Image via @dombagnoche

“4 sleeps out, you must be getting excited?!”
“Are you nervous?”
– Everyone

This time next week i’ll be sitting at an airport gate headed to JFK.  I’ll be THAT girl sitting by herself, eyes welled up with tears but a heart so full.  I will have given my sisters the biggest and longest hugs in the universe, and I would have told Mum to stop crying for the 90th time.  My Dad will have told me that the world is mine to take, have and conquer.

But that’s future talk, and I get pretty overwhelmed even thinking about that exchange.  My god, someone give me a paper bag to cover my face so I don’t scare off any potential plane friends with my happy tears.

But for now, everything is an under and overstatement. Bizarrely, for probably for the first time like ever, I can’t describe how I feel.

Or maybe I can…

It’s like that split millisecond of breath you take at the top of a rollercoaster. You know the one.  The one that is full of anticipation, fear, thrill and bliss. You know you’re about to drop.  Like the beat you wait for on the dancefloor, what’s coming holds so much potential.

But for now, like right now.  There’s not a lot to say but – just you wait sweet darlin’.

Like it always does, the bass will kick in.  The carriage will reach that final clink on the rail that pushes you right over the edge – where you belong.

I want to chronicle this countdown to relocating to the Big Apple. It’s a beautiful thing meandering daily through the 8 piles of clothes on my bedroom floor and no full-length mirror in sight.  As you can imagine it’s such a heightened time for introspection. So i’ve been thinking all the things.

Things I won’t miss:

• People assuming I like coffee, because it fits the profile – I’m from Melbourne / work close to Patricia’s.  Go figure.
• Being too late for that prime 10 min window on the 58 tram before it’s reeling with pre-pubescant Grammar boys.
• 10% surcharges on weekend brunch.

Things I will miss with my whole heart:

• The option to have a bloody good coffee when I absolutely ‘need it’.
• Avoiding the 58 tram altogether and cutting laps along the Yarra to work instead. Sunrise, rowers, skyline, the scent of lemon balm trees, cheap transport, interval cardio. What more could a gal actually want at 7am?
• Weekend brunch in the city of gastronomy – deconstructed egg / chilli scram / bacon dust I’m looking at you.
• Pretending to be a city gal 9-5 then running home to the farm and into a Mum hug at every opportunity.
• Elwood sunsets with my favourite people, you know who you are.
• Dreaming, laughing and being with my favourite people.
• EVERYTHING with my favourite people.

Things I’m looking forward to:

• Everything else.

But for now, you’ve not gotten rid of me just yet..

– S.