Happy Days...
Well, right now not a creature is stirring in my house except for my fingertips on this stubbornly loud keyboard, so I'm going to keep this short - I just have to say while the topic is on my mind that life is gooooood right now.We just had my mom's side of the family over for a low-key Christmas Eve dinner (although this year we stepped it up and had a ham rather than the traditional 6-foot sub sandwich!) and, as usual, the conversations were effortless and entertaining! The older I get the more I recognize how rare this is...
The immediate family played some board games after everyone else left, after which I could not delay gratification any longer and started uploading my pictures onto the computer! I just downloaded Picasa, a picture-organizing tool from Google, which has been super fun to play around with!
Chatting with people with whom I might not have talked in a year in and of itself made me get down to the bare bones of what all has happened this year...last Christmas, I was going to return to a job I hated in Rochester, the idea for cross-cultural volunteerwork and a vague desire for exploration only abstract seeds in my mind.
Could I have possibly forseen what would come - the three months (instead of 3 weeks) in Belize, the New York to Washington State Road Trip, my first real 9-5 type office job at the UWMC and the coworker bonding that ensued? Meeting Suraj and reassessing so much of what I thought I knew and wanted from relationships? The tears, treks and tremendous generosity of my family, friends, and strangers along the way during my part-solo Europe Trip?
I've often resisted romanticizing my experiences, because people should know that travel is always full of rough spots, ambiguous situations, worries and fears, but while I looked through my pictures tonight I just felt a deep sense of wonder at all the positive experiences I've had. I decided to choose some pictures that reflected the highlights of the year - they are by NO means exhaustive, but I felt they lent themselves best to this medium.
What will I be assessing at the end of 2006? I can't wait to find out! | posted by Cheryl, 12/25/2005 01:03:00 AM
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