A Walk Through the Woods

This trip is coming to a close faster than I expected. After My second ten day I got back to the Schloss and stepped into chaos. We are having a huge Thanksgiving party and are cleaning and preparing for it all this week. Before all the prep work started I had a free day, it was Monday. There was snow on the ground and I had nothing to do, so I decided to take a walk through the Vienna woods. It was beautiful. Every time I get away from everyone and take a moment for myself, my mind goes insane! I start thinking metaphorically about my past, present and future. Each path I took had an unknown ending and each fork in the road I came to presented a problem. Do I go left or right? Up or down? Will I regret going one way and not the other? will I get lost and not find my way back? At this point in my life there is a lot to wonder about. The woods are directly behind our house and the trails lead uphill. So I decided after a while to just kept going uphill, not having any idea where I was going. I went back up to a meadow I found a few weeks back, where I went to think when I found out about Cascade closing. It was my refuge because it was big and quiet and surrounded by trees with fall colored leaves. It was gorgeous and comforting. When I went back, there was snow on the ground and all the trees were bare. It didn't feel the same. It made me realize that it was a temporary comfort, everything about this trip is temporary. Living in Vienna, in a castle with 47 other students is my current reality and after 3 months I have really gotten used to it. Now its going to change again and never be my reality again. Weird... I am so excited to go home, but I also don't want to leave. I am so torn, in more than one aspect of my life. Torn between choosing Rochester or OC for school next year, torn between Europe and Oregon and torn between my friends here and my friends at home. I just need to be sewn back up! I want answers but I know I won't get them right away. I have to pray. I have to trust.