The Art of Finding Yourself

These past few months have been filled with many "firsts" for me. First time in a foreign country. First time being single since preschool (maybe not really but that's what it feels like). First time kissing a boy who didn't speak the same language as me (literally, not figuratively). First time feeling truly alone.

There I was, my bags of clothes, books and toiletries spilling out all over the floor, my shoulders aching from the heavy load, sitting on the uncomfortable European mattress, listening to the first silence I had heard in weeks. When the taxi dropped me off, I thought he had gotten the wrong address. I was at a bar, miles from the center of town. He assured me this was my hotel and I was ushered inside where I tried to communicate with the waitress who spoke about as much English as I speak German. She showed me to my room up the tiny spiral staircase and I gratefully locked the door behind her and collapsed onto my bed. It was then that it hit me. I had been traveling the last 36 hours and had not had time to absorb that I was completely alone, in a country where I didn't speak the language and I knew no one. I suddenly felt overcome with grief and for the first time since I got on the plane in San Francisco three weeks earlier, I felt scared.

It was just getting dark when I arrived. Too early to go to bed, but too late for me to safely maneuver through a town I had never been to before. I tried to fill the silence by turning on the tv. The German language dubbed over the American television only angered me. I longed to hear anyone speaking English. I missed my new friends from school. All I wanted was to connect to someone.

This wasn't a new feeling that had suddenly appeared for the first time. I've been spending my entire life trying to connect to those around me. The majority of these connections end poorly for me, with those I trust pulling the rug out from under me just when I start to settle in. I had spent the few months prior to going abroad trying to learn how to be content with just myself. I read more. I spent more time alone. I went out with friends who I had spent too little time with in previous months. I felt so independent and so prepared to "find myself", but when I put myself in a situation where I would learn more about myself than I ever had before, it terrified me. I finally realized while sitting on the bed in Dachau, with Family Guy playing in German in the background, that my months of soul searching led me to the inescapable fact that I have no idea who I am, and I'm not ready to define myself. I felt like by figuring out who I am meant putting myself in a box and sealing it up; there's no changing who you are once you go down that path. Perhaps I'm just scared that once I figure out who I am I won't like what I find but regardless, I know that I create my own destiny and as cliche as it is I am the one who gets to decide who I become. No amount of bad parenting and poor choices can take that away.

Now that I'm back home I've decided I'm in no hurry to find myself. I know where I am today and I know where I'm going tomorrow and that's enough for me.