I have been doing a terrible job with this whole "blog" thing. It's just that the deeper into the semester I get, the more things I have to share with everyone, the more overwhelmed I get by trying to process them. I'll try.

First of all, I'm not sure how I missed this fact during the first month or so of my journey, but Paris is incredible. After travelling to other parts of Europe (that's an entire other post, definitely) I realized that I chose exactly the right place to be for this semester. There is so much to do and the city has so much to offer, that for maybe the first time in my life - I am in complete control. What I want to get out of my abroad experience is entirely in my own hands, and no one is holding my hand and taking me on tours of the city every day. Paris is my city to discover for the time being, and it seems like every day has something exciting waiting in some small alley of a quaint Parisian street corner. I'd never been much of a museum go-er, mostly out of circumstance - the only museum in Portland that ever interested me was OMSI, and that was because I got to play with all of the toys in the boat room or the Dr. Seuss exhibit. But here, where there are too many museums to see even over a five month period, I can't get enough. I love the food, the theatre, the architecture - it's like a treasure chest of culture.

Strangely enough, many of these revelations come as winter rears it's ugly head. Normally, I am a member of the Seasonal-Affective-Disorder Club, complaining about cold and rain to no end. Something about Paris lends itself to a gloomy climate, though - looking out at the Eiffel Tower on a thick foggy day is almost better than blue skies... one can see the appeal for the moody and artistic writers that flock to Paris during winter to sip on cafés and smoke cigarettes, if I were writing a memoir I'd do it here, too.

I realize that I have less than two months left abroad before, whether I like it or not, I'll be on a plane home. Admittedly, during the first month or so in France, I dreamt about that trip home, the time when I would reunite with my friends and rave about how much better home is than Paris. Somehow, slowly but surely, I've arrived in an entirely new place: I am happy where I am. That sounds simple enough, but for me it means everything - having a positive attitude about what I am feeling and experiencing, the people I surround myself with, and knowing that when I return home and back to Vassar, I will be confident in what I am doing because of what I learned here. At the very least, I won't be afraid to go to French class anymore.

I guess what it comes down to is that finally, I know I will be sad to leave.