Paris, Finals, and the Holiday Season

The streets of Paris welcomed me into the open spaces between antique buildings covered in cobblestones. The Bouyoux family embraced me with smiles and fresh coffee, and Marko held my hand in the marketplace that is the Champs Elysses during the Christmas season. There were art, fine pastries, and champagne over the weekend, followed by a great Thanksgiving feast and lots of cookies in my home-away-from-home, then some more art and a night out with Angela before my very short but worthwhile journey in Paris was through.
I absolutely adored my time in the city of lights, which is a place that I hold very dear in my heart. All the good-byes and airplane stress were almost more than i could handle, but somehow life moved along, as it has a tendency to do in spite of my desire for it to pause from time to time. Thanksgiving with my family in New Hampshire and seeing my grandparents again was also very lovely, and one of my older brothers surprised us all by showing up in our driveway with a U-Haul attached to his sunny yellow Jeep and news of his permanent return from Colorado! It all went by very fast, and with a very large amount of food, then I was back on campus.
My finals were not as awful as I had been anticipating, and everything worked out in the end, even though I realized that a lot of my success over the last term was the result of luck. This term, I need to do more and push myself, but I've set myself up to do just that.
Over Christmas break, which was also went by with rapid speed before my eyes, was pure and wonderful. My family and a few friends passed many moments of joy with me, and life got to be simple during that brief time. Sleep, novels, shopping, celebrations, and happy movies were enjoyed thoroughly, completely, and often. Church with my parents on Christmas Eve was full of song, smiling children filled to the brim with anticipation for the coming morning, and warm hugs from the congregation. When I woke up on the big day, clad in the new pajamas my parents let me open the night before, the spirit of the season had fully awoken within our home. Sweets for breakfast, all of my brothers at the house, each of us opening our stockings and presents around the big, brightly decorated tree, and a complete, home-made turkey dinner, and nothing and no one forgotten or burnt or missing combined together to form one of the best holidays I've ever been blessed enough to have. In the afternoon, I finished reading "Finding Noel," which was a lovely story, and I passed the evening with my grandparents and old home movies. For the first time since I was much younger, the day felt magical and pure. It was the first perfect Christmas of my adult life.
Snowboarding with my dad and cousin a couple of times in the mountains was exhilarating, even if I did fall and look like an idiot one or twice. The "face-sized" cookies I remember from my childhood were still available at the lodge, and Daddy shared one with me on the way home. New Year's Eve was small and simple with a couple of old friends and the ball dropping at midnight. I had to get my wisdom teeth taken out a few days before my return. Coming back to college was a blur of laundry, packing, driving, and attempting to get myself and my things together upon arrival.
Now I'm back, and I'm no longer in any real pain nor am I puffy-cheeked as I was a few days ago. Life is moving more slowly again. This term is already packed full of courses I know I will enjoy, and I'm in the process of completing my transfer applications for a few of the schools in Boston so that I will have my options open when I figure out whether or not I belong here, which will only be determined with time. This place is a good place, it's just unfortunate that the size of its theatre department as well as the location are not what I feel I want or need at this point. All of this is confusing, my realities and my attempts at planning. All of it confuses me and sometimes leads me to feeling anxious.
For right now, I'm just trying to reflect and take it all in. The next couple of weeks will be very interesting. Between auditions, forcing myself into better study habits, new classes, transfer paperwork, and all the little readjustments that I have to make now that I'm back, it's going to be a lot of work. I'm determined to make myself proud of all I put my efforts into over the semester.