Barcelona's where the heart is

This is a mass email I sent out last week, but I don't have many of your emails, or I didn't include you because I know you read the blogs here regularly. So, sorry if it's a repeat.

Hi Everyone,

I figure once a year or so is frequent enough for these kinds of things.

As many of you know I moved to Prague last year to> teach English, and after a year I decided it was time for a change and now I'm living in Barcelona. I've been here a little over two months and it's utterly fantastic.

It's so hard to sum everything up in an email but I'll do my best.

Actually, no, I won't even try to sum up the day-to-day... you can read my blog for that... It's too daunting to try to explain a year's worth of experiences. Needless to say my life's been really full, full of joy and hard times, full of jokes and tears, full of learning. Always always always learning. This is starting to sound like a Hallmark card and that's not something I'm interested in doing. So, read my blog for details.

Generally speaking it's been an amazing year/year and a half. One of the most interesting things has been facing my own fears, and in turn facing myself.

When I started thinking about moving to Prague (some of you will remember this) I was terrified. Terrified. And when I got to Prague I was terrified. And when I started teaching I was terrified. It seems like I spent so much time being afraid.

I think what I was most afraid of was the unknown. A pretty common fear. But not just the unknown of the big vast world, but the unknown Molly, the Molly I was turning into, the future Molly. I knew I was changing (and had been changing intensively for several years before moving to Prague) but I couldn't imagine what I would look like.

Unsurprisingly I look a lot like myself, only more so. I feel like the more I change the more I become myself. What a huge relief!

Also I've learned countless other things, most of which I'm sure I won't even realize until later in my life. Some of which are basic skills like teaching (adults and kids) and some of which are more abstract like an increased sense of self and my place in the world, my ability to make friends, courage and what it really feels like (most of the time it doesn't feel courageous at all), and many more. It's been an unbelievable ride, and I'm nowhere near finished yet! As I said to a friend recently, "If it wasn't me I'd be jealous." And it's true. I'm jealous of myself.

This feels like a very truncated email, like I've been telling a story to myself and decided to start writing it mid-stream. Sorry if it's too abstract or too vague or too touchy-feely, I can't really sum up what I want to say. I keep thinking, "This is really silly. You haven't even had any contact with half of these people for ages!"Basically this is a thinly veiled attempt to get you to read my blogs! No, seriously, I just feel like it's time for an update.

If any of you are planning a trip to Barcelona drop me a line, you always have a place to stay.


Thinking of you all,
Molly

http://blog.myspace.com/curlymolly
http://curlymolly.blogspot.com/

PS I have two blogs, the myspace blog is older, so has all the Prague posts (and pre-Prague posts), but myspace is a little frustrating sometimes so I added blogspot to my repertoire... Both are the same after a certain post, I just cut and paste from one blog to the other.