we've played this game of just imagine long enough

Y'all, y'all, y'all. Stop. The. Presses.

No, I have not, FTLOG (TM Abhi), quit my job. No, I have not packed a box or shipped anything off. No, I have not put together an official plan for my departure. And no, I have not given my landlord official notice.

No, no, no, but yes, I have done the one thing involved with all this stress that is inherently and perfectly sublime. I took a long, deep breath, and clicked a button, and y'all, it's done- I am officially going to Spain.

And the thing about this little spoonful of sugar that makes the medicine go down is that it locks everything else down. Everything must happen now. I have to quit my job by the date I planned to quit, because after that, hello, trip to Spain. I have to be fully moved by the date I had targeted, because, oops, too bad, trip to Spain. It all has to happen, and the mandatory nature of the situation is sure to help light a fire under my sorry a$$.

I really cannot believe it. I have been talking about Spain for so long with such certainty that it seemed inevitable that I would be writing a post in a few weeks that said, oh yeah, I came up with a reason why that just wasn't going to work out. But it is going to work out and I am afraid it might not, simply because my insides might explode from excitement and it will be hard to put a blob of goo onto a transcontinental flight.

Planning this trip has been interesting. I have been fiercely against the notion of making these plans with anyone else's input. Once, oh, about a decade ago, I was supposed to drive across the country. My friend JL offered to drive with me, which seemed a brilliant idea at first. But as the weeks passed by, she usurped all planning responsibilities for the trip. The next thing I knew, we had an itinerary and certain must-see landmarks flagged, and suddenly I panicked. It was a b*tchy thing to do, but at the last minute, I backed out. The trip no longer felt like mine. I don't know why, but that was very important to me.

It's the same this time, but perhaps for a different reason. Of course, I was still feeling that I wanted it to be my trip. But also, I didn't want to blame anyone for this trip. I didn't want to, years later, say "I was going to go with X, but at the last minute, he/she backed out because the timing didn't work." I didn't want my happiness to be dependent on anyone else.

And I find it rather amusing how this is all playing out. So far, CGBF claims he is going to join me for the first leg of my trip, and that he may even whisk me off to Londontown for a few days (who knew the G's were such big fans of the LDN?). AL tells me he'll be joining me for the last leg of my trip. Even my friend SP has said she might come along. I could not have dreamed up a better vacation- days with friends, days alone, days traveling as a pack, days exploring by myself. Perfection.

And the best part is that, even if all of those plans fall through, I'll still have one, undeniably blissful thing: Spain, b*tches.