Full Sending
“I just need to full send, and I’ll figure it out later”.
I’m sitting on my green couch that has chunks missing - a Facebook Marketplace find - in my rundown home in Boulder. I’m explaining my revised plan. This is at least my sixth revision in two weeks, my poor roommate can barely feign interest at this point. Project Get Claudia and Cinder to Spain is not going well.
To “full send” as defined by Urban Dictionary is to “Not give a fuck about the consequences” otherwise known as “send it” defined as “Whole heartedly throwing caution to the wind”.
For example:
“I’m gonna send it, Mom. Who wouldn’t want to live in a tent all summer and be a whitewater raft guide?”
“Hey, Dad. I sent it, I got a dog.”
“Dear Mom and Dad,
I’ve decided to move to Spain. Full send, baby!! Call me later.
Love, Claudia”
Yes, my dad often makes fun of “the weird lingo” I bring home from being a young person living in Colorado. He swears that every time he sees me I use an entirely new vocabulary. But “sending it” has been a phrase that’s stuck around the last few years.
Crappy couch in the crappy house :)
I had spent weeks finding different programs to potentially give me funding to move to Spain. However, almost all the deadlines had passed to apply for grants, and doing the research I was interested in didn’t exactly line up with many scholarship programs. I was about to graduate college, and had no interest in going into a grad program. So, as it had been put so eloquently to me, who the hell was going to give me money?
This brings me to draft eight of Project Get Claudia and Cinder to Spain. I had done a semester abroad with a program called CIEE. I lived in Barcelona, and they had provided great support for me. I had recently learned that they offered another program, based in Madrid. I could become a Language Assistant, otherwise known as an “Auxiliar de Conversacion.” I would be placed at a school within Madrid, work four hours a day, make next to no money, and most importantly, complete project Get Claudia and Cinder to Spain. Once I was there, I could figure everything else out. What could possibly go wrong?
So here I am, in my tiny little apartment in Madrid. By day I work at a vocational school, where I teach primarily adult men, English. By night, I’m a confused twenty two year old trying to figure out how the hell all the Expats on TikTok make living abroad look so effortless, and 24/7 fun.
Less crappy apartment with my Madrid Familia
(Yes, this is BeReal)
I’ve cried more these last two months than I have in years. Wrestled with grief, struggled with anxiety, homesickness, dog attacks, a very long month of being without a place to live, and all the instability that comes with being a recent college grad.
But I’ve also experienced more kindness from strangers than I could have ever hoped. Locals offering free Spanish lessons, Airbnb hosts helping me find housing, waiters introducing me to new friends, and one incredibly kind man took care of my dog when I was in crisis. I’ve met endless amounts of new friends: friends that let me indefinitely crash on their couch, that impulsively book trips to Valencia, that chicken fight in the ocean with me, that hold my hand while I cry over my injured dog, that religiously do family dinner. They have made every tear shed these past weeks worth it. Project 'Get Claudia and Cinder to Spain' has been checked off the list, and now it’s onto the next adventure — figuring out the later.