getting into the swing

the past 3 weeks have probably been the hardest of my life for various reasons...i left home for a strange country and a strange culture, and with it my family, friends, boyfriend, and the comfort they offer whether they mean to or not. everyone here was (and still is) completely amazing and helpful, not to mention that the land here is gorgeous - and yet i felt as alone and conspicuous as i´ve ever felt in my life. not an inspiring feeling when the only people you can talk to about it #1 probably don´t understand and #2 are 4000 miles away...well, that was the past 3 weeks anyway.

this past sunday marking the official close of my 3rd week here, i finally felt comfortable here, i realized. it was the craziest thing, just very sudden, you know? it´s like when you´re learning to drive and it never feels natural even though you know what to do until one day you just get in the car and it feels...right :) it was kinda like that. i´m a little disappointed because i thought myself to be more adaptable that this, it took way too long. i can´t help but ask myself "why?" but then realize that there´s more to it than me, there always is.

good thing, too :) i definitely don´t know everything, as evidenced by my failing to drink enough during and after 6 hours in the hot sun of a bahian beach on sunday...let´s just say i was very very sick yesterday, ha ha...i´ve realized that no matter how independent i think i am and how logical my ideas, i can´t do things alone, no one can. that´s what living the dream is, really.

i think my biggest misconception before coming to brazil was that "the dream" would be perfect, my experience here would be flawless, i wouldn´t feel a day of lonliness or sadness nor a twinge of misunderstanding...you know, perfect, as people usually assume dreams to be. that´s what we all mean when we say we want this "dream job" and that "dream guy (or girl for you guys, ha ha)," right? well, here´s the thing that has become very apparent to me over the past 3 weeks and that i think we´d all do well to realize so as not to have unrealistic expectations for ourselves and other people...dreams, when lived, will never be perfect - and that´s what makes them so amazing. if i had been dropped into this country and the second i hit the ground become brazilian, what good would that do me? i´d learn nothing, just go on as i do anyway and everything would work out...what kind of dream is that, to continue on as you have forever and ever and ever with no opposition to your point of view and therefore no motivation for it to expand?

it´s a type of irony then, i guess, that "living the dream" isn´t perfect, as i thought it would be...but it´s been more perfect for me than i ever could have imagined.

beijos :)