I now have two homes

I stepped out into the crisp, cold air. It was hard to believe that I'd now been awake for longer than I'd slept, and that the chemistry final, for which I'd stayed up into early hours of the morning more or less preparing for, was finally over. I smiled and looked out across the lawn. The uncertainty I was feeling about the test was destroyed as a sense of relief and freedom washed over me like a wave sweeping over a footprint in the sand, erasing all doubts. It was finally over; all the studying, the late nights, the sudden anxiety that gripped me only moments before I entered each classroom and picked up the exam booklet, had come to an end. No more class, no more finals, no more school...for now at least.

The smile faded from my face as I again gazed across the frosty quad. Sunlight spilled over the ground making the scattered yellow leaves glisten like specks of gold against the damp earth. I watched while people walked in and out of the library, some hastily and quietly, dreading their coming exams; others laughing and bouncing about, ecstatic with the fact that they'd completed their finals and were free to go home. I walked slowly down the steps, becoming conscious that I was still holding my empty plastic mug that had earlier been filled with rich hot chocolate, provided as a good-luck treat for exams. I found a trash can to my right, and threw it away, knowing my roommate would be disappointed in me for not looking for a recycling bin. This thought made a smile, once again, flicker upon my face. I realized that despite my delight that all was over, I couldn't help feeling a little down. Three and a half weeks was a long time, I decided as I reached my dorm. I was going to miss being at Centre.

I entered my cluttered room hoping to have company as I began to pack what seemed to be my whole closet. I was greeted by my roommate and a couple friends just leaving for lunch. To my disappointed I couldn't join them and I was left to pack, dreading the coming departure, alone. I emptied drawers, threw out food, and found shoes I'd been missing for weeks. I picked up clothes off the floor, pulled the sheets off my bed, and unplugged every electrical item that belonged to me. I stacked the semester's books in a pile on a shelf. I found little things that I might...

...Then it occurred to me what I had just done. I stacked the semester's books in a pile on the shelf. I wouldn't be needing them anymore. The prospect of three weeks at home was starting to look more hopeful. It hit me again, that it was finally over. I'd survived my first term of college, and could now take a well deserved break.

I finished loading the already overflowing car, said my last goodbyes, and before I felt the sorrow of leaving again, hurriedly drove away with my brother in the passenger's seat. He gave me an encouraging smile, picked up a book by Kant, which I'll study for my CentreTerm class, and began to read. His voice made me slip into a kind of a trance as I drove, and the more he read, the more I felt I should be at home. As we sped along I-75 another thought dawned upon me, I now have two homes. I was traveling toward the one in which I grew up, but was leaving the one in which I now lived.