Where do I go when I have nowhere left to turn?

College is great. I have awesome new friends, my classes are barely hard at all (yet), and I have nothing dictating my schedule. I have a job now, I think I'm gonna be an RA next year, and I feel rather at home. My life at Allegheny rocks, it's great, and I would not have it any other way.

Outside of Allegheny however, things kind of sucked today. Thursday night I had gotten up the nerve to ask my mom if I could go to the Czech Republic in May. After two days of pondering in Churchville, to my surprise, she said YES. Holy wow! How could this happen? I thought she would never say yes to taking $700 of my money and blowing it on a plane ticket! I only had one hurdle to jump...making sure it was all right on the Czech end that I go.

Tyna was ecstatic at the news. Neither of us could believe this would actually happen so soon if ever. Thinking ahead and longing for the days of May where we would reunite and be the best of friends again. Her family was happy for me to come as well. All was good. Then she came back with the worst news ever. Her exams, the big ones that she has to take at the end of her school year that pretty much decide the rest of her life, are from May 21-June 1. My heart was broken, I was shot down, I was depressed...still am really. How could I get through my parents, have them say yes, have plane tickets drop to low rates and work myself up to a level of excitement, only to have this one glorious thing pushed down by something as stupid as this? I think the worst thing is that it CAN'T be CHANGED. Parents say no, I can change it. Plane tickets too high, I fork over another hundred bucks and spend less. But THIS...there is nothing I can do. It's hard to recover from something lie this...getting up on a 500ft pedestal of excitement and joy, then falling flat on my face unable to stop myself before I hit the ground.

The worst part is, now that I know I won't be seeing them in May, they seem so much further away and distant from me. I fear I may never see them again as we enter the adult world and our lives become complicated heaps of responsibility and work. I realized that I have been hanging onto this hope for several months, fully convinced that no matter what blocks I came across along the way, I could get through them with cool persuasion and a drive to show that I can still afford it even while I am at college. Entirely confident in that fact that on May 13 2008 I would be on a plane across the ocean for the greatest reunion of my life to date.

But where am I supposed to go now that the single golden thread of hope has been cut? Who am I supposed to turn to? None of my friends here will understand, to them it will seem like some petty problem that is not worth crying and being depressed over. Their thoughts would be something along the lines of, boo hoo Stacy can't take a trip abroad at then end of the year. How is that a big deal?. My friends at home would barely understand, not wanting to listen to my stupid problem that seems so superficial on the outside. My parents don't understand. My friends in the Czech Republic are probably feeling the same things and I barely ever get to talk to them because we are all so busy. Where do I go when I have nowhere left to turn?

Now I feel really dumb for putting this all here. For some reason, it looks petty and childish and immature that I would be so distraught over this, and it probably is. But explanations unknown, it's hitting me hard. Harder than a freight train and I don't know what to do anymore.