Mush

Yes, it has been forever since I've updated this. It seems as time goes by and I get closer to leaving my desire to write is less...almost non-existent. I will only be a Peace Corps Volunteer for 11 more days, but after that I will forever be a RPCV (returned Peace Corps Volunteer). RPCV for life!!! I'm in the winding down process now. Packing my bags, cleaning my apartment, saying "good-bye".....all in all just preparing to leave. It's funny though, I don't feel like I'm leaving. It doesn't seem real that I'll be going "home" and that I most likely won't see this place again. Basically I'm in denial that this going-away process is even happening. Which is exactly how I was when Mickie left last week. I spent her last two days with her in Sofia, checking out the tourist sites that we'd never gotten around to see and just hanging out. I KNEW that she would be leaving but it didn't sink in...not until I watched her go through the security point at the airport and disappear behind security screening. Then it hit! Mickie was gone! Soon Melody and Kathy will be gone! Then E! Then me! I know of course that I will always be friends with these people and will make a point to see them once we're all back in the states. But it won't ever ever be the same. We will all be living states apart....maybe even countries apart. There will be no taking an 8 hour train ride to go visit for the weekend, no meeting up in Sofia or another middle city just for the day. Seeing each other in the states, where will all have jobs, school, families, and lives to tie us down will make meeting up so much more difficult. Added to that is the fact that it won't take a 5 hour bus ride to visit, but more like a 5 hour plane ride! And then there are my Bulgarian friends! Most of them I'm almost certain I may never see again. There are a couple whom I just might see...especially if I succeed in bringing my dance group back to the states next year. But for most of them this is it. This will be my last time to go to coffee with the teachers at school. The last time to sit and talk for an hour with Tstetska at the copy-center. Of course there are my kids too!!! :( As much as a pain in the butt they were at times I'm really going to miss my students. They are the reason I was here. I'm going to miss their crazy antics and inappropriate questions like, "Miss Steph, do you have a lover?" I'll miss playing games with them. Miss watching when that light bulb switched on and they got what I was saying.

I never felt this way when I left home. I never thought "this will probably be the last time that I ever see these people" because I knew that it wasn't. I knew coming here was only 27 months of my life and that I'd see my family and friends again. There have been a few elderly people that have passed away since I've been here; I'm sad for that. Sad that I didn't get to say good-bye or attend their funerals. But for the most part I knew my being gone was temporary and I wasn't too broken up. But here, this time, it's really hard. Even if was only 2 years, it was a lifetime. This has became my "home." I'm used to being here and at times cannot even imagine anything different. I don't even want to say "good-bye" to folks here because by saying good-bye it means that's it. Na krai. The End. I'd rather sneak away quietly and not say those two words. By not saying them that means that it's not really happening. In my mind it means that I'm not really leaving for good. I know that it would be lying to myself and I'd wouldn't really have closure on my life here...not the healthiest thing. But the thought of "good-bye" hurts. Again, when I left home two years ago it was not like this. I had a big "going away" party with 90 people there to send me on my way. But it wasn't "good-bye," it was "be safe, have fun, do good work, stay outta trouble, and see you in two years." Here, not so. I want no send off, no going away gathering, no nothing. Because this time it's permanent.