Time.

Time is, at once, our worst enemy and a precious commodity.

On the one hand, it never goes fast enough. Half of it is spent waiting – counting the seconds for class to end, dreading an upcoming driver’s test, hoping for the pain of heartbreak to ease up.  The other half is spent doing exactly what we don’t want to be doing… or at least dreaming about something we would rather be doing. We always think to ourselves that if we just make it through this moment, now, the next one will be better.

Time is a to-do list that never ends until we die, and it is the constant reminder that we aren’t as young as we used to be.

But then again, time seems to be that one thing that none of us can get enough of. We hit the snooze button for just a few more minutes of calm before the storm, safe and warm under our layers of fleece and cotton comforters. We look into the azure-green eyes of our lover and wish that somehow, in any way possible, we could capture this moment and re-live it for the rest of our lives.  Time is the laughter lines around our mouths.  It is the sweetness of melted ice cream and the changing of summer to fall. It is the wish of those who will soon know nothing but blackness, and time is something that remains a mystery to the scientific community of the only species on Earth who have ever been capable of reading a clock.

The product of time is all of us.

Time has been, as of recently, my number one best friend and most detested rival. I want so much more of it, and yet I hate it for going by so quickly. I swear it was only yesterday that I arrived in Dublin with Jessica, and only a few hours ago when I stepped off the train into Rennes for the first time. Forty five minutes ago, I was in Paris with Antoine. Within ten I completed my semester finals… and I’m about to do them all over again.

When I first thought about moving abroad for eleven months, I told myself that it would seem like an eternity. Now that I am almost to the end of my stay, however, I can safely say that it is not… and the day that I have to walk on that plane to go home will be here only too soon.

And what about all of those places I didn’t visit, those things I didn’t see? What about those people I will never meet, or those events I will not be able to participate in when I am gone? Why can’t it all SLOW DOWN so that I can just look on for a little while? The harsh lines of endless urban sprawl, traffic, and the distant Rockies will soon envelope me, and I will no longer be looking over the peaceful stone chimneys, soft grey, and shocking green of Bretagne.

All of a sudden, everything I do here in Rennes seems precious. Even going out for a kebab and fries is monumentally important, because I know it may very well be one of my last. Walking through the Saturday morning market only becomes more magical and bustling, and spending an evening at a crêperie seems nothing less than divine. Class turns into less of a nuisance and more of a blessing -- because I will never have the ability to sit in the lecture halls of a French grande école ever again. 

In a mere three days, I’ll be flying to Haarlem and Amsterdam to spend the weekend. Just a week after, I jet off on my last major European voyage before finals, and my return home to the States in June.

So I am sorry, dear friends and family, for not writing a blog post for more than month….

I guess I was just looking for a bit more time.

D