Leaving, 6 days

Leaving home is always such a bitter-sweet experience. In front of me lies every opportunity in the world however, at home I'm leaving behind everyone who has helped shape me into wanting to reach for each of those opportunities. Being home for 3 weeks before starting this adventure was incredible.

It was spent under the incredible stress of Semester at Sea but counterbalanced with the carefree nature of some of the most amazing people in the universe who remind me what I'm doing is something so many wish they could do, but never have the chance to. I shouldn't need to be reminded of this but being home gives me the reassurance of the familial support that is sometimes the only thing holding me together when I feel like the stress is going to tear me apart.One of my main goals for the year was to be able to make my Mom and friends proud of me and what I am trying to achieve. I can never be thankful enough to my Mom for allowing me the opportunities of a life time and I can only hope she is proud of the person I am becoming in reaching as far as I can.

Most significant about being home was the ridiculous amount of love and support of my friends. Being from such a small, strange little place in Hawaii there are few people who venture out on ridiculously grand scales. They've made it known to me that they'll be there to support me through it all. Every slip and fall, all the not so shiny moments, through scolding, late night drives and sitting together in the nothingness that often envelopes our tiny little island. Through all of these things I am reminiscent of what makes home so special. It's in the ability to be non-reliant on material things and get back to having good conversations and creating our own good time. We all grow and do different things, we change. But when we come back together, its as if a day never passed. There is no judgement or time lost between people who're always in your heart.