On Monday night I arrived home from London, where I had spent the weekend visiting friends from school. As I hurtled through the English countryside back towards Paris (I took the Eurostar) my heart swelled painfully with conflicting emotions: I’d been so happy to be spending time with some of my best friends again, and yet, heading home, I was equally subdued at the thought that I wouldn’t see most of them for nearly a year. Of course, in the grand scheme of things, that’s hardly a long time – but having spent the past five years together, nine months seems unimaginably long to go without seeing them in person. The…