I don't know why but I feel desperately homesick tonight. Usually it comes and goes but tonight it came and stayed. I can't really put my finger on what I'm homesick about. My sisters and my family, my friends, my home, my things around me, the familiar sights, sounds and smells or probably the combination of it all. I have built a good life for myself back home. Not the most exciting one or even a good one for most people's standards, perhaps, but dear and familiar to me all the same. I think the weather has something to do with it as well. It feels so much like home. The warmth of the wind blowing through the trees feels hauntingly familiar on my skin but everything else seems so wrong. I feel so out of place that it blows my mind.

My life has always been about service but I feel useless here. All this time I'm here, it's like playing catch-up with my studies so I never really have any time to really feel the absence of the familiar. I was too caught up in my studies to feel that I'm missing anything other than the occasional moments of weakness. Now with the summer vacation here, I've too much time on my hands bringing with it unwelcome thoughts and emotions. It hits me like a ton of bricks that I am actually alone here. I am usually alone and it has always been by choice and I am never lonely as I do enjoy my own company but tonight I feel totally alone and lonely. I have no one here. And that is really sad.

What do I want actually? I don't rightly know. I never really fit in when I was in Malaysia and I don't really fit in here either. Oh yes, it does seem that I fit in all right here or back home- or at least I make it looks like I do- but not really. Not where it really counts. Thirty-four seems to be a ripe old age to be wondering the "where do I belong" question but I'm not really surprised. I've been dealing with it for a long time now and have come up with different answers every time. Not only that, I'm a late bloomer anyway and things always come late to me and for me. No use in fighting that there, it is what it is.

I'm tired but I can't seem to sleep. I did three loads of laundry at 2 am tonight. I've been trying to go to bed since 11 pm. I'd gotten in and out of bed more times than I can't count now. So now what? I don't know. I feel like taking a long drive and not come back for a long time.... You know what? Maybe I'll do just that. I've never seen Austin before. Maybe tonight is a good time to do just that. Or maybe I can drive down to Galveston and see the sun rises over the sea.