New year...same me

I thought that maybe this year I would be able to say new year new me and actually mean it, becoming one of those motivated people who keeps their new years resolutions for more than a day. Looking at my bedroom right now has just reinforces that I am, in fact, the same me, living in the same mess (maybe even bigger than normal because I'm trying to pack), and procrastinating the same amount. However, even though my room looks like a nuclear bomb just went off, starting to pack has made leaving for Italy, which always kind of seemed to be this far off thing in the distance very real, and very close...and I am the opposite of prepared, but what's new.

Being the kind of person who is a big believer in "winging it", the stress has settled in that I have completely put off getting ready to leave the country for 4 months until about 4 days before departure. I would let myself push it off by thinking "You don't have to even think about it that much, it's the same as going back to Clemson!", but it's just not because half of my unnessecary stuff that we all know I'm going to bring anyways isn't already there, and my mom can't mail me all of the things I forgot and really don't NEED, but have convinced myself that I do. I've gathered that the normal way things go for people who are leaving for a semester abroad is that all the bags are packed, but it's the mental letting go and mental preparation that isn't quite there...for some reason I'm the opposite. I'm ready to ship out, but low and behold, none of my stuff is. Ladies and gentlemen, things are being kicked into overdrive. You see, I'm the poster child for packing uneeded things because I convinve myself that they are, in fact, needed. This has led to me fall victim to the crippling disease of overpacking...and not just bringing too much, but the worst type of overpacking. The type where I bring irrelevent items instead of things I actually really truly need, that I may have even put on a list if I was feeling organized (which let's be honest, rarely ever happens).

Even though, deep down inside I wish I was organized, and could make a packing list containing useful things without my mom helping me, that's just not who I am. I have an adventurous, "let's just see what happens" personality, and that is something that has led me to discover some of my goals, expectations, and overall hopes for studying aborad. One of my every day goals is to just go off the beaten path, and discover things that the run of the mill tourist wouldn't. I want to go full on native. I've learned from years of travel with my family that this is how you really discover a culture, and immersing myself into the cuture of Siena and Italy as a whole is my ultimate goal for this coming semester. 

T-minus four days till I'm out of Florida, and on the way to Italy, which also means four days to get it together, and pack...yikes. 

Arrivederci!!