Documenting Your Life

It's an interesting thing, to have spent a whole year documenting as much as I can about my life. What's most interesting to me is going back and reading some of what I've had to say. Between my blog and my journal, there's a lot to see.

I had this question posed by my director a couple of weeks ago in a meeting: how have you changed since you arrived here? I told her I wasn't really sure how to word it, that I could feel that I'd changed and that people have told me they've seen a change in me. But then the idea hit me to go back and read to see who I was then and compare it to who I am now.

My first blog post was a year ago today, I can't even begin to describe how crazy that feels, to know a year ago this moment I was sitting at home on my couch, typing away, anticipating what was to come in just 33 days. It's not a year later, and I'm astounded at how fast it has gone. Part of me is still amazed that I'm even here, and that I lived this experience.

And look at what I had to say! I was worried about the money, that turned out to be a very valid concern as I've battled that issue between my own personal funds and my impending student loan payments practically since the moment I got here. But, everything worked out much better than I ever anticipated. Imagine that.

My other concerns didn't pan out to be issues at all once I was here and into it. It was almost seamless for me to move in with and become a part of this community. I've never once felt like an outsider or like I wasn't a major part of everything. The age difference didn't seem to exist, as one sister put it "you two are ageless, you just work well with everyone." What a compliment!

Being further from home than ever turned out to not be so bad, my family was able to come visit me a couple of times, and I made a couple of trips home. I miss my family, I miss my dog and my friends from home, but I've found a place where I belong here in Erie. I'm close enough to home that visits have been decently easy. And clearly living down here hasn't bothered me much if I'm moving into an apartment down here in a couple of weeks. I mean it when I say I feel like I have a family here too, these women are here to support me and be there for me if I ever need anything. I'm sure it has to make my mom feel better about her oldest child moving away :)

So this sounds too much like a wrap up, like I'm signing off at the end of this wild year as it draws to a close in less than two weeks now. But it's not, I promise. There's still more fun to be had here in the last week and a half, and I plan on writing about all of it, these last days are some of the most important, I want to capture all I can.

And I don't think I'll stop writing when this year draws to a close. Why not keep it up, it's not like I'm done growing and learning as soon as I walk out of these doors. Now the challenge will be seeing how I take all of this and use it in my day-to-day life back outside of these walls.

I've had too much fun keeping this blog and sharing this part of my life with everyone. It's still amazing to me that so many people read this and that I've had so many visitors come up to me and say "It's nice to finally meet you, I've been reading about you all year." I'm grateful to my readers for hanging in there with me, supporting me and praying for me all this time. Thank you, a million times over :)