Foreign Feelings in a Familiar Land

Being that it’s my first time in California, I can’t tell if taking in a dark warm night filled with cool colors, mild traffic, and gargantuan billboards always produce feelings of nausea. My brain feeling like it wants to throw up is new to me. So is wanting to call my parents to tell them I've changed my mind. It doesn’t matter that this visit involves a semester-long program, or that in some ways, I’ve been preparing for it my whole school career. The bottom line is that a North Carolinian like myself has no business being in southern California.

I was fine all through the planning phase. Montage shots of me and my newly made friends cruising streets, lounging by the ocean, and any other stereotypical Hollywood image filled my head. Internships would turn to job offers and a student in her last semester of college would be safe. After all, California was where dreams came to fruition.

My first sliver of regret appeared only after I boarded my first plane. And it continued to grow as I sat in aisle seats, ran for next flights, and scarfed down personal pan pizzas. But reality quickly burst my 90210-infused fantasies. It seemed that the place of dreams was also a place for fears.

As I stared up at movie billboards on the ride “home,” the main actors seemed to stare straight through to my soul. How could I deal with being so far away from the only world I knew? This coming from someone that completely leapt over the culture-shock stage when traveling to Europe at 15 with a group of strangers. The difference is, this wasn’t a ten-day field trip. It was an insight into life after college: the period with no safety net. It’s the part of life that can’t be claimed as studying abroad, even though it should, because the life you haven’t lived is in fact foreign.

So with no real alternative, I stayed. I fought through the panic and fear as well as the unrealistic idea that California was one big movie waiting for its main character to arrive. I studied, had fun, graduated, and stayed in this foreign land. And therefore, a nice medium was created. One where dreams can come true, but not without unexpected and sometimes rough adventures in between. Now, a year later, the bright lights aren’t as staggering, the traffic is a bit harder to take, though doable, and when I pass by the billboards, there’s no overwhelming or nauseous feeling in sight, only a sense of fortune and a small sliver of wonder.