Exámenes matan

Remember when you were about 12 years old and your mom would come pick you up after a sleepover at a friend's house and you didn't want to leave so you'd hide in some ridiculous place like the pantry or the coat closet or just casually put a bag over your head (because obviously if you can't see mom, she can't see you)..? I think I'll be doing that, but on a much larger scale. I'm going to hide in Spain, and I wish Lara and Jake all the luck in the world trying to find me, because I am motivated dammit, and I will not be leaving. I'm not ready. I won't be ready next week or next month or next year. I am in love with this country. I love the cañas and the coffee and the culture and the chinos and everything else that apparently starts with C because I was on a roll there..

I will not, however miss the exams. You see, I've done it poorly. I have a flight out on the 14th, I finish exams on the 13th. I do not have time to lay around with my friends and just talk about nothing. I do not have time to go out with my flatmates or sit on the couch and watch stupid youtube videos and laugh. I do not have time to meet Alvaro for a beer or listen to new German music with Lara or sit around with Jake and throw things at him when he isn't looking. Spain is evil and drags exams out for a month long period of super much fun. I have completed my first two exams and am currently (not like right right now bc I'm typing this but like now-ish) studying for my second two, which are conveniently the most difficult classes I have ever taken in my life and happen to be in my second language. La vida is buena. Pray for me or send good vibes or whatever you're into bc I'm going to need all the help I can get.

So here is where my current conundrum is stemming from: I have 6 days left in Spain (unfortunately once you're under a week, it's hard not to subconsciously count the days, no matter how much it hurts). Mind you I really can't complain because I'm leaving and traveling and then heading to Germany for my internship BUT I will complain anyway because leaving Spain and Lar and Jake and my flatmates and amazing friends is going to rip out my heart and stomp all over it and you just cannot mentally prepare for that while also trying to study for two impossible freaking exams AND packing AND saying goodbye to everyone who leaves before you as our Erasmus numbers dwindle and there are only a few of us left AND try and stop at all your favorite places and get all your favorite coffees and cakes because no one makes coffee like Spain does AND try and see the few people who are left (I have basically moved in with Jake and Lar so as to spend as much time with them as possible before leaving) AND trying to maintain what little sanity I ever had claim to in the first place. Suffice it to say I'm just doing everything I can to keep my head above water. I. Am. Not. Ready. To leave.

I was living in  a solid state of denial until all the stuff I have to do came to the foreground of my life. Things like closing bank accounts and deep-cleaning my apartment and packing my bags and taking my exams have been dropped into my lap (I say all that as if I didn't know the end was near and it's taken me completely by surprise) but in all honesty it really has. It crept up on me out of nowhere. I remember getting here my first day and going grocery shopping with Ysa, waiting for Er and Jake to get to Murcia and meeting Er at Bicoca for coffee, a cafe I have now been to more times than I can count. I don't know how to leave this place that I have fallen so deeply in love with, but the promise I've made to myself that I will come back and live here is what has held me together thus far. I don't plan to live in Murcia again, there are too many wonderful memories and living here again would truly just tarnish everything this city means to me, but I know it will always hold a place in my heart and I could never even begin to forget what living in this country has done for me, and I plan to come back to live in southern Spain soon after graduation. Granted, I also plan to come back to live in southern Germany as well.. and I live in southern California...... Guess I have a thing for the South, what can I say.

Anyway, I guess this is the part where I go back to studying so that maybe I won't completely bomb my next two exams (Spanish Narrative Lit and Spanish Syntax and Semantics - life is good).

No word of the day because any word I gave you would have to do with medieval Spanish picaresque narratives and no one should have to suffer through this pain, so I leave you with my love and appreciation for reading this whole post, you're thebomb.com.

Xoxox mis amorcitos