This summer I actually woke up in my own bed.  This was a foreign concept to me after finishing my first year in college.  I hadnít slept in my own bed in months, with the exception of a couple of times when I came home for the weekend or the month that I spent at home during Christmas.  Own bed I guess is somewhat of an exaggeration because itís not the bed that I left at home before I left for college.  In fact, the room that I left here isnít mine anymore.  I am now subject to sleeping on the top bunk of the bed in the room that belongs to my brother when Iím away at school.  Itís almost as if my existence is gone from this house entirely except when I ìgrace them with my presenceî during holidays.  Does my family realize that when I went away to school I didnít leave forever?

     Not having my own bed was one of the hardest parts about coming home after a year away at school.  I visited and I saw my family a few times during the year, but that summer ñ the summer after my freshman year ñ was a huge adjustment for me.  I felt out of place. I felt that I missed everything important that had happened in the past nine months and there was no way that I would fit in at home again.  I felt like a stranger in my own house because my sister locked me out at night - she thought she was the last one to get home.  Yet I knew that I was not the same person that packed up my belongings and moved hundreds of miles away either.  I knew that I was not the same person, but I also knew that I had this whole year of experiences and stories and people that no one from home could even begin to understand.  Thus began my life in two worlds.

     I knew that when I left I would come back home being a different person.  What I failed to realize is that when you leave somewhere the whole world does not stop in that particular place so that you can feel comfortable when you return.  I knew that my family would remain the same.  There are some parts of life that you can always count on ñ family is one of those parts.  What I did not predict happening was the growing up of my siblings.  Sure, itís a part of life and everyone does it.  But my 13-year-old brother is not supposed to hold intelligent conversations with me, and girls are still supposed to have cooties.  My 17-year-old sister is not supposed to be driving MY car.  Itís mine, thatís the way it was when I left and thatís the way it should be now, right?  My 8-year-old brother isnít supposed to have more to entertain him than me; it was never like that before I left.  What happened to my family??

     I knew that my friends would never change so much so that I didnít feel comfortable hanging out with them.  Imagine the difference one school year can make!  The things that I used to love doing with my friends no longer held any meaning for me.  We used to be able to sit around at someoneís house for hours and talk about nothing ñ well, nothing may be stretching the idea but we talked about work and goals and friends and families -, but this just didnít happen anymore because of everything that had happened in the past year.  I figured out that the world did not stand still for me while I spent nine months in a new city meeting new people and experiencing new things.  People actually did live without me.  This was a new concept in my world.

     I know that as teenagers people have a tendency to think they are invincible.  The entire world revolves around one human being.  I know that there was a time when I thought this way.  My encounters with my friends back home after that first year proved to me that there is a much bigger world out there.  I finally realized that, as much as I convinced myself that things were going to change and be different when I came home, I never truly believed it until it happened.  My friends talked about people that I didnít know and complained about their jobs that I didnít have.  It was a whole new world for me.  I actually had to sit there and hear them talk about something that I knew nothing about.  I was always the advice-giver in the group. Now I couldnít even fulfill my role as that because I didnít know what they were talking about and they didnít need me to play that part anymore.  Not to mention I was told that my advice was terrible now because I didnít know what was going on.

     Life definitely has a funny way of handing things to people when they least expect it.  College has been the ultimate learning experience of my life.  Not just because I realized that you really can never go home again because nothing is ever the same, but it took taking that leap of faith and going off to an unknown place to cause me to realize that life still can go on if at home everything is a little bit different.  The first summer was difficult and caused me to really look at the people in my life, mainly my friends, and see if they really were important to me.  Life has a funny way of handing things to people.

     The second summer at home wasnít so bad because I didnít build up expectations that I had the summer before.  I knew that life was different and everyone there was different and I was finally ok with that.  I realized that I was doing my thing away at school and my friends are doing their things either at home or away at school and we have to get past this in order to maintain being friends.  The second summer that is exactly what happened.  People came home and others came out one night and everyone got along and it was like old times again.  Only we were older and wiser ñ at least in our minds we were.  There are those times, I have come to realize, when everything makes sense and everyone can just go back to being who he or she was during a time when things were ìsimpler.î  We would sit in the closest driveway of the night and talk about what happened that first New Yearís Eve we all went to and that party that was the highlight of the summer.  School and what happened during that year while I was away would disappear as if it never existed.  Then the next day everyone wakes up and itís back to the present way of doing things and people go back to work and school were we had left off before the world let us experience high school for just one night again.  But for that one brief moment everyone was seventeen again.  That is what brings me home every year.

     I have spent the past two years away at school and seeing the way that people have changed still astounds me.  I canít get over the fact that most of my friends are engaged or about to be married.  I canít get over the fact that my sister is going to graduate from high school and enter the ìcollege worldî that was once just mine.  I canít get over the fact that my parents talk to me about ìreal issuesî that I will someday have to deal with.  Learning is a crazy way to live life, but itís impossible not to learn because that is what makes us grow ñ and growing is something that can only be seen from an outsider coming back home.  Being an outsider has allowed me to see my life from a different perspective.  I finally understand what everyone was talking about when they told me that the guy I had a crush on all through high school was a jerk.  And I finally see that it is ok to only talk to people once a week and have nothing change.  And I finally see that the important people in my life are the ones who still like me for who I am now.

     Every time I go home now I have that same feeling of not belonging.  Itís not a feeling that disappears with time, but it does change.  I still miss being able to hang out with my friends and not have those two weeks where it takes everyone some time to get used to being home.  But this is just one obstacle that has to be overcome.  Itís not a major one but it does take some time.  I have realized that it is easier to fit back in with my friends who went away to school because they missed out on the same things that I missed out on while we were off in another city.  The hardest part is trying to become comfortable with those who stayed at home.  They havenít gone through anything that Iíve gone through being away from home so itís hard to help them understand that Iím not the same person that I was when I left home over two years ago.

     It is hard to go home, but yet itís like going back to a place where I feel comfortable.  You know that some place can become a home when you return and it eventually feels like you never left.  I know that being away at school was the best decision that I have ever made.  It has given me memories and people that I could never replace.  I have never regretted leaving home and everything that I was comfortable with for this new journey.  I have never regretted having to leave some of the people who were at one time the most important parts of me behind because of the enormous amounts that I have changed.  I do, however, wish that I could go home to my own bed.  Sometimes I do wish that things didnít have to change so much in order for me to grow and learn, but I know that my own bed (or at least the top bunk in my brotherís room) will always be waiting for me anytime I feel like I need to return to it.