| | THE LAST GERMAN POST--- TSCHÜß, BIS AMERIKA, KYLE
The days of Kyle's year of partying, drinking, shopping everyday, eating everything in sight, being treated like a baby but still having freedom, growing to learn about himself and other people, meeting some the the coolest people that he has met in his life, saying so many hurtful goodbyes, traveling around Germany and Europe, speaking German, learning so much more about the German culture and why the people are the way they are, realizing everything that he loves and hates about America, also realizing that not everybody wants to come to America, crying at times that he was depressed about going home and then crying later during the times that he didn't want to go home, and having that sense of having the control of anything and everything that he wants to do, will come to an end on Thursday, June 23, 2005. That date has been in my mind for the last three weeks and everyday as it comes closer and closer, I get more and more nervous, excited, depressed, and this feeling that is undescribable.
I cannot wait to get back to real life where you don't have to be a puppet, smiling and saying yes all day long. I want to be able to say no or be grouchi without feeling guilty or uncomfortable. I have enjoyed this year so much.... there is really nothing I could ever think of that will ever get to this level again in my life and I can accept that. That doesn't mean that I'm not going to give up on having a good time because I know that nothing will ever get close to my exchange year, but that's just it. Nothing will ever come close to this, bestimmt.
The tears will be shed so much in these next couple of days and the re-entry back into America is going to be a bitch, but that is just how it has to be. Everything like that is just making me so much more mature, stronger and flexible, and I love that. I can't believe that this one short year could have ever done 1/2 of the things that it has done to me. I know exactly what I want from life and I am not afraid to do what has to be done to achieve that. I love that feeling more than anything else I can think of. (Kyle rolling around in a room full of bright color polos from Tommy, Polo and Lacoste, while drinking a chai tea latte, and watching Paris Hilton checking herself out in the mirror, all while I am thinking about the greatest year of my life and listening to the EuroTour soundtrack-- that is the closest feeling I can describe in words, but still that is nothing compared to the previous feeling.) I have fallen asleep every night for the past month thinking one of two things: how depressed I am, wanting to cry because I feel like I am losing a part of me when I fly back to America, like nothing will ever be the same, the friends will forget you, the host parents will get too busy to keep in touch, the discos and cafes will change names and owners, and basically that my whole life will be shit for months... On the more pleasant nights, I think of how fucking proud I am of myself for not only just surviving one year in a foreign land, but making the best time of my life in one of the hardest, but also most rewarding, years of my life, accepting that it will never be the same, but at the same time loving how great I did and being happy that I even had the chance to make memories in Germany as an exchange student this year. That is one of those feelings that cannot be described by words.
The next time that I enter a post into my Xanga, I won't be able to say that I am an exchange student. I will have to say that I was an exchange student. I won't be able to speak German with everyone I meet. I can't eat Brötchen on Saturday afternoons, after sleeping in because I got back at 4 from Toxic the night before. I won't be able to skip all of my wonderful classes at the Gauß Schule and then wander into the city alone. I really won't get to eat cake and drink tea everyday at 4 in the afternoon with my host parents. But none of that matters to me, because I've all ready lived it. I've done it; it is over. I am so excited that I had the chance to make them. They are my memories of Deutschland and they will never be forgotten.
I made it. I accomplished it. I loved it and hated it. I would do it all over in a heartbeat, without question. I was an Outbound, an Inbound and I'll be a Rebound forever. I was a Rotary Exchange Student and will be one for the rest of my life. |
