memories

My husband and I recently arrived back home from a two and a half week vacation to Europe, but this wasn't any normal vacation to Europe.  this was me exploring places I had lived as a high school kid and hadn't seen in years and trying to show my husband all of the memories I had of my time there.  It's impossible to pack that many years into such a little amount of time, but we tried.

The visit, while over all too soon, was perfect for me.  It reminded me of so many good times I had while living in Europe.  The Czech Republic was my home while I lived there, but Vienna was an "adopted home" of mine, just three hours away across the border (back then there was one, now it's all European Union) we went there often during the summer and every Christmas as well.  My 16th birthday was a surprise weekend trip to Vienna - and the Prater and it was magical.  Getting lost in Prague with my Russian friend Ilja and missing the bus back to Brno...having visiting friends from Spittal and wandering through Brno...watching The Thin Red Line with my Japanese friend, Yuki Oki...

Always before when I've thought of Europe it's hurt so badly, good memories that I couldn't think of because I felt the experiences would never come again?  During this trip, I felt the heart wrenching ache of days gone by, never to come again, but it was also - hey, this is where I lived, this is where all my stories are where I grew up, let me tell you about the time when.....

Now that I've been back, I think it's that it doesn't feel so out of reach to me, it doesn't feel as if that part of my life almost never existed.  It felt for so long that people were saying it was over, done and for so long no one seemed to understand how important that part of my life was to me, like I was putting too much weight on how important it was to me - well, it's my life, so I'm the one weighing in how important everything is to me, right?  So if I say these five years are more important than those five years of my life - hey, it's my life, right?

And now that I've been back down memory lane, somehow I feel it's okay that I can start creating my own reality that doesn't end up with me going back there to live - even though for years that's all I ever wanted to do.  People change, I've changed.  I could go back there and live, I still love it there, my past is still there - but the wheel has turned, and I don't think that's where I'm going to end up anymore.  Which, yes, in some sense relieves me, because as it breaks my heart, I love Europe, I love everything about Europe, but the past is now in the past.  That's not to say I won't want to go back again, and very soon.
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