered on getting myself through my freshman year.

As sophomore year arrived, the possibility of my study abroad became very real to me. I like to get things done and early, so I met with the education abroad office within the first two months of being back at BGSU and began my research, ultimately landing on some consortium's program in some town in England, and I began meeting with advisors in and out of the study abroad office to ensure that I could do this program for the whole year and still graduate in May 2016.

To make this already long story short, during the application process, I realized the program I had been working towards all semester wasn't the one for me and was back to square one.

After many tears, a lot of emails, and two recommendation letters, my application was in, accepted, and I was officially set to study abroad by this past May. My welcome letter notified me of the need for a Tier 4 Student Visa and I assumed I'd have my needed CAS number by July.

Lo and behold, the much awaited email arrived MID AUGUST, which only gave me a month and a half to apply. You may not know this about me, but I like to get applications like these out of the way in advance, but after an initial read-through of the application, I was totally lost, and for two weeks sent emails and attempted to fill out the application as best I could and finally, finally, in the very first few days of September, my application was finished and sent in the mail to the UK consulate in New York.

A week and a day later, I got an email from the consulate themselves that I hadn't included a shipping label, immediately I sent the label back and realized I would not be getting my much awaited visa for two full weeks. My hair began to fall out, I became addicted to The Sims 2, I drank 20 cans of Diet Coke a day, I packed my suitcase, cried, doubted my intentions of going abroad, cancelled my flight and finally, three days after I was due to depart, I received my visa and was on my way to England in a day.

The process was extremely dramatic and to any students wishing to study abroad for a year in any country that requires a visa, my advice is get your visa EARLY!!!!!! You will still have hair and will not harass every single power you can, from the US passport agency to the consulate in NYC to the local congress woman's office and you will save yourself some money and emotional turmoil.

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NEW YORK NEW YORK NEW YORK

We went to New York! Well, I went to New York. So did Rachel, my PM (previously mentioned, get with the Internet slang, please) Internet pal for THREE YEARS this fall. Time flies when you're throwing watches or whatever.

Picture the luckiest person you know. A small leprechaun, your grandpa who won the lottery, my dad, whatever, picture that person. And then picture me. If you are picturing the right people, they should be starkly opposite because I am so unlucky, my past lives must have smashed mirrors regularly. For fun. Like, instead of playing some rich-person sport, they just stood in a room in a manor and threw mirrors to the ground. My LUCK doesn't even exist. Because, okay, so I decide to visit NYC in January 2014. At first, I was kind of lying. Didn't really intend on going, put it on a sticky note on my wall at the rarely-used desk in my bedroom, never looked at it again. I think it fell down, actually. Then, it was like, a plan. Let's go to NYC, visit Shanna, see the city For Real. Okay, sure, sure, we'll go. Let's decide on dates another time. I'm procrastinating then, in this past that I'm describing, and also now. I'm supposed to read Terry Eagleton's 'What is Literature?' which sounds fun, I know, but this is funner. Anyway, I was procrastinating, put off deciding on a date, said I'd ask my mom and I never did. But, you see, it kept coming up. Like, when are we going to NYC? We needed to arrange travel plans, whatever, I asked my mom, and Merry Christmas to me, because she said yes, and we planned a far-off date that I thought might never come.

Well, it did. It almost didn't. The gosh-darn blizzard monster decided it'd be a wonderful time to bestow a level-three or whatever, whatever, snow globe thing onto America. And it was great news to find out that my 6 AM bus was cancelled. Luckily, I'm not suing Megabus because they refunded me, anyway, I got to NYC eight hours later than I planned. I'm never going to get those eight hours back. I'll be on my death bed, if it ever comes, you know, the planet thing, I'll be there and I'll still be saying, "I WANT THE EIGHT HOURS WITH MY INTERNET FRIENDS" and it'll never come.

I didn't tell my mom this, but I waited at Penn Station, alone, for like twenty minutes because trains are slow and I don't trust them. I made it out alive, though. That's what's important from this little narrative, is that I'm still alive, and here to tell you how. It was cold as a Friday in January when I got to New York and navigated the five blocks from the bus stop to Penn Station. Why doesn't Megabus just drop off outside of Penn Station? What is that even about? The five blocks. It's nothing. We made it onto the train, though, and I forgot to thank her again for it, but Shanna bought me a train ticket home, saving me a whole nine dollars that I had but didn't want to spend, since I'm thrifty and a little poor myself. I don't work because I'm too glamorous to hold a job.

Nothing super exciting happened after I lugged myself, my 35 pound duffel and backpack into Penn Station. Yes, Shanna and I were reunited, obviously, nothing special though. It was too dark to really experience Long Island or whatever, because of night time.

In fifth grade, I wrote detailed descriptions - that is an egregious lie - I wrote dull descriptions of things I did and wrote meta about myself in the margins. In case I get Alzheimers :D, emoticon included, of course, and not even a real sentence. Or, well, a grammatically incorrect sentence. You can't see it because I'm transcribing it from a memory of a page of text in a diary, but there's some sort of indicator that the "in case" relates to the description of the day. I think that day I watched Aladdin twice in a row. The point of this tangent is to say that I am writing this blog post in case I get Alzheimers and cannot remember this strange, snowy time in my life when two of my best friends (sisters, maybe, if I'm getting stupid and sentimental, remember future readers, emotions are the enemy) didn't live at least forty minutes from me and we had to drive long hours or fly distances to hang out for a few days. So I want to remember everything, even the boring stuff on the train to LI, like how Shanna and I are basically twin sisters separated at birth by distance and two-ish-three-ish years.

I look like maybe I just swallowed a jalapeno whole. I didn't, I assure you. This was merely my attempt to keep it Real.

There we are, looking great. What did we talk about, on the train? New Years Eve shenanigans, TV shows, life, I suppose. We went back to Shanna's, got on our computers, as we do, and after a while we went to bed and that was that. I wish I'd had cooler stuff to sleep in, like a fancy robe or onesie or something, but when it comes to sleepwear I'm afraid my taste is quite pedestrian.

We woke up. Straightened my hair because even though it looks semi-decent in the above photograph, I woke up and it looked how I'd imagine a tumbleweed feels after tumbling around in dust for a few years. We drove to LaGuardia airport because Rachel was there after flying in from Indianapolis, and she, too, was delayed in a freak series of winter activities, but no worries. We got her, there in Queens, and we sang in the car to Wicked, like the true celebrities we are. And we sang, too, to "Sugar, We're Going Down" by Fall Out Boy, which I think might be our anthem as a triad. Maybe not. More on that later, but the point here is that we made it, the three of us, fulfilling the prophecy. It's like something out of Harry Potter, in retrospect. Voldemort - the snow storm - tried to stop us, keep us from completing our life's goals, but we overcame it. Now that I'm looking at it from here, almost two weeks later, I'm realizing that it's far more inspirational than I ever could have dreamed. I'm going to turn this into a fantastic (DOUBLE MEANING HERE) YA lit series, you watch me.

I was hungry when we were in the car, during the singing, too, and we went to Panera and I got macaroni and cheese. It's really good from there, you know, and while it always makes me feel weird afterwards, I think it's always worth it. Don't really remember what the others got. Also, I don't care. This is about me, after all, not them. I also don't drink Diet Pepsi, so going to Panera is a bit of a catch-22 for me. We went to Ulta, a fancy makeup store, after lunch, because I wanted makeup brushes. Recently, I decided that it was up to me to become a famous makeup star, and well. I need makeup brushes, to this day, so if anyone knows of a sponsorship I can acquire, hit me UP. 

Found nothing of worth in Ulta, we returned to Shanna's. En route, Rachel described to me how I am Mindy Kaling. She loves Joni Mitchell, Mindy, that is, and how can I dispute that claim? I've been meaning to read Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) ever since I discovered that my friends were hanging out without me. And other concerns. I also recently uncovered this quote by Mindy herself:

"I always get asked, ‘Where do you get your confidence?’ I think people are well meaning, but it’s pretty insulting. Because what it means to me is, ‘You, Mindy Kaling, have all the trappings of a very marginalized person. You’re not skinny, you’re not white, you’re a woman. Why on earth would you feel like you’re worth anything?’"

This quote really gets me, you know? Besides the white thing. I'm white and aware of the privilege. I feel like I need to say that for legal reasons, please don't come after me, I am a white privilege girl. But I'm not skinny and I identify as a woman, I need to talk about this elsewhere. Okay. Anyway. We discussed the Mindy thing, shared some laughs, then we sat on our computers some more and decided what to Do in NYC. 

We saw Frozen and I have now seen it three times in theaters, not ashamed in the least. It's cute and smart and good music and I don't care what you think as long as it's about me. We saw Frozen and played Heads Up, not the 7-Up game but the one on the iPhone that we played when they joined me in Ohio for a few days back in August, and we played apples to apples two ways, green describing red and red describing green, backwards and forwards ladies, we are, so progressive, and we played pictionary. I chose the best ones for pictionary, like The Black Plague, surfboard, and others, like Soulja Boy. Another good word when you play make-your-own-pictionary could be Infidelity. Draw that and lose. It's impossible. I don't have more pictures so it's a lot of text. 

Saturday, we woke up too early (like eight thirty, not that early, looking back) and rode a train into New York City. Penn Station, again, my old friend. We got coffee at Starbucks because it felt right and real. And normal. This was actually on Sunday, but it felt like Saturday, because God Bless winter break. The coffee was good, as usual, but the croissant was not and I regret getting it even to this day. I had taken the subway exactly once before in my life but I definitely understood everything about it, I'm a quick learner, if I do say so myself, anyways, we got our metro cards if that is supposed to be capitalized I'm sorry but grammar is irrelevant in the 21st century full of Internet lingo or whatever, we got on the Subway, sat on the subway, not the sandwich store so I'm sorry for capitalizing it. I want everything to be a poem. That subway ride into the Museum of Natural History, the giant dinosaur skeletons, the taxidermy. It's all so beautifully raw and real. Some pictures from that exist, Heavens thanks or whatever.

Rachel, our true dino-philiac, posing here with her natural reaction to the dinosaur wing.

Shanna wondering what is scarier: the dinosaur teeth, her, or the word 'diet' behind her? What do you think? I'm thinking the Shanna.

After that, we explored NYC a bit because Shanna couldn't find a subway entrance on her phone and she'd never hung out much in that part of the city before. Also, I met Abraham Lincoln.

I'm posing like Abe, FYI. It looks like I'm doing the Pledge of Allegiance, but for once, I am not.

We called a cab and went to the biggest Forever 21 in the world. And it was scary and I wish that store organized by color or sweater or something and it felt very haphazard and I bought nothing while there because I was too busy being scared and cowering in the corners and also I'm too cheap, even for them. We ate Real Pizza, which was just...pizza...with a thin crust...don't really get these "pizza cities" or whatever, but okay. Cleveland will always have those famous chefs and Melt.

Times Square is 100% better in the cold rainy weather than in the blistering heat of late July that I experienced over the summer. There were a lot of weirdos, too, but that is to be expected, because I am like a magnet to weird things. Also, bad luck. Remember the blizzard? I'm quizzing you at the end of class.

Times Square Selfy!!

We saw the Rockefeller tree, which is not cool enough to merit me putting a photograph of it in here, because it was extremely underwhelming. I like the tree at the outdoor shopping mall near more. The NBC store was much cooler but I didn't take any pictures because Kyle Chandler, AKA Coach Eric Taylor from Friday Night Lights was in there. Maybe he was. It looked like him and we made eye contact and that's all that matters. Pretend you didn't read any of that and just read this: I saw Coach Taylor in the NBC store in NYC, we made eye contact near The Office merchandise.

There were some more things. I saw St. Patrick's Cathedral and the Catholic schoolgirl within me lit up and propelled me to take a very poor photograph of it. Earlier, I forgot to mention, I saw the Church of Scientology's building. Joey Potter was in that before she broke up with Tom Cruise to get away from it, so Dawson's Creek continues to live and breathe within this world. We met another Internet friend within the Rockefeller Center and it was beautiful, all this Internet happenstance happening around me, I don't think any of the surrounding humanoids knew what was going on next to them in the food court at Rockefeller Center, near the Starbucks: a collision of the Internet. A Collision of the Internet is going to be the title of my memoir, if anyone steals it, I'm suing for copyrighting purposes. Thanks in advance for whatever I purchase using the money from the lawsuit!

We found a subway and took it back to Shanna's, which I just (heartbreakingly) referred to as 'home' in my brain. So sweet. Then, the train, where a guy sitting beside Shanna gawked at us talking about not only funny things we read on the Internet, but Kevin Bacon, and how celebs really are "just like us." Someday, when I reach my celebrity, you are going to think, wow! Mary Gael Britton once walked outside with her skirt tucked into her underwear without knowing for at least 5 hours! She's just like me! I want you to know that no, I am not just like you, that is why I am (will be) a celebrity. You don't just get famous for being a regular human, otherwise, there'd be no point.

We got breakfast at midnight, I think, and played cards. There are approximately 56 diners on Long Island, and also, CVS and Dunkin Donuts, but before midnight, we played on the computer, called our moms (me and Rachel, anyway), watched Mean Girls, and sat gloriously. Also, we ate pasta for dinner. See, old age is already altering my memory. I just told things backwards and didn't even mention that the girls on the train next to us were 100% judging and making fun of us but what's the point? They were wearing fleeces in the city. We are fashion forward young women, the three of us, and well. We would never.

The diner was great and groovy and so was the rest of the evening but Sunday nights are always prickled with the sadness of upcoming Monday, and upcoming Tuesday, when we would say goodbye again until the summer, even though we Skype almost every night. It's not the same.

What is Long Island planning that it needs all these CVS pharmacies around? Or the Dunkin Donuts? Should a donutpocalypse descend and we find our world devoid of donuts, I'm pretty sure that Long Island will become Donut Island, you know what I mean? What I mean is that Long Island is hoarding donuts and pharmaceuticals and also shampoos and low-end makeup brands, and when the apocalypse descends, they will be the sole survivors.

Can I just say that being in huge malls reminds me of You're Invited to Mary-Kate and Ashley's Mall Party and I was a little disappointed that I didn't find them, like, I don't know, singing in the food court. Anyway, we went to this huge mall and I bought a sweater and we ate food court food and went to Hot Topic and F.Y.E. and had a blast. I have this thing where I have to either be driving or shot gun or I'd rather be flying on the end of the car holding on with my hands, you know? It's a control thing from being the youngest child or something. We left the mall, went to Target, sang our faves from the Wicked soundtrack and Shanna got lost again. We've realized she knows, like, maybe ten things out of one hundred.

At Barnes and Noble, later, I got tarot cards because I don't know I feel like I need them. Maybe someday I'll be the entertainment at children's parties (as if I'm not already!). I hate the ends of things, vacations and trips especially, and our little things we do now. We went to this swell British fake pub, in that it was a poser and we were still in the US and not in England like the pub might've suggested. In fact, it was actually a restaurant and Shanna bought us dinner like the good date she is and the mac 'n cheese was good and basically, that's it, besides 300 pictures on my computer's webcam and a fun game of Glee Scene It that I lost at, terribly. It took me a few tries to spell that word right.

This is all pouring out of me like lava this fine January evening and I wish time had stretched into years, then, in that city with those people, and I don't want to get overly sentimental but someday, I want to live in the city and be able to see them regularly. Or something. Anyway, we got up at five in the morning to go to the airport again and my flight was delayed and I was in that airport for 5ish hours but the point of this tale is that I'm here, despite the problems, I made it out alive.

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