NEW BEGINNINGS
Overlooking Pearl Beach - a final Australian coastal trip.
// SYDNEY AIRPORT INTERNATIONAL DEPARTURES //
It’s always such a strange spectrum of emotions that hit you when the time comes to depart for a long-awaited trip. This is by far the strangest. It’s a trip of length in all senses – being one I’ve awaited for over 13 months, and one that will last a similar amount of time.
The past few weeks of the silly season have given me the chance to be around some of my most cherished friends and family alike. Knowing I won’t see most of them for at least 12 months adds an unexplainable touch of bittersweetness to my looming lift-off from Australia, particularly seeing I’m still accustom to seeing many of them multiple times a day at school.
Final shifts at the pharmacy were notably emotionally nuanced. I’d never had to say goodbye to someone knowing that they likely wouldn’t be around when I next returned. This was also the case for some family members – ones who played an integral part in shaping me as a young person, and ones who I will be forever in debt, gratitude, and admiration to.
Indeed, also the release of HSC results has given me plenty to ponder, which I’m certainly glad to have until this time in 2025 to make up my mind! Maybe there might even be a series of experiences I encounter on my gap year which change my career interests entirely.
When many of you asked the question, “how are you feeling about leaving”, I often gave the lackadaisical teenage response that it ‘hadn’t hit me yet’. It’s now starting to. Watching my comfortably overweight suitcase packed with my life roll away from me at check-in set it off, shortly followed by walking down the one-way corridor to passport control after fond farewells, I can confirm, it’s hit.
And it would be remiss of me not to quote the opening of a personal favourite – Love Actually – which I think beyond perfectly sums up the past while.
“It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often, it’s not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it’s always there – fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends.”
Onwards + upwards (quite literally!). Next stop London Heathrow…
~ Will
