Alicia

I can't remember if I've ever talked about my friend Alicia, like maybe when I posted journal entries from the Europe trip. If I didn't, or if you weren't reading back then, I'll tell you about her now.

She's from Oregon and we met the first night in Spain. We were roommates.

My first thought: "She looks weird and she's probably going to hate me because I'm feeling cranky and homesick and will not be a lot of fun. Oh well. At least this is just for one night."

Only then I got paired with her for our homestay, and ended up being with her for three days straight in a tiny Spanish apartment with a family that spoke no English. And guess what?

We became best friends.

The whole rest of the trip, it was "Stephanie and Alicia." We sat together, ate together walked together, shopped together. We told each other secrets and used each others' hotel rooms if one of us got paired with a weird roommate. She saw me laugh, cry, cuss, panic, learn, go off on people, make amends, try new foods, and do scary things.

I became closer to her in three weeks than I'd become with anyone {besides Cass} in my whole life. It's amazing what tense situations can do for bonding. They accelerate it 150%.

Having the luck I do with relationships, I didn't become best friends with anyone from my state. Of course not. That would be too easy. No, I had to become best friends with a girl who lives 2,810 miles away. That's 47 hours.

Of course.

We parted ways the last day of the trip. Neither of us cried. We'd known it was coming. It sucked, but we had to walk away. I neatly retracted my heart and told her 'bye. We said we'd see each other again, but I didn't really believe that. People make promises like that all the time; they mean them in the moment, but eventually someone doesn't care anymore and the promise dissolves.

But guess what?

That didn't happen O_O

And now she's coming here, to my state, to my town, to my very own house, and she's gonna live with us for a week.

I don't even think it's sunk in yet. I've known for about a month that yes, it is actually happening, but...I still feel sort of numb to the whole thing :) My head is excited though :D

So, don't expect to see me around much until this time next week. I have posts scheduled for every day, but I won't be commenting :)

Send a virtual wave and greeting to Alicia!

~Stephanie