It's all in my head (t-9 days)

The other night, I had one of those rude and nagging message-dreams.

It was a couple weeks into the future, and I was on the plane to Málaga. (The plane in question happened to be orange and shaped like a car. You know. How it do.) After landing, I was approached by a gaggle of Spanish airport security officers asking for my visa (in English? with British accents? Sure). Only... I didn't have it. I panicked, of course, and started frantically searching my carry-on and my suitcases and turning out every single one of my friggin' pockets, but my visa was nowhere to be found; I had left it at my parents' house. I could SEE Spain through the windows and I knew I was there, but I was forced to turn myself around and get right back on the plane, because, as the surly Spanish security dudes told me in a dramatic chorus, I "should've packed sooner." Then I woke up.

Uhhhh... Dear subconscious: subtle, you ain't.

I have (sort of) been working on packing. But instead of really, y'know, doing any actual packing, I've been doing what my sister calls "Visualizing the Actualization Process" of packing. It's a handy expression that's code for procrastinating HARD.

I've for sure thought about packing. I've talked about it. I've made some lists, trying to brainstorm a roster of Things I Need (while struggling to keep it separate from the instantly flooding-in ideas for a much longer list of Things I Just Really Want--like my obnoxious keepsakes, or lots and lots of cardigans). But until that morning, when in a frenzy of scary-dream-induced productivity I dragged a suitcase into the middle of the room and started throwing random articles of clothing into it, I had done bupkis.

Since the Dream Scare, I've been trying (with some minor success) to get away from the purely mental and make some steps forward that are more.. solid, shall we say?

For instance! I did something that's sorta been at the back of my mind for months now: I bought a water bottle. I was meandering through a Marshalls and bumped into a shelf full of super cheap name-brand ones, so I picked out one of the fancy detailed aluminum kind. How's that for something solid? Aluminum!

It actually makes me feel ridiculously chic and collegiate and environmentally conscious. (There's also the added bonus that it was the only damn one that wasn't slathered in embarrassing slogans in the "GO GREEN! REDUCE REUSE RECYCLE! I LOVE EARTH MORE THAN YOU DO!" family.) It's shiny and gold and I'm a little obsessed with it, probably because I look at it as a totem of the put-together-prepared-and-ready-for-anything Margaret that I want to be. That I want to pretend I am.

She's on it! She's with it! She has a water bottle! Sure, she hasn't packed or practiced her Spanish or straightened out her finances, but did you not hear about her water bottle? She totally has one! Look at her go!

...don't judge me.

So, I did that! I also bought a three-pack of European plug converters, and took my passport and its enclosed visa back to my place so there's no chance it will get left at the home of my parents, cause damned if I'm going to let my subconscious get away with predicting my mistakes, OH HELL NO.

Let's hear it for productivity! Next up:
1) Getting off my bum and doing my dang laundry, cause otherwise I'll never get packed;
2) Buying a gift for my host family, utilizing the tip I got from my roomie's Spanish mother that they'll probably be into fridge magnets and comestibles;
3) Getting my glasses tightened, cause even though I never wear them they are loose as all get out and have taken on a kind of trapezoidal shape that is beginning to concern me;
4) Takin' care of bidness at the bank, including a) opening a checking account, b) wiring a sad majority of my summer earnings over to my father, and c) trying to up my pathetic credit limit;
5) Actually cracking open my Lonely Planet guidebook to maybe find out a little bit more about what I'm getting myself into;
6) Making at least three photocopies of every highly important document/card I'll have with me in Spain and scattering them across safe locations;
and
7) Finally spending some gahdamn time with my Grandma, because I never do enough of that anyway, and since being home I have been totally negligent on that front.

Seven things. That's not so bad! It's even lucky, right?

Right.