Dreaming of home...(or at least I would be, if I was sleeping)

I leave for Australia this Saturday morning... right now I am a nervous bundle of excitement and dread at the prospect of going home. Dread, because I have mixed feelings about continuing to live in the UK and I know two weeks is going to go by very quickly. Excitement, because I haven't seen most of my family for two long years. Or my little Pepper-dog.

I have been over here now for nearly four years. Last night, I was reading Clive James' autobiography (highly recommended, BTW) and he made a comment about how, if you have been away long enough, going home constitutes some kind of time travel. A hum of recognition went through me. I definitely feel as though I will be travelling back into my past, revisiting old friends (some from distant high school days) and going back to my old bed in my old room in my old family home, with my old parents taking care of me. Actually, that's a bit cheeky - my parents are incredibly young compared to most of my peers (my mum was merely 23 when she had me).

There was enough of a gap last time I went back (2 years ago), that when I looked at the books on my bookshelf and the CD's on my CD rack, I felt miles away from the girl who lugged her refridgerator-sized backpack to Tullamarine airport, crying helplessly all the way, and waved goodbye to her parents without knowing when she would see them again.

The combination of giddy excitement, stress about making arrangements, anticipation of emotional roller-coasters to come, as well as fear of coming back to the UK, has meant that I haven't slept for at least two months. I am currently a walking zombie, necking Fizzygoodmakefeelnice (ie. Berocca's) and stumbling through my days with only the hazy vision of a Qantas ticket keeping me going.

Roll on, Saturday.