In high school my friends and I would talk about how cool it would be to get a house and live together. Coming home from work to your favorite people every day, making dinner (and a mess), all squeezing onto our little couch and watching tv until we all fell asleep. And I thought about how it would be perfect and amazing in every way. Well now I’m living in a tiny apartment in a foreign country with 6 other people that I met a few months ago. Personal space isn’t a thing. I work next to them, I sleep next to them, I go out with them. We eat each other’s food, we wear each other’s clothes, we share everything. (Everything includes the stomach bug). Our power goes out a lot, and I make my calls home sitting on the washing machine in the bathroom because that’s where the wifi works. I don’t know the top 10 on the radio in Michigan and I miss my best friend playing with my hair. But living with them is so messy and fun and it’s even better than what I used to wish for. Yeah they aren’t the people I hand picked to live with, but I love living a life intertwined with theirs. We’re laying on the roof and watching the sky, cleaning the floors with fabric softener (improvising), and holding each other for as long as it takes when it’s been a bad day. Traveling abroad gets so glamorized, and I definitely had this idea of how my life would be while I was out of the states. But you’re still living your life. You still go to the grocery store and take naps and do the things you did back home. It’s just better burning dinner and deciding to just go get pizza when you get to do it with beautiful people.
