Madilyn Clair

Happy belated Thanksgiving, everybody! I hope everyone is still so full of food and have super happy (but maybe not the healthiest right now) hearts today.

I've been meaning to write about my time in Australia for a while now. My plan was right around my halfway mark to write a little something, but for some reason I ended up getting really homesick around that time. So much so that when I sat down to blog I just couldn't think of anything positive and I really didn't want to blog about how much I missed home because 1) no one wants to hear that and 2) I really do love it here and I would hate if I made it seem otherwise. But then, one Sunday afternoon as I sat in bed and watched my sixth episode of House of Cards of the day (we all do it, don't lie), I realized how little time I had left here and how much stuff I still wanted to do. So the next day, I made a list of "Things to do before I leave Australia" and commited to making the most of my remaining weeks. And I've been doing pretty well!

So, here I am, finally ready to write a bit. Knowing how hard it was just to make it through late October and Halloween, I realized that Thanksgiving might be tough: being away from family, in a country where Thanksgiving isn't really a thing, not watching the Cowboys lose (too soon?). But I have been doing so great and have been so busy and having so much fun that I made a conscious effort to make sure I didn't have a bad day. I started my week watching the Thanksgiving episode of New Girl, season 1 to get pumped and I made a Thanksgiving plan: to get up early, to FaceTime a friend from home, to go to yoga before work to officially start the day with a practice full gratitude, to physically write a list of everything I was thankful for on my hour long train commute (one way), to have a makeshift feast/my first Friendsgiving with my suitemate after getting home from work and class, to acknowledge how great Australia is and how happy I am so be here. I even planned on writing this blog post, although I think it's going to be a little different than I planned. Because here's what happened...

I hit snooze on my alarm and stayed in bed longer than I wanted. I didn't have time to go to yoga. My friend couldn't FaceTime. I tried getting a head start on the dessert for our feast before I left for work and ended up 1) ruining it* and 2) spilling hot melted butter on myself (*I later found out during my second attempt I actually hadn't ruined it). I got overwhelmed by dirty dishes left in the sink. All of these things happened within the course of an hour and by 7:45am I was fed up. So I showered and headed off to work trying to convince myself that nothing was sacred, that there was nothing special about the day, that it was just another Thursday in Australia where people don't celebrate Thanksgiving. That was sort of hard, though, because I work with a few Americans, as well as Australians conscious of American holidays. And then my mom called about something and I got frustrated and was a little snippy and then the next think I knew everything that happened that morning came crashing down and I was in tears. At one point, my mom said, "I think you're missing the whole point of today." But I had tried! I wanted to be thankful and for things to be special, I really did! Even as I was talking to her I realized how trivial everything that happened was and that I was making a big deal out of nothing and that I was homesick and being ridiculous and just wanted someone to feel sympathy for me. But what's Thanksgiving without a little family drama, am I right? Anyways, a 45 minute phone conversation later I was feeling better and ready to give the day a second chance. After work, I rode the train to class and started a list in my journal titled "Things to be Thankful for on this very un-American, not a thing in Australia Thanksgiving" and by the end of the day it was two pages long. After class, I came home and made a feast consisting of salad, shepherds pie, Mars Bars slice, and raspberry crunch dessert with friends and it was so delicious. And Thanksgiving ended up being saved.

I know the Thanksgiving holiday comes with several criticisms, one of them being that we should always give thanks, not just one day out of the year. And despite loving the holiday, I have to agree with that a little bit. As my experience goes to show, sometimes it's hard to feel thankful even on the day we literally set aside to do just that. You can't delay gratitude until a time you feel is more appropriate to be grateful. Same with happiness (more on that here). Because if you try and plan a time to give thanks and refuse to do it until then, then it'll never happen. So while this isn't the Thanksgiving post I planned necessarily, I like this one better. I needed a reminded that nothing ever goes according to plan.

And now, to close, random excerpts from "Things to be Thankful for on this very un-American, not a thing in Australia Thanksgiving" (but not the whole thing because then this post would never end):

Adele's new album. Bieber's, too.
Chicken Salt on hot chips.
Sushi burritos.
NYU Sydney and all of the friends I've made here.
French Bulldogs. All dogs, actually. Maybe not tiny, yappy ones though. (JK)
TV shows like New Girl and Friends that make me laugh and feel warm and happy and that everything will be okay.
My friends & family.
Texas, and the fact that I'll be back in 22 (now 21) days.
Australia, and that I've had I've had the opportunity to live here for 4 months and make my dream come true.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
That Christmas is ONE MONTH MINUS 1 (NOW 2) DAYS AWAY!!!
That I have this and so much more to be thankful for.

Also, if you're reading this, I'm thankful for you.

Cheers,

Madilyn

G'day! or G'night, actually. Either way, hi. I haven't written all summer and I know I keep saying that I'm going to get better at this blog thing and then nothing happens so I won't promise anything this time. Not that this is an excuse, but there have been several times this summer where I wanted to write about things other than just my day to day life and I stopped myself because I felt like maybe this blog wasn't the place to do it. See, I started this blog as "MCB in NYC," sort of as a way to fill people in about me moving to New York and how I was doing and all the crazy things going on. But then I started to realize that half of the times I've written, I wasn't even in NYC. Summers have been spent in Texas, New Years Eve posts have come from Colorado, and I'm about to spend 4 months in another country (more on that in a bit). I'm all over the place, literally and figuratively. And, while I in no way consider myself a writer, there are some things I have thoughts about that I like to turn into words and would like to share. And I'm just not sure if this is the place to do it. So I've been thinking about moving my work somewhere new, just so I can sort of have more freedom to do whatever. What's stopping me? Well, the fact that this is my first post in 4 months. Also, like I said, I'm not a writer. I feel like if I come up with this awesome website and never use it then that's sort of a waste. Anyways, that was a lot of unnecessary ramble. For now, I'll still be here and I'll try and post more (gah, see, here I go making promises again).

So back to me being in another country. I'm currently sitting in DFW airport waiting to board Quantas Flight 8 to Sydney, NSW, Australia where I will be studying abroad with NYU for the semester. My flight is delayed an hour and I'm not even mad about it because that just means I arrive at a more reasonable hour (7:30AM instead of 6:30AM AEDT). I'm nervous. I'm excited. I'm ready... I think.

My obsession with Australia started years ago. I'm not really sure if I can pinpoint when it started exactly. Was it my best friend's dad being from Queensland? Was it my first horse named Aussie Ali due to the shape of the marking on his forehead? (this is real, people.)

Anyways, I'm not sure when it all started, but the obsession eventually turned into determination. Studying abroad down under was already on my mind before I even started applying to colleges, and NYU's study away sight in Sydney was definitely a factor that was considered when I accepted my offer to attend the New York campus. Then about a year and a half ago, second semester of my freshman year, I started realizing my dream could be come a reality. Life got sort of crazy and I started looking for an escape and Sydney became the light at the end of the tunnel. My end all be all. So I applied, I got in, I waited several months, I packed my bags, and here we are at the airport. But something else happened in those months. All the problems I was trying to run from didn't necessarily go away, but they got better. I learned how to be happy in my situation, learned how to move on and just accept how things were. Not perfectly, of course, but suddenly my big scary problems weren't as big or as scary. I don't want anyone to think that the only reason I'm about to get on a plane was to run away, because it's not. Me going to Australia is a lot more than that. It's making one of the few dreams I have come true. It's immersing myself in a culture I've wanted to learn more about for a very long time. But, there was a small part of the trip that allowed for that escape, I won't deny that much. And now that things don't seem so bad, there's a tiny, negative voice in my head is saying, "then what's the need to go?" And I'm doing everything I can to ignore it because obviously there are so many reasons. I will still have the greatest time ever and I will still find myself in a billion ways. Oh, and I'm still trying to convince myself that everyone I care about will still be here when I get back, haha.

Like I said earlier, Sydney has been the end all be all for so long. And now that it's here and I have to start looking past it as far as future planning, I start freaking out a bit because suddenly I have to figure out what happens after the dream comes true. But, I refuse to ruin this trip before it even starts so we'll just have to cross those bridges when we come to them.

So here we are. We're finally at the big event. Welcome to MCB in SYD. Here's the cheesiest photo of me with my bags before check in: