In which all travel is finalised, and I chat about Cardiff.

Above lie two of the tickets which will seal my fate.

I jest. I'm looking forward to it now. Towards the end of the next five weeks, I'll post about why.

"Above lie the two tickets which will transport me across France," would be a better description. So that's it! This evening I bought my final train ticket from Paris Saint Lazare to Bréauté-Beuzeville for the sum total of €15 (you have no idea how long it took me to find that euro sign - just one of the ways in which I'll change during the next twelve months!).

However, now I've shared that, I am going to discuss something else.


For one night only, I made a bit of an improptu trip to Cardiff on Thursday. It's a city which I haven't visited in four years but one which I simply love. A capital city without the attitude and without the cost! But although it's only Wales (not meant in the sense that it's only Wales, but that it's not that far away from home), it help in the realisation of a couple of profundities, the sort which would be in a movie for those in their late teens and set in some glamourous city. Twenty isn't too far off my late teens...

Since moving away from home I've been aware that my time has been predominantly my own and I have explored that to an extent; I haven't had to tell my parents when I take a train somewhere unexpected (although I often have, as I share almost everything with my mom), or explain why I was going to the shops or any such thing. But in Cardiff, when at half past eleven at night I announced I was going to walk for half an hour to the Bay, there was a sudden thought: yes, because I can. Don't get me wrong, I'm not the girl who has been stymied by my parents, but more so by myself.

I've also been wanting to meet even more new people lately, and by looking for work, volunteer opportunities and popping off to different cities, I'd been hoping to do that. Taking up the hostel on its simple offer of free pizza couldn't have been any more perfect; it's been a long while since I let myself talk and, to be honest, steer the conversation, and so after everybody rearranged the tables to talk better, I realised that none of these people knew me. In order to get the best first impressions, I was going to conquer this recent problem of mine. And do you know, asking questions and listening to the responses got me the best reaction. Before long four Aussies, a Kiwi, an ex-member of the Queen's Guard from Wednesbury and I were playing creative games of Jenga in a hostel dining room in Cardiff, Wales. Brilliant.

So I suppose, to anybody reading this who feels that perhaps they aren't reaching their full potential, trying things or doing what they want to do, take a deep breath and dive in. I booked my flights to the USA this week too. I said at the time I'd gone crazy, but I'm not, I'm just doing what I want to do whilst I can - you never know when that might change. As for Wales, well, I left my heart in Cardiff. Yeah alright, that's not a phrase, but what the hell...