A patron at the JCC (pool I used to work at) gave me a journal at the end of summer, on the condition that I must write in it every single day to document my new experiences and changing perspectives. I'm (unsurprisingly) terrible at remembering to write daily so I play a lot of catch up, but one theme has been especially recurrent over these first 4 months. Immense gratitude. Gratitude that in a world where the majority of people are unsure about their familial and/or financial stability, I'm fortunate enough to be worrying about how to pay off the government loans that enabled me to move to another country and pursue a masters degree.
Gratitude that I live in an era where I can experience incredible new things and still maintain immediate communication with the people I love and left back home. Gratitude that I have the most incredible friends. Seriously. I completely took for granted how absolutely, irrationally blessed I have been to belong to these communities. Now that high school and college are several years removed and the relationships that formed by default have begun to default away, I'm just staggered at the strength of the relationships that are still standing, even with 3,000 + miles between us. I love you all. I'm being crazy sentimental right now, but I really do love you all and I cannot thank you enough for being in my life. I don't say that very often, but it needs to be recognized.
Gratitude for my new friends - my family for the past 4 and the next 19 months. The 27 people that I'm going on this journey with are truly one (or 27, I suppose) in a billion and RGU could not have done a better job of picking the most admirable individuals for this programme. I couldn't ask for a better group. Or better faculty, who are exemplary models of empathy and leadership in our field, and are absolutely transparent in their investment in our success and well-being.
Gratitude for everything I've been able to to do in my life, and for where I'm from. I'm going to quote LeBron James and you can't stop me. "In Northeast Ohio, nothing is given. Everything is earned. You work for what you have." I know a lot of people who work a hell of a lot harder than me and when I stop to think about it, I often feel like I've somehow cheated the system. I have such a beautiful life. There have been so many opportunities, adventures and moments for which I'm forever indebted to so many people. I don't deserve any of this. But here it is. There it's been. And it keeps coming. But at the same time, I have a deep sense of Midwestern integrity. You work hard, you work honestly, and you don't knock anyone down on your way up. I don't care if it's kind of boring, I'm passionately proud of my Midwestern heritage and it's one of the greatest places in the world.
Gratitude that I was raised in a family that didn't value material wealth. Don't even get me started on my family. This is going to just turn into a giant humblebrag about how great my life is, and I don't mean it that way. Frugality has been indoctrinated into my mind from an early age, and without that concept, I would never be able to drop money on trips the way that I do. I've been allowed to foster my belief that experiences are invaluable, and my family has been nothing but supportive as I continuously empty my bank account on impromtu trips to wherever I feel like going. Gratitude that, for whatever reason, I'm good at school. I'm able to study anatomy and PT and all the sciencey things, and still have the mental capacity to pursue music on the side. Gratitude that my mom sacrificed so much to homeschool me and produced a scholar who has been conditioned to faciliate her own education from a young age.
Gratitude that my life has surpassed my wildest dreams, and somehow I'm living in Europe and travelling to places that are, literally, the stuff of fairytales and legend. But somehow it's real life, and it's my life. Gratitude that the world is so perfectly beautiful. For sunshine, waves, mountains, and waterfalls. (Especially for waterfalls :) ) That I'm alive. That I can see, hear, and feel everything that this existance has to offer. That I was raised Catholic and can spend an hour every Sunday in a beautiful cathedral, thinking about charity, fraternity, wisdom and sacrifice. That I was taught to love the deeper things as well as the simple things, and that I understand the transcendant beauty of the greater good.
Gratitude that I can sing. I can't even say anything else about that. Music is the purest expression of beauty that I have ever experienced and there is no possible way to quantify how valuable it is that I'm able to participate in that beauty.
And let's be honest. Gratitude that the Cleveland Cavaliers are fighting hard in the playoffs right now, because the city of Cleveland deserves everything and more. Tomorrow, my first big exams start. I definitely could (probably should) have studied more, but I'm comfortable enough with the material to have spent today just appreciating life, because mental health is a big part of performance and I couldn't be in a much better headspace right now. I skyped with my best Townes End friend until 6 am, slept late, biked through the radiant sunshine to my new music school, and practiced new music in an absolutely gorgeous practice suite. I played piano for the first time since January. I can still sing; my range is still there, my belt is still there, and absense truly makes the heart grow fonder because I have never loved warmups as much as I did today.
People like to imply that I'll regret my tattoos someday. I still don't. Vita bella, you guys. This is an undeniably beautiful life, and I never want to forget that.
