missing oxford

I catch my self.
Counting the hours from here to there.
Imagining what they are doing.
How their morning is progressing while I can't seem to fall asleep.
Wondering what is being served for supper in hall while I am only slowly sipping my first cup of coffee.
Slightly obsessively checking my weather widget that is still set to Oxford.

I didn't think it would be this hard. I was only there a couple of months. Shouldn't the feeling that I am missing out be fading by now? Perhaps this is the penalty for giving an experience my entirety. From the touchdown of the plane in Heathrow I soaked in the new accents and peculiar vocabulary. Each new discovery brought a greater connection to the land of Great Britain.

And then there was Oxford itself.

The cloudy, misty sky. The time-marinated buildings. The eternal contemplative walking. Every moment, each adventure, the culture sinking deeper into me. Permeating my skin and diffusing into my blood. The clock. The time of academia. The time of Oxford. Advancing rapidly yet nearly halting. The land in which I was living had different rules, not simply a different time zone. Getting groceries could take two hours. Getting to class, forty minutes. Always Getting somewhere, but with the Getting a crucial component of the process. Walking the uneven cobblestones surrounded by voices, but alone with my thoughts. Everything analyzed. Everything processed. The whole experience paused and examined. Yet when the clock revives, it has to redeem the time lost. The minute hand sweeps while in the library. I am trying desperately to get the essay researched and written and read out and defended and a new topic researched. Thirteen essay crises in eight breathless weeks.

But it is the people that drives the shaft deep. I knew I was leaving from the beginning. I knew I would be three thousand miles away. Each morning meant one less day to spend time with these individuals. I chose to make the friendships, though. The right choice. Laughing, gaming, praying, singing, crying, dining, flying through the precious hours I had. The time pressure forced the relationships to a greater depth while I pondered the likelihood my heart could survive the separation. There was a transition from my being immersed in England to Oxford being burrowed onto my bones, melding with my very marrow.

The goodbyes came and went. The clothes were stuffed into a suitcase, the souvenirs carefully stored. The bus was boarded and the plane took off, leaving the Atlantic between me and a new home.

Two months later I still feel the pull. The yearning for teatime and pub food and slightly damp libraries. For the flower stand on Queen, Mick's on Botley, Ben's Cookies in the Covered Market, the Rose on High Street, and the Alternative Tuck Shop on Holywell. For an evening with the best of companions and the back-of-the-mind thoughts that these memories will take precedence in future reflections.

Is this ache worth the experience, the investment? Absolutely. Undeniably. Untradeably. It changed who I am and altered who I will become. It gave me the confidence to step into the unknown, even if the butterflies are causing a tornado in my stomach. It taught me how to meet new people and put aside the fear of rejection for the hope of a new relationship.

I may never master the perfect accent, but I will always be part British and fully an Oxfordian.