La langue française

I used to hate studying languages. If you had told my 16 year old self that in 6 years she would be conversational in a second language (especially french) I would have laughed in your face. Yet here I am, 22 years old, having lived in France for a year and itching every day to learn more and become better at a language I thought I would never understand further than the franglish "ooh la la" and "trés belle." 

I decided to study abroad in France after a summer program in Paris in 2014. I was going through a rough personal patch and the summer abroad filled me with love for the city and a desire to explore more of Europe. There's nothing quite like the city of love to mend a broken heart, as cliche and disgusting as that might sound. A year after that trip I embarked on my full school year in France with the plan to spend my first semester in Paris and the second in Bordeaux. Stepping off the plane without any experience with the french language, or to be completely honest any language, was a little unnerving. And for the first month I was taken back to my 16 year old struggling with languages frustrated self, unsure how anyone could do this and why anybody would want to. But more and more, things started to click. And finally, around month 6 of living in France I found myself being able to understand more and more and make my way through with much more ease than before. I came home at the end of the year and graduated with my Bachelors, and yet I didn't want school to be over. I wanted to continue learning and I wanted the next time I visited the country I had learned to love so much be with the ability to converse with whoever I chose. 

I'm now back in my home town taking a year to save money to apply to grad school. I am happy to say that I enrolled in my local community college to continue my study of french. Learning a new language has given me so much appreciation for my own language, the world, and the ability to communicate with different people! I wouldn't change it for anything. 

Lots of old, lots of new

I haven't written in a while, and I have to say it took some pushing of myself and sell encouragement to even open up this page, which is kind of funny since I'm pretty sure nobody reads my stuff! 
Nevertheless, I've totally been in a creative funk and just kind of an emotional rollercoaster these past few months. Not surprising at all considering the fact that in the past year I've 

• moved out of the country to Europe
• moved to Paris without speaking any french
• moved to Bordeaux and went to french school 
• moved back to the U.S and graduated 
• moved back to my hometown 

Thats a lot of moving and a lot of big changes for someone as uptight and type A as me! A huge adventure, yes. An amazing opportunity- definitely. But an experience that caused the post grad adjustment period to be a little harder? For sure. I went from spending a year embracing new cultures and traveling like it was my job to moving back in with my parents and being stuck in the post grad limbo so many millennials find themselves in. Spending a year abroad was and will forever be one of the best things to ever happen to me and I don't regret a single minute of the journey or anything that I did to make that happen. But for my next dream to come true (grad school, ah!) I have to put extravagant fun on the back burner for a bit and work to save that cash to finance my future. I know my story is extremely close to so many people, but sometimes its hard to not think that you must be missing something and that you're not doing everything you're supposed to be doing. (In reality I'm pretty sure most people are in the same position as me, and just pretending they have their sh*t together in moments of crisis and trying not to explode at the thought of adulthood) 

I've decided to start writing an documenting again in order to keep myself exercising my creativity through writing and other creative outlets as well as document my growth, because maybe sometime in the future 40 year old Mandee will laugh at what a nut ball 22 year old Mandee was being about her future. 

For now it's going to be lots of soul searching, hanging with the people and animals I love, and making the most of the time I have here. S/o to all the other struggling post grad millennials out there- it's all gunna be ok