je suis minuit.

The half-way point.
It's a time during which an exchange student can't help but to think:
to think about what they've done and what they've yet to do; what they've learned and what they've yet to learn.
To think about how they've changed in personality and opinion, and how their home has changed in meaning and comfort.

Have I changed?
Should I hear it in my laugh
or in the way I say my name? Although it is true that I now prefer the French JorDANN more than a simple "Jordin".
And that's a change.

En fait, I have a hard time remembering who I was before I came to Belgium, or rather, who I was before I began my life as an exchange student. When I think of  how to label myself, the only thing that comes to mind is exchange student or something in its effect.
How can I know if I've changed if I don't know who the person was that changed?

My year of 2010 was entirely consumed by what I would become. I worked, thought, wondered, worried, and worked some more. By the end of August, I could finally say "I am" rather than "I'm going to be."
Looking back on it, it's as if the majority of 2010 didn't exist: I'd gone all-in with the present for a chance of a better future.
Slowly pushing a messy, colorful pile of seconds, minutes, and hours towards the center of the table, I'd bet it all for what I'd hoped to win.  All the while, I had never felt so weak, so vulnerable.
For strength's reputation, I bluffed. Though I had to force a smile rather than try to prevent one. How is it that no one ever called it?

But I never folded my hand,
and here I am: sitting on my bed in Belgium with my laptop cradled between my knees, content to have made the bet.

"and here I am."
What is "I"? A single letter so powerful and uncertain.
You may read this and think you know "I": the way "I" speaks or the way "I" wanders.
But "I" isn't who "I" was, it's rather who je suis.

I no longer want to fly.

If I did, I would never witness the puddle's goosebumps when he feels the touch of the rain. I would never hear Abe Lincoln, his cheek pressed against the sidewalk, begging for liberation to simply give luck for a day.

I'm now patriotic.

Living in Belgium has made me appreciate the US: it's constant laughter, always listened to like music and never criticized; it's open roads, wide enough that we can drive our aspirations as well as our "big American trucks."

I've forgotten how to spell and instead learned how to breathe.

Words have no sense:  they're powerless in the presence of a crooked smile
and its captivation,
of humbled innocence.

I think I'm just who I'm supposed to be, though I always will become.  It's a constant effect of time and its duration.

And in effect of time and its speed as well as the body's gradual exhaustion,

writing has finishe