Thoughts Before Leaving

I apologize in advance for a relatively disjointed post, but I suppose I am leaving for London. Would you really expect anything else?

This is what the morning of departure looks like: apprehensive, with just a hint of the crazy eyes. 

The main thought as I begin the final few days before leaving for London is that I'm not sure they've arrived yet. The thoughts, I mean. I'm supposed to be having thoughts of the London variety, but actually I hardly ever think about London at all.

Or maybe that isn't necessarily true.

Maybe I do think about it, but not in the way that I used to. The phase of speculating about how my life will be seems to be over, as does the phase of idealizing the way things will be. I'm done imagining scenarios in which I get off the plane and first person I meet ends up being my future best friend or something. I no longer fantasize about meeting my favorite British celebrities. I also now understand that my academic life won't actually consist of a movie-esque "studying" montage, ending with me receiving an award for Year's Most Brilliant Master's Thesis. No, these thoughts don't really turn up much anymore.

Now when I think about London, it takes the form of thoughts like: what bank should I choose? Are these shoes actually worth packing? Can I afford this? (No.) Do I have any idea how to get to my flat? (Again, no.) Is this a good idea? (I certainly hope so.)

Another common thought: I would like to be a college freshman again. Then I remind myself that - apart from being older and having better hair and immediate plans to move to another country - I'm in essentially the same position as I was four years ago. I'm starting over, just as I was then, and everything that now brings forth these feeling of nostalgia was, at that point, a total unknown. All the people I was about to meet, all the things I was about to do - I couldn't even conceive of them as we drove the hour and a half from my hometown to Ann Arbor, and I cried the whole time.

So far I haven't cried once about the impending London trip, and I'm not even feeling particularly nervous. If there's going to be fear, it generally sets in late at night and is always accompanied by these images of me wandering lost around London with more luggage than I can handle. Then I force myself to think about something else.

UPDATE (on the morning of departure): Well, I cried, but then I got through the part where I had to say goodbye to my family and remembered that I still have a working knowledge of how to be a self-sufficient grown-up. I mean, sort of. There is still a 50/50 chance that I will have a breakdown at the airport (sadly, this had happened before). Possible breakdown aside, I think I'm fine.

There's a long day of waiting ahead of me, followed by a long night of flying, followed by London.

I'm pretty sure this is a good idea.

Hometown Touristing

Sometimes I wonder if my use of the word "hometown" to describe Ann Arbor is a misnomer. I was born here but didn't grow up here; I attended college here but moved back into my parents' house directly following graduation. I suppose this is really an issue of not quite knowing where I live anymore. Is my home where I'm living at the moment? The "permanent address" I list on official forms? The place I'm moving to in about two months? Honestly, I think the answer is none of these - not entirely anyway. This is the summer of self-imposed rootlessness. You see, I could have a place that I fully consider my home, but I'm choosing not to, mainly for fear of becoming too attached to something I have to leave. 

This is getting too sad. 

Regardless, I'm back in Ann Arbor for a few days, and I'm just now realizing how much I missed this place. I missed being surrounded by people my own age; I missed the abundance of coffee shops, the student-oriented restaurants, the campus buildings - practically all of which I can point to and say, "I had a class in there once." The benefit of being back here without any real purpose is that I can finally do all the things I was too busy for while still a student. It's going to be Tourist Day, Part 2. What is Tourist Day? Well, allow me to explain.

A Brief History of the Original Tourist Day: this is a holiday that my friend and I celebrated when we had officially completed all of our college classes. Basically it consisted of walking around, taking pictures of everything even slightly meaningful, eating in a restaurant we both love but never really go to, and trying a new coffee shop. The logic behind it is kind of obvious: we wanted to do the fun things in this town before leaving it forever. Not that we didn't have any fun during four years of college...

As the shirt above may have informed you, Ann Arbor is not entirely real. This doesn't mean that it's a cardboard city they disassemble every night (although I'm convinced that those exist - some towns are just too perfect), it just means that Ann Arbor doesn't have things like bad neighborhoods - at least not that I've seen - and the city's general population tends to be fairly young and well-educated. It's something of an anomaly. And, yes, sometimes I do feel like I spent my college years living in a fantasy world. Not that I'm complaining. 

I must say that a fantasy world appears more fantastical when you are free of all responsibility, and during those first few minutes of Tourist Day sightseeing, Ann Arbor looked ridiculously beautiful.

This is Nickels Arcade. I once heard that there aren't many of these left in the world, although I can't seem to find confirmation on the internet. Oh, internet, why do you fail me just when I need you most? Kidding, kidding. 

Most of Tourist Day consisted of wandering around, since there turned out to be very little actual sightseeing to be done in a city where I had lived for four years. Still, we did hit some tourist sites: the Arcade, the Cube (see below), the graffiti alley (likewise). 

The Cube. It spins. 

The Graffiti Alley

For me, though, the highlight of Tourist Day was, of course, the food. We went to Fritas Batidos, which is one of my favorite Ann Arbor restaurants. My roommates and I call it "The Cuban Place," although it apparently isn't a Cuban restaurant - just Cuban-inspired - and I sometimes call it "That White Place" because it's very white inside. Have a look:

In the interest of full disclosure, I should say that I have only ever ordered one thing here: the black bean frita with muenster cheese. I don't need to try anything else on the menu because this meal is perfect. It's basically a black bean burger served on a brioche roll with fries on the inside. Yes, the fries are part of the sandwich. And I know that this sounds like a fairly ordinary meal, but just trust me, there's something about it. Something addictive. Something that will keep you awake the night before a trip to Fritas Batidos thinking about it. Sadly, during this trip to Ann Arbor, I don't expect to make a return trip there. I can't afford such luxuries as restaurant food. I guess these are the trials of recent graduate/future grad student life. 

Don't pay too much attention to me. I'm just being melodramatic.