It is really exhausting trying to not be exhausted all the time. I have no idea if my body is just recovering from our trip or if it liked Rome so much that it decided to adopt the time there and use it as its internal clock. I have never been this tired before, though. I fall asleep at 9 pm and wake up at 3 am ready to rock and roll, which is crazy. Sometimes I can fall back asleep and wake again around 9 am, but sometimes it can take a little while. Other times I go back to sleep and wake up fully rested at 7:30. For some reason, this trip has turned me into a morning person, which is why someone should send help. I am not, nor have I ever been a morning person. I enjoy sleeping in and staying up late, thank you very much.

The food back home is different. The first true meal that I had when we came back ( I do not count the late night IHOP pancakes, I was half asleep during those and forgot to really taste them) was sushi. It was a pleasant break from the pizza-pasta-pizza-pasta dominant food that I had been consuming the previous ten days. My tongue seemed to have been beat to hell and back. It was really torn up on the right side from the bread crust and the acidic tomatoes.  Driving around was also really weird. I was hyper aware of my surroundings, watching out for vespas the entire way. Also, not driving for ten days made it weird. In addition, they closed off one of the entrances to my street while I was gone. You can only go a certain way, which is fine. But it did freak me out at first

I have to say, I missed my family near the end of the trip. You cannot, however, tell them that. They will not let me live it down and that is not something I can afford. I did like that it gave us something to talk about over FaceTime. Usually, we always know whats going on with one another and are usually present for each others lives. This was different because I was exploring things that they had never seen, while my sister was competing at nationals and my family did some home renovations. It was nice because it teaches you to treasure the time you have with them. To cherish the moments where you can sit and talk about your day without someone already knowing how it went. It also teaches you to work on telling great stories.

Overall, I had an amazing time in Italy and it is one that I will never forget. So many people will never get that chance, due to the economy or their current lives. They will never get to say “Yeah, I saw the Coliseum” or “David’s pretty cool up close”. They won’t ever have that opportunity, and to be given that at such a young age is a unique experience.

For the last time, Ciao!