that was then. and this is now.

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It's absolutely astounding to me how much the passing of time can change us as people. I've been in Korea for a year and a half, which in the grand scheme of things is a drop in the water, and yet when I look at pictures from when I arrived here or read my old blogs and personal scribblings, it's like peering at a stranger.

I had an out of body experience today where I saw myself teaching my class and was pretty proud of how well I commanded the classroom. It was not so long ago that I nervously stood before a class, unsure of how to teach my students English. I didn't have the faintest clue how to connect with them or what to do when they got out of hand and tried to test my authority. I still struggle with trouble classes, but mostly I feel as if my job as a teacher is something that is a part of me now. It comes second nature. I came to Korea to see if teaching was something I would want to do with my life and after my time here, I can see myself becoming an English literature teacher.

My memories of my first months in Korea are patchy and foggy, as memories of fun and confusing times usually are. I had the feeling that it would all pass me by if I let it and godamnit, I wouldn't let it. The friends I made at orientation instantly became part of my heart and soul. We went to concerts, camped in the rain, had sleepovers in cramped apartments, celebrated holidays, and protected and comforted each other from brawls and drunken mistakes. We would pass a bottle of wine or champagne around, on multiple occasions, and give a toast to a chosen person or day. I spent every weekend with them and during the week, I was mainly in my apartment or at school. I had few friends in my town and even fewer ideas of much to do in my area, but I was happy, as I always am when things are new, fresh, and hopeful.

It's now been nineteen months. The honeymoon period with Korea is over. We're an old married couple who knows each others habits and goes through the motions now. It's comfortable and it's home. I spend my week with the girls making food, meeting up with Scott for coffee or BBQ, doing my workouts in my room where it's warm, and writing. On weekends, I sip on cocktails and dance in dingy bars with the same orientation friends and some new ones. Today, I wore my blazer, black jeans, and button up blouse to school with my hair uncombed in its natural curly state. I looked quite different from the girl who used to wear hippie dresses to school and blow dried her hair straight every morning. Or, for gods sake, used to wear it in twisted braids. My co-teacher Maria has become a very close friend and when she tells me that my after school classes next week are cancelled, I deadpan, "Oh Maria. No, I love those classes." We crack up and giggle like my middle school students. I have all low level classes and I am busy the whole time, going through the classroom and helping them. At one point, I turn around and they all have drawn mustaches on their upper lips. I can't help but love them. Even the troublemaker, who made me so mad the day before that I wanted to punch a wall. She followed me into the bathroom with an apology she had written and read it to me as I held back a smile.

After school, I walked in the warm weather that is slowly seeping out of winter, and was so into my music and watching the daily life around my town that I took the long way home. Home. I write the word without even thinking twice about it now. My ever-changing home. People come into my life, change me for better or worse, and then leave. Students graduate and then come back to visit as young women. More than anything, the thing that has changed me the most is the realization that not one thing in this world can last forever. Some of my dearest friends will leave in less than a month. I am sad, but less sad than I would have been before because I now see how inevitable it is. This chapter of my life is close to its end and then a new one will start until the book's finish. So it goes...and so do I.

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