After very little, if any, sleep I began my final hours in London. We woke up at 5:30 a.m. to be ready for our bus to pick us up at 6:00 a.m. When we woke up, we looked out our window to see the first snow fall of the year.
After scurrying about to throw our final things in our bag it was finally time to say goodbye. At the time it really didn’t even feel like we were leaving. The whole London experience was surreal. The fact that I had been dreaming about studying abroad my whole life had finally become a reality and that reality was about to come to a close. It is really impossible to put into words how I was feeling. The only people who can truly grasp how it felt to leave were those surrounding me. We had shared in an incredible three months together and made our stay in London an experience that none of us will soon forget.
After packing up the bus and having a mini snowball fight, we took one last view of our flat and headed onto the bus. Jeana was staying in London with her family, so she tearfully hugged everyone goodbye before heading to the tube. During all of these moments I thought I would be bawling my head off, but surprisingly it felt like it wasn’t even happening. I don’t think I came to terms with the fact that we were actually leaving until we finally landed in Indy.
Our bus shuttled us to the airport for our last drive through the city of London. It was about a 45 minute ride, and being as it was 6:00 a.m. you would think we would all want to sleep but we were pretty alert the entire way. Denise went with us to the airport and informed us on the way that Nathan had lost his very first tooth the night before!
When we arrived at the airport, we took one last look back at London, even though we were away from the city, and said our final goodbye. After checking all of our bags in (and I was lucky because mine was overweight but they let it slide) we went to sit and wait for our plane to board. When we were able, we boarded the plane and Ashlin and I did some seat trading so we could sulk next to each other for the long ride home.
During the flight we watched movies and napped on and off before landing in Chicago. Everyone was ecstatic to be back on U.S. soil. I’m not sure I was ecstatic as the rest of the group, but it was good to be close to home after a long day of travel. Unfortunately we still had lots of waiting to do before we would make it home.
Our flight to Indy was delayed and then delayed again. Finally we were able to board to plane, only to wait for about an hour before we were cleared to take off. This put us way behind schedule and everyone was getting pretty antsy to just get home, me included. I did nap a bit on this plane, hoping to pass the time quicker, but it didn’t do much good. Eventually we were cleared for takeoff and off we went.
We landed in Indy and met up with Ashlin and her family and friends as they said their hellos. Once we grabbed our luggage and all said our final goodbyes, it was time to make the drive to Indy, where I would finally get to see my sister after three long months. When we landed in Indy, the reality of being home had finally hit and I was ready to just be with my sister. The drive home felt like forever, even though it helped listening to glee on the way home :)
After 9:00 I was dropped off at my sister’s apartment and able to finally give her the big hug I had been waiting for. We grabbed my luggage out of the van and headed inside to eat the mac & cheese she had made me for dinner :)
Since I had seen my parents in London just the week before, I was spending the rest of the week in Muncie with my sister and catching up with friends. I couldn’t think of any easier way to transition than by surrounding myself with people I loved :) I was home sweet home!
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