Day 325: A Broad Abroad

Me. A broad abroad. With my Scottish broad, Nat.

Is what I'll be for less than two weeks, now.
And the bitter sweetness of that phrase is being swallowed like the six-year-old me taking her nasty pink stomach medicine. Whatever that stuff was, it didn't want to go down.

I had a nice coffee date with my dear friend Lena the other day, and we chatted about Aberdeen. And leaving. Aside from the friends, the faith, and all the experiences I've gained since I've been here, it hit me that Aberdeen, the city itself, has become so important to me as well.
Everyone has a hometown, maybe not the place they were born and maybe not the place they actually spent most years of their childhood, but a place they affiliate most closely with their formative years, and when they imagine themselves as a kid, this place is the place that rings out in memory.
For me that is obviously Virginia Beach, I was lucky enough to not be one of the many military kids in the area, and, born and bred, my years from 0-17 were spent full time in this city. I'll always love VB. It was always my home and, in a sense, always will be. I grew up in the ocean, with salty blood, gifted from a mother who grew up on the Gulf in Louisiana and the east coast of Florida and a dad who had me swimming and body surfing with him from as early as I can remember. Attempting to avoid cliches, and failing, it's just true that the ocean will always be part of my identity, especially the part of the Atlantic which extends its kiss to the sand from Kitty Hawk, NC to 87th St, VB.

North End shortly after sunrise

S-turns' clouds

My second home came through college, at the beautiful University of Mary Washington. Three years spent here made for some great times, where I made lifelong pals, went through some of the hardest struggles of my life, truly sledded for the first time in my life, and earned my first degree. The cherry blossoms and brick buildings of downtown Fredericksburg make it a hard place to dislike. But I think I always saw it transitionally, figuring I would never settle there, and so even through multiple years of living and loving there, the idea of "home" never manifested fully.

Fred is pretty doe

Campus in the fall and spring. Buonissimo

Kyle, Kyle, Chelsea, and me. So college. Love.

I came to Aberdeen, Scotland almost a year ago, knowing nothing of the city, of the university I was about to attend, or even of Scotland in general. But after everything these past days, weeks, months have brought, I now find myself walking, or riding my bike, down the streets, seeing things with such familiarity, and attaching certain thoughts and ideas with specific scenes and distinct flashes of memory from my time here, that this blink of a year feels like it's held so much more of my life than it possibly could have.
In my independence I became dependent upon this city. I needed it to provide me with friendship, community, food, education, maturity, resilience, newness and pavement for the path that is to come. It did.
And so as I begin to pack and actually prepare to leave, my heartbeat quickens into the familiar beat which came after every summer when I'd have to leave my beach, my ocean, to head back inland for college, the anxious beat that comes when leaving Home. This is the first place that is my home not because my parents happened to choose it as a place to raise their children, but because I had to make it one.

Nat, Sean and David Bowie last week. Open Mic at Musa was for some reason also playing labyrinth on the wall?

Three priest cyclists who stayed at my flat for a night before flying back to continental Europe after a tour around Scotland.

The French-Canadian cyclist, Eric, who stayed with me the night after the priests. Hope he enjoyed that night of karaoke. Woop!

And I'm listening to Tom Jones right now. What better way to shoot back to childhood, eh? (Oh that's not normal for most kids my age? Oops--First CD. My man. TJ.)
Song of the day: The Green Green Grass of Home, Tom Jones: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSajFnkUxQY