I have been waiting for a conclusive moment to put the bookend upon my journey. I think that it has come with transcripts, midterms, and the fresh suburban air of Doylestown. Even while giving a presentation to prospective study abroad students I felt like I was still processing the experience and knew that what light I could shed for them would barely give them any insight into what lies ahead. The experience is unique for each individual. I have kept in touch with two dear friends from the trip and love that we can share that time together as well as our new lives. As with entering Madrid, I am not suffering from any sort of culture shock on my return. I think that cultures are interesting but life itself is what causes the shock for me. I am faced with new ideas to ponder, new arguments to pursue, and new conflicts to confront regardless of my present culture. Perhaps it is just the unending process of growing up, but I have been realizing that life is hard. Saying it is hard makes the assumption I thought it would be easy which I indeed subconsciously constructed and now must reconstruct. This trip helped me along on that process of reconstructing the thoughts and assumptions I had made. Life is begining to look more complex than I had ever imagined. I am hardly finishing a journey at all as new and unobserved experiences confront me daily. And so I press on.
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