"Everybody's changing
And I don't feel the same"

I had two scary dreams last night involving friends I know either walking away from me or pushing me out of the circle/gang of friends. Weirdly, in one of the dreams Princess Blondie's mother told me that "it would just be best if I left now". Yow, that hurt.

Truth of the matter is that something unexpected has happened during all this planning for my trip to Israel; I have found myself very disconnected from my life now. I feel like I am in a strange limbo as I have had plenty of time to imagine what my life will be like for 5 months in Israel. All this daydreaming and planning and buying and packing has me feeling very disconnected from my current life as it is now and leaves me in a feeling of limbo. I feel like I have one foot here in Canada and one in Israel and it actually doesn't feel altogether good.

A few weeks ago I had a big falling out with two of my closest friends which has had a different impact on me than I would have expected. These girls were two of my greatest confidantes and were important emotional supports for me in my life and upcoming journey. When those friendships abruptly ended I mourned only very briefly and it was then that I began the feeling of great disconnect from my life. (How do I describe this without sounding like I should be in a padded room....?) I guess it just felt like two more things were removed from my life that might keep me attached to my life here. Two more reasons for me missing Canada and my life here are gone.... two more reasons for coming back at all. And while that may seem dramatic, you have to remember that my family is *incredibly* small... so my friends very much serve as my extended family. And when two of those extended family members fall out of grace with me it also puts an incredibly uncomfortable strain on me when seeing the rest of my extended family. As it is, I have become far less social since that falling out with my girlfriends and keep much more to myself now.

I feel like I am a ghost walking around and haunting what was once my life. No longer here, but not yet ready to move on to the next level in Israel. Friendships are evolving right before my eyes.... some have disintegrated completely while others are being stretched and tested. Will they snap? As I take steps towards the biggest journey of my life other friends are also caught up in their own journeys and our paths are diverging rapidly. Friendships I once thought unbreakable I am now not so sure of. On bad days this feeling destroys me... on other days it feels like this is how things are supposed to go. It's all part of the plan to get me to let go and take the leap.

This trip of mine has really brought to light who my steadfast friends are and which ones aren't. I have one friend who not only bought two of my bracelets but he took a bunch of them from me and peddled them around his office and favourite comic shop AND his family dinners. He showed me incredible support, and took up my cause as if it was his own. I have had bloggers, virtual strangers, who have gone out of their way to mention me on their blogs, often several times, and really help get the word out in the vast blogging community. And then there are those friends who hardly acknowledge my trip at all, only ask when they feel obliged to, never mention me on their blogs and only actually call when they need something or need to talk about what's going on with them. They always say that it's when you call for help that you find out who your real friends are, and this has definitely been the case for me, with surprising results.

Clearly I am afraid I will return to find that the gap left by me in the circle of friends will have closed up and I will not be invited back in. You laugh, but these things happen! However, I can't afford to let myself worry about all this. I have to have faith in the remaining friendships and the path that lay before me. I know this is where I must go and what I must do and I know it won't be easy.

"Nothing worth having comes without some kind of fight
You gotta kick at the darkness till it bleeds daylight."