It's always odd when you meet friends that you haven't seen for extended periods of time - I never know how to react, a bit like when you're saying goodbye. Do you make a big deal of the time, or just react like you've seen each other yesterday? I suppose the good thing is that whatever you do, it doesn't feel awkward, which I guess is the mark of a good friendship. But after I moved on from London to catch a train up to Cambridge I certainly had a lot of that!
I was last in Cambridge only four months ago, but such a lot happens in such a short space of time that it felt like an age, and it was an odd feeling being back. I'm now firmly in between years - I'm not a third year or a second year and I spent the four days I was there skating over the surface of the place. Yesterday was results day and it felt very peculiar being there when everyone else was getting there's, knowing I'd have to wait another year. It's an odd feeling knowing that the people I've basically grown up with at Selwyn won't be there next year, and it'll be like starting over in a way, but most will be living in London next year, and I'll probably be doing the same the year afterwards.
As a kind of celebration of the past year a group of us went to the Downing May Bay on the Wednesday night, after the Law Society garden party, and thankfully the rain stayed away the whole night. I think I speak for everyone when I say that we all had a fantastic evening spending time with good friends. The Ball itself was good fun as well, and better than last year's at Sidney Sussex.
Unfortunately I now have to decide which subjects I want to take next year when I'm back there, and this is about one-hundreds time harder to decide than it sounds. I had to have two meetings with my Director of Studies discussing the issue and I still never really reached a conclusion. Utrecht's spoiled me with its huge choice of subjects, such that the 10 or so I can choose from next year seem a little stingy. I think I'll have to do some pondering this summer, but it's good to be able to consult those who did them this year.
Lots of people asked me whether I'd missed Cambridge and whether I felt like I'd be able to get back into it next year. I don't think I could answer 'yes' more strongly to both questions if I tried. This year has been fantastic and I'd do it again in a heartbeat - and I told as much to the people I met who are coming here next year - but I left a lot behind to come, and while that's not lost, it wasn't quite the same being back as it would have been had I never left. Of course, that's to be expected, but there's a part of me that will wonder about that. As for getting back into it, there's an odd idea that once you get out of the Cambridge 'bubble' you can't get back in, but I can't disagree more strongly. I already feel more grown up than this time last year, and there have been times this year when I've felt so frustrated by the work here that I've longed to read an article or a case judgement properly, and I'll be able to do that with a vengeance next year. I know I'll be complaining the opposite way next year, but at the moment that doesn't matter. I'll be more than happy to move into my room in September to start my final year, but I'll be sad to leave Utrecht and the Netherlands as well. I would never have thought about living abroad unless my job took me there prior to this year, but now moving to Utrecht, or Amsterdam seems no more of an upheaval than moving to London. A small world it is.
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