It's A Small World, After All

My decision to move to London was the product of one of the larger and more daunting choices in my life thus far. I am, after all, a girl who is drawn to the comfort in familiarity and who, in new and foreign situations, tends to become rather annoyingly lame, wimpish, and shy. If you need proof of this, you can just ask Sarah Conway, who literally had to drag me out of my dorm room freshman year to get me to have any kind of social life at all, even if it just meant hanging out in the boys' room down the hall for twenty minutes. (A thank you to you, Sar, for enabling me to have friends.) These antisocial tendencies in the face of "the unknown" may not be so surprising considering that I am from a town of 2500 people which is isolated on top of a very tall mountain, populated by personages who live in the same bark-trimmed abodes that their great grandparents probably built with their own two hippie hands. This all explains why my decision to say goodbye to my hard-won New York social group and fly off to the UK was a big deal.

And to tell you the truth, the move hasn't been as easy, spontaneous, or carefree as one might have hoped it would be. Homesickness has run its course like a bad fever, and overpriced phone cards have been burned through like so many Woolworths sale bin sparklers waved half-heartedly on Guy Fawkes night. But certain recent events have transpired in a way that has managed to lend me that much-needed spark of closeness, a reminder of my bygone days of confidence and relative popularity (in comparison to the nine phone numbers that now feature in my mobile phonebook, 3 of which belong to people I live with). These events center largely on the reappearance of key loved ones for brief intervals at the exact moments that they are needed. Here's the lineup:

--The ever-reassuring presence of my good friend Melissa here in Brit-land. If it weren't for all the loud, smokey dancing nights out with this hip, wine-swilling comrade of mine, I fear that my weekends would be painfully dull.
--Random presence of old high school buddy/ex-sort-of-boyfriend-type-deal/son of Jazzercize creator, who is currently studying at the same University as Sam and is living mere footsteps from my old study abroad dorm near Russell Square. In addition, he has gone from being an In-n-Out addict to a vegan in the three years since I last saw him, so we sometimes cook together.
--The tour of the band Akron/Family, of which my friend/ex-co-Angelica-Kitchen-employee Ryan is a member. Last night the tour rolled into London at the tail end of a lengthy and successful European tour. I saw the listing in NME and traveled to the Brick Lane venue to find my vegan buddy from ago, and was pleased to encounter him running across the bar area to give me a big hug and put me on the list for a fabulous and energetic show that truly warmed my heart.
--The pending arrival of my good friend Charlotte, whose three night stint on our sofabed overlaps with Thanksgiving, thus amplifying the general excitement of the upcoming week exponentially. I am ridiculously happy that I will be seeing her soon.
--The pending arrival of my good friend Jara, who is seemingly having a wonderfully eventful time of things in Madrid. It appears that even though we are from the same town, she is much braver than me.
--The pending arrival of my parents, whose frequent emails and jpeg attachments of various pets always cheer me, but whose actual presence will be ever so much better.
--The pending arrival of my good friend Michael Mapel, who is by far the best email writer I know; his epistles are not only frequent, but poetic and uplifting as well. I have a hunch that my new years with him will end the long and dreary history of watered-down celebrations that have made up the respective commencements of the years of my life thus far.
--And, of course, Sammy. No matter how bad a mood I'm in, he always gets up to make me tea and crumpets before work and gives me a kiss when I come home. Sometimes that's just the best kind of comfort a girl could ask for.

I just wanted to say thank you guys for making my life a happier place for me to live.