Because my classes start in March and because of my general antipathy to structured studying environments, instead preferring to soak up lots of information and study quite a lot on my own, I have profited from having a yet further-extended break. What this is elaborately worded text for is to say that I've had plenty of time to party, be a tourist, and generally act like a philistine live out all of the moments that are less befitting of my academic character than otherwise. It's not so much that I've made poor judgments or anything, but I may or may not have accidentally walked into a pole on the street. Twice. Nor am I wasting away the time completely, studying Portuguese a little bit every day and continuing to read, albeit at a reduced pace from before. Before the break started though, because I would be lying right to your face if I laid claim to reading even a full book during my break before coming here.
Everything feels sort of like life blew up and confetti has come down in its place, nothing particularly organized and everything scattered about just waiting for me to clean it all up, piece by piece, one thing at a time. I went almost immediately from living a stable domestic life, spending more time than not with a partner doing things like tending home and seeing movies, getting breakfast with my mother on Sundays, and other things that are terribly boring except for those living and accustomed to doing them on a routine basis to partying perhaps a little too hard the night I got here, becoming a tourist, and fumbling my way through a language my brain only understands well half the time. Studying in the very concentrated and intensive way that I had been doing all through the last semester would be an exercise in futility at this point, and it was not on accident that I chose my courses so that I could start later and put more effort into them when I am better equipped to do so. I can only handle so much at one time – even my room took two weeks to get completely organized. My spirit is still confused.
I feel stagnant at times and overwhelmed by things to do at others, and sometimes I have days where I step back and take a breather and things seem just fine. Mostly I pinch myself just to make sure I'm actually experiencing all of these things, because sometimes it feels like I'm watching it on a movie screen. I'll leave you with a panorama from one of the days I finally got to breathe for a moment.
Everything feels sort of like life blew up and confetti has come down in its place, nothing particularly organized and everything scattered about just waiting for me to clean it all up, piece by piece, one thing at a time. I went almost immediately from living a stable domestic life, spending more time than not with a partner doing things like tending home and seeing movies, getting breakfast with my mother on Sundays, and other things that are terribly boring except for those living and accustomed to doing them on a routine basis to partying perhaps a little too hard the night I got here, becoming a tourist, and fumbling my way through a language my brain only understands well half the time. Studying in the very concentrated and intensive way that I had been doing all through the last semester would be an exercise in futility at this point, and it was not on accident that I chose my courses so that I could start later and put more effort into them when I am better equipped to do so. I can only handle so much at one time – even my room took two weeks to get completely organized. My spirit is still confused.
I feel stagnant at times and overwhelmed by things to do at others, and sometimes I have days where I step back and take a breather and things seem just fine. Mostly I pinch myself just to make sure I'm actually experiencing all of these things, because sometimes it feels like I'm watching it on a movie screen. I'll leave you with a panorama from one of the days I finally got to breathe for a moment.
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