The Final Stretch | WOU Students Abroad

(Written Friday Dec. 4, 2015)

Next week is my last in Dublin and I couldn’t be more sad to be leaving or more ready to be home and see my family and friends. I’m sure it’s been used a hundred times before to describe the end of this kind of experience, but it truly is bittersweet. I could really live here, I really feel like I do, in fact, and so I feel a bit like leaving a home. I find myself with more places to call home as I get older and I absolutely love it. I’m more confident now more than ever that I am capable of making myself comfortable somewhere I never before thought possible. That’s just one of the many things I’m taking with me from Ireland.

So, my last few weeks in Ireland have been going well, but noticeably different from all the weeks before. Mainly, I’m stressed, and because I have more school work than the rest of the term combined all to do in these final three weeks. The first of those three was mostly occupied showing my visiting friend Heather around Dublin and Ireland, and the rest of the week spent recovering from those fun and exhausting five days. Now I’m at the end of the second week and can confidently say, most of my work now remains to be completed my final week here. If all else fails, I have a cushion of one week between the time I leave and the time most assignments are technically due. Thank goodness for the internet.

So between stressing about semester finals and packing three months of things back into my suitcase (I tried but did not do well “packing light” as was suggested, and I knew I’d regret it–and I do), I still want to get out and see some things, but that isn’t really happening. I’m learning to be okay with that though, and we’ve now planned our last few plays and free days. Thursday night we went to our farewell dinner with our program and program coordinator. It was nice and we went to a great new pub which made me realize, or remember that there is still so much to explore in Dublin. I think I could live here another month and never go to the same place if I tried. I haven’t decided yet whether that’s exciting, or makes me feel unaccomplished in my explorations these months.

Later, in our last week…

We visited the Rock of Cashel…