Goodbyes and Such

(this blog post is being written as I am on my first flight to Dallas)

I had a day and a half of notice. Let me say that one more time… a day and a half. I figured that would be a good time to start saying some goodbyes. My best friend Halie and I went out to our old high school to pick up her sister and while we were there I said some goodbyes to my past teachers and fellow graduating students. That night I went to my last rotary meeting. I got to say one last thank you and goodbye to all the wonderful Rotarians in my club. I also had to say bye to our new Turkish exchange student in Armstrong, Zeynep. Zeynep if you are reading this, have an amazing year in Armstrong, it truly is a wonderful community and I know with your personality you will make lots of friends. I wish you good luck with my family, they are a little strange but you’ll get used to it I promise! Next I had to say bye to John. That was actually really weird for me because he has helped me with everything along this process so I was kind of like “what am I going to do without John, ahh!?!”

My last night in Armstrong I had a bunch of friends come over to hang out one last time and say bye. It was honestly so much fun and I am so thankful to have such amazing friends. At about 11:30 night that we all decided to go for one last Denny’s date. So 9 of us hopped in our vehicles and headed to Denny’s only to find out the kitchen was closed so we couldn’t order food. We decided to just go to Mcdonalds instead because nothing else was open at midnight haha. After we ate our food, we went to the parking lot where Austin and I had a “twerk-off” on his car. Yes, a “twerk-off”. And yes, I won.

We got back to my house around 1am and I had to say bye to Austin. Halie and Nathan came inside for a while just to hang out a little longer. Halie left around 3:00 but I said bye to her the next day. Nathan stayed til about 4:15am! We were both so tired but I’m really glad he stayed.

The next day I woke up, brought my uniform to work, picked up my check and figured out my last minute paperwork that I needed to bring. I got to talk on the phone with my Grandparents that live in Ontario which was really nice J. Then it came the time to head up the road to my other Grandparents house where I had to drop off my two dogs and say goodbye. I can’t even explain how hard that was for me. As I sat down to hold and kiss my puppies one last time for a year, I instantly started crying. I hugged them at least 60 times before I could actually get myself out the door. I continued to cry as I said bye to Grandma and Grandpa. We went back home after that, packed the rest of my stuff, locked my suitcases and loaded the truck. Halie came over right before we left to say bye and we had one last sushi date. My god I love her. Then we were off. Family road trip time. We drove for 5 hours until finally reaching our destination: Richmond! We got to the hotel, which was only a 5 minute drive from the airport, and then headed out for a nice family dinner. It was wonderful. Back at the hotel we just hung out in the room as a family, laughing, talking. I was so exhausted so we ended up going to bed at only 10.

Today. Today is September 12 and it is the day that I said my tearful goodbye to my family. We got up, drove to the airport, got my bags checked, then had a very quick breakfast. Then it was time to say goodbye because I had to line up to get through customs. We all started crying (except dad) pretty much immediately. I cried the whole way through the lineup. I breezed through customs fairly quickly actually so I was pretty happy! I found my gate right away, sat down, turned on my laptop. The background was a picture of my parents and me at prom. I started crying again.. ughh.

Finally I am sitting on the plane typing this all out even though it won’t be posted until I have wifi. I gotta say though, the view from the plane as we were flying over Vancouver and then over the mountains was one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. I am so proud to live in such an amazing country.

I do believe that is all I have to say for the time being so until next time, tchau.