There and Back Again

I’ve been home for a week and I’ve already fallen into the everyday rhythm of preparing for school, doing last-minute summer homework, and catching up with old friends. My life is back to normal, and as senior year approaches, I find myself being swallowed by a life familiar.

But I am not the same girl who left Texas over a month ago. She disappeared somewhere over the Pacific Ocean, and I haven’t heard from her since. While I’m far from uncomfortable here in my hometown (except for this “fork” thing; I need my chopsticks back), I feel a bit like a stranger, seeing everything for the first time.

My friends seem different, and yet, so unchanged. They are the same goofy kids I left behind, with darker tans and longer hair, and somehow, I know I can’t truly share the amazement of my trip in its full entirety with them. They just can’t understand.

I’ve been wondering if this is how the hobbit Bilbo Baggins felt as he returned to the Shire. He’d had a marvelous adventure, one no one he knew could fully comprehend, and returned to his warm, safe home feeling very much a stranger. And even more than a lingering sense of foreignness, Bilbo felt the need for more adventure.

Now that I’ve tasted a crumb of this wide, sprawling world of ours, I want more. Japan was a goal, and I’ve met it. My goal now: everywhere else.

I also wish to further my exploration of the Japanese language. Even in its complexity, it fascinates me, and not continuing my study of it further is just not an option. I will master Japanese one day, and I will return to Tokyo to utilize those skills.

But, much like Bilbo Baggins, I am glad to be home. During my adventures I did long for the world I left behind, even if those longings were short-lived. Japan will forever hold a special place in my heart, but, like they say, there’s no place like home.

“Roads go ever ever on
Under cloud and under star,
Yet feet that wandering have gone
Turn at last to home afar.”

-J.R.R. Tolkein, The Hobbit

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