Fear: The Key to Some Little Things I Call Dreams

So I realize I have been horrible at posting to this blog yet again! I am not going to make any promises that I will be better at posting, but I will try once again to post more often. I get so caught up in my school work that I put this as a last priority, when in reality, I should be putting this higher up in my priorities because it gives me a chance to write freely, without any fear of my writing being graded. I can hardly believe that it's almost February, and at the same time I can't believe February hasn't come around yet. It seems like as I get older, the years go by faster and faster.

So many of my close friends are getting engaged, and I'm happy for them, but it's quite unsettling to me. Of course I'm very happy for them, but it makes me feel uncomfortably grown up, which is a feeling that I've never quite gotten used to no matter how many times I am forced to acknowledge it. My mom just laughs at me, telling me that I am still so young and I have nothing to worry about. Of course I know she is right, but there's a side of me that realizes that I am grown up and I can now realize the dreams I have been waiting my whole life to achieve, but I'm letting myself down. I have so many plans and dreams that I am scared to reach for; scared, because for the first time in my life I might actually achieve them. Scared, because now that I might actually achieve them, I have the possibility of failing to achieve these same dreams; dreams that I have spent years building and dreaming and planning for. I am afraid to go out in the world alone, away from those I love, yet I have dreamed so often of freedom and independence and adulthood.

One of my dreams has been to go to Europe. Ever since I could remember, I have dreamed of London, Paris, Rome, Athens, Copenhagen, and numerous other cities that I have only ever read about in books and pointed at on maps. I finally decided to apply to a study abroad for this summer, and if I get in, I plan on visiting Great Britain for a month and a half. It is probably one of the most frivolous thing I could do financially, but one of the most imperative things I could do to feel alive, learned, and happy. I can almost see the iconic Big Ben before my eyes, and it is just in reach, if I can get into my program. I have to wait a whole week to find out, but I am so excited. The Old World has never been this tangible, this close.