Solitude is Bliss

Thank you all very much for the birthday wishes/presents/cards/letters. I had an excellent time celebrating turning 17 here in Spain. I'm very happy right now, which is good. I'm also learning life lessons all over the place, which is also good.
I was Skyping my mom last night and, being the Journalism Mom (like a Dance Mom but not really at all) that she is, she asked me what kind of article I'd write about my experience here so far. I laughed at that for a bit, but then I thought about it seriously. What would I write about? I could definitely compose a solid list of complaints or gush for pages about everything I love, but that's not exactly something worth publishing. After a couple minutes I said that, if I had to be entirely honest, I'd write about what it's like to be alone.
I've felt alone at many points in my life at varying levels of intensity. There was the time I got lost in the woods in Canada, the first time I was left home alone by myself, when I went to Washington DC without my family, all the times I feel left out of a conversation, etc. But never have I ever been as alone as I am right now. It's not even a bad thing- I actually rather enjoy it. It's an educational thing, really, and it's teaching me to be comfortable with myself.
I have always been a pretty independent person, but I never really even knew what that meant before coming here. I have always (mostly) made my own decisions. But until Spain, I had always unknowingly been influenced by something or someone. I knew the social norms of where I lived, what my friends and family thought, what I was predicted or expected to do, how the people around me would react to different things. Here I have none of that knowledge. This may be inconvenient, being surrounded by completely foreign ideas and people all day long, when all I want to do is hug my little sister or have a nice peanut butter and jelly sandwich, but it can also be beneficial. In many ways, it has freed me. I am still held to a certain standard by my host family and by myself, but I am also largely allowed to do what I want and find out who I really am.
Being yourself is hard when people who you've known for years and years already have an idea of who they think you are. Being yourself is easy when you don't have the language skills, energy or memory capacity to pretend to be anyone else for longer than a minute or so. I can't remember the difference between "cuchara" and "cuchillo" (words I use rather frequently) so I definitely can't remember the difference between all the different ways I present myself when speaking to different people. I am forced to wear one face because not only am I too tired to keep track of a bunch of different identities, but I really only want to be one person; myself.
When I was younger someone told me that in elementary school you find your role as a family member, in middle school you find your role as a friend, and in high school you find your role as yourself. I think that was one of the main reasons I so frequently separated myself from everyone when I was still in Bend (that, and the fact that I don't tend to like most people, so if I've given you this link feel special cos it must mean I like you)- it's impossible to get to know yourself if you are constantly surrounded by people with their own opinions, way of speaking, life goals, etc. People don't realize how great of an influence the people you interact with have on you. Being alone is very important when you are trying to figure out who you are. Here in Spain, I spend a lot of time both physically and mentally alone. It takes me 45 minutes in the morning to take the bus to school and most of the time I don't see anyone I know on my commute, which means I get some good thinking time in. Also most of the time I get very frustrated not being able to understand anything that's going on when everyone's speaking in rapid Andalucian Spanish, so I remove my thoughts from the conversation and get some good thinking time in then, too. I've learned some  very important things about myself from all this thinking time. For instance, I may be regarded as intelligent by some but I am definitely not an academic; an important distinction, as choosing a college used to be based on academics for me but now I know I'd rather choose based on the experience it can give me.
Another way being alone has made me get to know myself is by seeing how I handle challenges and struggles. My whole life is a challenge right now- unless you have ever been in a scarily similar situation to mine, you cannot understand how difficult it is not understanding the language, social norms, grading system, anything about the place you are now LIVING in- and as a result much of what I do defines who I am. Dealing with a tough situation brings out who we really are, I've always thought, and the fact that I'm doing it all on my own has helped me realize a great deal of things about myself that I wouldn't have been able to learn had someone been helping me. For instance, when a friend of mine lost her wallet on a long-gone bus I learned that I'm actually an optimist when I immediately began listing off solutions and ways to fix this and how she could get her wallet back and who we could call, etc. That was huge for me, because my melancholiness has always tricked me into believing I'm a pessimist. In reality, I'm just a slightly sad optimist.
I've always enjoyed being alone, but here solitude is more than just bliss; it's an important way for me to learn who I am. I am becoming less and less defined by the people I surround myself with and the places I go and more and more defined by me.