Just kicked in

The excitement! Oh, the excitement!

In less than 24 hours, we will be outta here. I love the Big City and all, but it's time to bust out and have some winter fun. We're going down to the Eastern Shore for a T Family Christmas in a rental house on the bay (I think?) in Maryland. It'll be T's family - parents, aunts, uncles and cousins - no kids yet. So lots of drinking, eating and general hanging out, spanning time.

After a few days with the T Fam, we move on to my parents' house for one night of FAST catching up with my parents, brother and sister, 3 nieces (in town on the one holiday that I'm not there!) and cousin, aunt, etc. It'll be a lot of socializing in a little time, though, because on Monday morning, we fly...to Colombia!

Two weeks in Colombia. As usual, I tentatively think I might have some kind of clue what to expect, while simultaneously feeling sure that I have no idea whatsoever what to expect. I do know that despite every logical part of my brain being convinced otherwise, we will be in HOT weather. So I am forcing myself to pack shorts, tank tops, flip flops even. And a swim suit, if I can find it.

In Colombia, we'll see lots of relatives I've long wanted to introduce to T. And I'll get to show him my family's home in Purificacion where my dad and grandmother were born, and where my great aunts and uncle still live. And for the first time ever, we'll get to do some exploring outside the realms of family. I just can't wait.

We'll fly back on January 9th, the Sunday before my last semester of law school (si Dios quiere) and then resume normal life again, which by then, I suspect, we'll be more than happy to do.

Hooray! Merry Christmas! Happy new year, ya'll!

Immigration, vacation, infatuation

Some thoughts...

* Well, this immigration gig is really overwhelming. It could be the experience of working where I'm at, but it feels like every post I've written since I started this job has been about how exhausting this internship has been. I do this thing when I'm really overwhelmed where I just kind of try to avoid the stressor (whatever it is) at times when it's not immediately in my vicinity. Which is normal, and probably healthy, in most situations. I come home, cook some dinner or sit on the couch with my laptop or a magazine, or maybe go out with friends or on a date with T. But when the job is all wrapped up in trying to come up with a fellowship pitch for your boss so that you can potentially have a paid job for the next two years, sitting around and doing nothing in the evenings isn't necessarily the best idea. For example: I should be researching some very specific sections of 8 C.F.R. 287.7 right now. And a small voice in my head is saying, "If you don't get moving on this, you're going to find yourself drifting away from a Very Important Opportunity." I'm doing my best to drown that voice out.

* People keep asking if I'm going anywhere this summer. I keep forgetting that summer is the time for getaway vacations and such. Instead, T & I recently purchased tickets to fly to California in October for his cousin's wedding. That, in my mind, is going to be an awesome weekend vacation. His parents generously paid for our hotel room, and we used credit from our cancelled trip to Guatemala to get the flight for next to nothing. (Yes, flying to Central America was cheaper than flying to the West Coast!) We'll be staying in a luxury inn at Laguna Beach, and surrounded by tons of family. And I do feel blessed that I actually love hanging out with extended family at get-togethers! Well... for a weekend, anyway. But even more than the trip to California... we got our "extra" tax return (from when I realized a big error in our first joint tax return and we filed a 1040X), we just paid off our credit cards and now we are going to be getting tickets to go to Colombia over New Years!!!!!! This prospect is so exciting to me that I could care less about getting away this summer. (Well, that and the fact that I actually truly am enjoying not having any more big plans for the rest of the summer... it still feels so much more relaxing to just stay in town.)

* I miss my husband. We've been so busy running around and entertaining other people and trying to catch up on work that I feel like I've hardly got to see him. Well, okay, that's not exactly true. We did get in a few rounds of Boggle last night and ate a delicious dinner with Best Man and Best Woman tonight. I guess it's not that I miss him (he's only up the street at a poker game). It's that I like him. A lot. Today I got him a (very belated) birthday present that I can't wait to give him...when it gets here. : ) I was going to do a list of things I like about T, but then it just occurred to me that I can tell him those things when he gets home. But I will say, the best thing of all about him and me is the feeling like we're part of a team - he's got my back, and I've got his - and no matter how much we get on each other's nerves, there's a flame there that's been burning since the day we met. I love that I can count on that.

Real

Things I have done [so far] instead of going to Guatemala over Spring Break:

* Ate out with T at the gourmet all-vegan bistro we've been meaining to try since we moved here. Seitan BBQ & Vietnamese (lemongrass seitan) tacos for appetizers. Skewered winter squash over a bed of black lentils, salsa verde, grilled green onions and a pepper stuffed with cauiliflour mousse. YUM!

* Beat the first level of the secret World 9 (star world!) in Super Mario Wii. Now working on getting all the star coins in World 2 so I can unlock the second star world level. For anyone out there playing Mario Wii, don't neglect or blow off those star coins. They're good for more than unlocking stupid hint videos!

* Outlined/read the first week of Civil Procedure II. It's a great system I have going. Even a little bit of reading makes me feel so much more competent and confident. The problem is I work sooooo slowly. But I'm still proud of myself.

* Took a solo road trip out to Amish country, where T and I spent our first night together 7.5 years ago on our first date. (We slept in the front and back seats of his car while parked on our way to Niagara Falls!) It's also where T and I went for our 6th anniversary when we got in a big fight about when we were gonna get married on our drive home. Haha...

* Ate first lunch in an old train dining car while I watched Amish families trot down the road in their buggies. Ate second lunch at a luncheonette where I was the only non-Amish (also the only non-octogenarian) in the place except for the woman serving us. Got a great close-up look at the white prayer veils the women wear over their hair, and good listen to the Amish / Pennsylvania Dutch / German pidgin language they speak. Also watched one of them flirt with an old man with a long beard as he was leaving. Can they do that?

* Bought farm fresh eggs at $1.50 / dozen.

* Watched far more Netflix than I'm comfortable with.

* Made plans for my best friend and her husband and their two dogs (and her bun in the oven!) to come visit tomorrow.

I was disappointed about not going to Guatemala. We made the right decision, but it's hard to sit around the apartment in the evening knowing that spring break is running out and I'm not off on a big adventure. But I know that life is all about attitude, so I've tried to look at this time as a gift and an opportunity to do all sorts of things I wouldn't otherwise do. (Yes, that includes start outlining.) While I was driving on the backcountry roads yesterday, I let my eyes linger for a few moments on a house that may or may not have had a candle lantern on the front porch. When I looked back at the road, I saw a truck coming at me, and realized I had drifted into the other lane. I quickly corrected and the truck swooshed past me, safely. But that instant, those fleeting seconds, made my blood run cold. I pulled into the Mennonite Church at the next intersection, parked the car and prayed. Life could be gone at any second. I feel like we're all here at the pleasure of someone bigger than us. So, yeah. I'm gonna try to appreciate what I've got. Guatemala would've been nice. But it can wait.

Bitten by the travel bug (again)

Exciting news on the homefront: It looks like we're going to be going to Guatemala over my spring break!

T & I have a friend who's been in the Peace Corps down in Guate for the last couple of years. It seems like just yesterday we were bidding him farewell, and only a few hours ago that I was reading his blog as he struggled to come to terms with the strange new place into which he had landed. Instead, A is now the old hand and I am excited to have a chance to see where he's been living and what he's been doing while we've been moving to Big City adjusting to law school getting married working 9 to 5 jobs drinking way too much and twiddling our thumbs.

We may only get to be down there for five days, depending on T's vacation and work schedule. But even 5 days will be more than none, and I am so thrilled to think of travelling in Latin America with T, revisiting some of the places I passed through ever so briefly six (!) years ago, seeing things from the perspective of someone who has lived there long enough to speak the indigenous language... I love travelling!

It's going to cost a penny, but I think it'll be worth it. The hard part will be coming home.