It was a difficult decision, but at the same time it was an easy one. I've been in a bit of a funk lately. Prague has been eating away at my sanity...nowhere green to explore, no good places to run, breathing the filthy air, riding the dark underground metro everday. It's had it's good moments...Mia and I exploring last Saturday night, looking for a decent pub, not returning home until 3:30am. The zoo, my Turkish cafe, the small internet cafe where a glass of wine costs $1. It's been an up and down experience here to say the least.
The teaching has been the same. Some days I get excited about it, other days I ask myself why i wanted to do this in the first place. I don't have much of a choice at this point...I'm good at it, so I might as well put my energy into it while I'm here and see what happens.
I realized this morning that every time I've traveled somewhere before, I've had a definite return date and some concrete plan to return to. This time, I didn't have that. I left for Sweden, and ultimately to Prague without so much as a return airplane ticket, and it got me all out of whack. I didn't realize it until this morning. I've been so obsessed with trying to figure out what the future would bring that I neglected to live my life in the present. This is part of the reason i decided to head off to Vienna tomorrow...at least I have something to look forward to, am on the move again to see a new place and have some new experiences.
When I made the decision to return home, a lot changed. I feel like I am freer now to experience life here, knowing I'll be returning to something familiar in the future. Jen has already told me I'm welcome to return to the Woodwind family, and I can't wait to go back there. I thought it would be cool to skipper a catamaran in the Caribbean, but what could possibly be better than sailing on the fastest sailboat on the Bay with your best friends, everyday, while living half a mile from the center of my favorite town on earth. Um, not much.
So my spirits have lifted. I'm lucky that I realized this now while I still have two weeks remaining in Prague. I actually can't wait to hop on that train tomorrow and enjoy the 4 hour ride through the countryside to a new city I can explore. I've been reading up on it tonight in a guidebook that I found in my apartment, and I definitely have to go to one of the outlying wine gardens. I only wish Nate and Ryan were here so we could reminisce about the Finger Lakes.
