One day more

^ Like the Les Mis song. Breaking out of Rockville. Jubilant chorus playing in my head 24/7. So excited I can hardly eat (abnormal, to say the least) or sleep.

My brother asked me today if I was worried about flying. It made me think...and I think the answer is yes, but not for the actual being in the air part. More for the not getting lost in the airport part. I love traveling -- the getting there part of it of course, but also (and maybe more than the getting there) I love the physical experience of traveling. Especially traveling where someone else is controlling the vehicle (carpooling, trains, subways, you get the idea. I tend to be a little too absent-minded to drive reliably). Thinking about what could be ahead, immediately romanticizing everything that's happened in the place I just left, reading and not feeling bad about "wasting time" because there's nothing to do and nowhere to go except onward, people-watching like it's my job...it's weird, but I do all of these things when en route to wherever, and they make me happy. Content. At peace with my limbo, in-transit place in the world, which in and of itself is a thrilling state to be in, because I really wanted to I could change my plan, blip off of the designated path, go anywhere and do anything. So even though the last time I was on a plane was when I was three and it's not an experience I can remember, I think it'll go okay. I'll probably flip a shit at the fact that I'm FLYING OVER THE OCEAN and then sleep until Madrid like the overgrown, over-excitable child that I am.

I can't wait for tomorrow. I can't wait to see what it will be like. I feel extraordinarily lucky that I am able to go, and when I say lucky I mean it truly does feel like luck. Like not something I earned or deserve or anything like that -- it feels like lottery-winning, $20-in-your-coat-pocket-finding, getting-helped-by-the-generous-lady-in-line-at-Chipotle dumb luck. Everything has a tenuous, unreal quality to it. If the whole thing were to fall down around my ears tomorrow -- say, if Spain stopped existing or I began waking up from a series of Inception-like dreams -- I think I would weirdly understand. This is too good to be true.

Goodbye, Maryland. Goodbye, east coast. Goodbye, a lot of American things I probably won't miss until I leave and then realize I don't/can't have them. Goodbye, Abby, loyal canine companion, who is alas about 80 pounds too heavy for my carry-on. Goodbye, English (must stick to the no-English resolution. I must.). Goodbye, sweeteners in my coffee and the dim possibility of snow and the drive to do homework. Goodbye, driving on the right side of the road. Goodbye, eating dinner at six. And so on.

Bye.

*1/16: so they drive on the same side of the road. oops.