The Perfect End

I can't believe this semester is already coming to an end.  It feels like I've been here for just over a week, like spring break just happened two nights ago.  Every semester seems to fly by, and yet somehow each semester after that seems to go a little quicker.  I've never quite figured it out, and I don't think that I ever will.  I have come to realize it's going to happen, though, so I knew it would feel like no time had passed when I was packing up and moving out of 37 Hyde Park Gate. 

The farewell week of this semester has been busier than most, which I didn’t know was possible.  We had theatre, meals, and museum visits.  This week sounds very similar to most other weeks of the program, except for what happened at the end of it.  On Thursday night, we had a surprise event for our farewell dinner.  It turns out this event was a river boat cruise on the Thames.  It couldn’t have been a better experience, a better night.  The food on the boat was delicious, it was a vegetable and brie starter, a cranberry, mushroom, spinach, and tomato puff pastry entrée, and a chocolate mousse dessert.   We also were joined by Mary, Josh, Steven, and our professor Justin along with his family.  Justin’s son made the night!  He wandered around dancing, taking photos, and being the life of the party. 

There was a point in the night where I was able to spend a little time on the open upper level of the boat.  The view was indescribable.  To be riding down the River Thames on a boat with the city of London lit up all around me was something a lot more magical than I was expecting anything on this trip to be.  And it is not because I wasn’t expecting magical things, it’s because this blew any expectation I ever had clear out the window.  It definitely made it obvious to me how lucky I am, how lucky we all are, to have been able to spend an amount of time, however small, in this wonderful place surrounded by each other. 

I like to think I’ll be back here again before too long, but I can’t say with certainty when it will be.  I can say with certainty, however, that I know it won’t be the same.  Nothing can top, or even match, this experience.  My time spent in London has truly been a fairytale.