I’m having a hard time with the whole idea of the race ending. It isn’t that I don’t want to go home and see all my friends and family. In fact I’m really looking forward to that moment as I’ve missed them a lot. I’m looking forward to eating the foods I’ve missed and I’m totally looking forward to the holidays. A few weeks ago I was sharing with someone about all our Christmas time traditions and I really became eager to be at home with my cousins making cookies at Gram and Pap’s house. I started to look forward to the Annual Cousin’s New Year’s Eve Bowling Tourney. And this may sound silly to some of you, but I also can’t wait to go home and see my dog and cat.
Yet, I don’t want to leave here either. Saying hello to home means saying good bye to life here and I’m not ready for that either. There are things I won’t miss, like sleeping on cold, hard airport floors, eating rice twice a day every day, mosquitoes and hot sweaty days. Although some of this I no longer deal with now that we are in Europe. What I will miss are the people and the memories we’ve made together. What I’m going to miss is my World Race family. I may have only known these people for nine months, but I love them as if I’ve spent a lifetime with them. When you live nonstop every day with someone you sort of grow to love them more than you think possible in a short time.
I have truly lived life with these people. We have laughed with one another, been mad at one another, cried with one another, struggled through life’s challenges together, shared hugs, food, clothes, bedrooms, cars, and most importantly life together and I’m not ready to say good bye yet. As nice as it will be to have my own bedroom at times and be able to easily have alone time when I want it, but I’m going to miss waking up each morning and sitting around eating breakfast with my team. I’m going to miss movie nights, and funny inside jokes. I’m going to miss sitting around just talking about life. I’m going to miss being surrounded by this community of people who I’ve grown to love so much.
