France

In exactly 23 days, I will be on a plane heading to Lyon.  How weird is that?  Here's the story of how this all came to be.

When I was 13, my mom and I took a week-long trip to Paris.  My sister was studying abroad at the time, and we went to visit her.  I absolutely fell in love.  I love speaking French, French food, the way the French live, everything.  Most of the French people were rude, but some were actually quite nice.  When we were at the Stravinsky Fountains (they're in one of the model shoots in Sabrina), we stopped to get a crepe at a little stand, and the guy there was so kind and even let me take a picture with him.  Not to mention the fact that he made glorious crepes.  Think about that for a second.  In Paris, they have crepe stands like Americans have hot dog stands.  What could be bad about a country that sells crepes on almost every corner?  Ever since I came back from that trip, I have wanted to go back.  I studied French all through high school and thanks to my fantastic teachers, I decided to be a French major.  What do I plan to do with a French degree if I'm not teaching or working in some international business, you may ask?  I plan to have a bakery, or as they say in French, pâtisserie.  Yep, it makes just that much sense.
So, I applied to study abroad, got accepted, and then went to get my visa. Oh, what a nightmare that was.  I had to leave camp for a day, which turned out to be fine and everything was working out just swimmingly.  My mom and I triple checked everything, talked to North Park to make sure everything was in order, and headed downtown to the Consulate.  I was feeling great.  I had coffee in hand, my cute polka dot dress, and my red shoes, and I ran into my friend Emily on the train.  We got to the Consulate with plenty of time, got called up and learned we were missing a document.  Upon further investigating, it was not just a document, but a fee that took three weeks to process.  And then we got lost in the boonies of Wisconsin on the way back to camp.  Horrible day.
Three weeks later, I got the confirmation that everything was set and I could get my visa.  And this morning, that's just what I did.  Seriously, nothing could have gone smoother.  To celebrate, I went to Borders and bought Corduroy, one of my favorite children books, and had an iced dark cherry mocha from Starbucks, dedicated to Jenny. 
At the moment, the French are in control of my passport.  I'm not sure how I feel about that.  That's not true, I do no know how I feel about that.  So now, I get to wait, unpack from camp, repack for France, and enjoy life in the meantime.  Apparently, I'm supposed to be going there because everything is working out and one of my dreams is coming true.  It's a little scary when that happens, and yet so exciting!