happy
It has been a while. I know. I'm sorry. I have been distracted. I have been flying and landing and swimming and running. I have been distracted but for good reason. I have some incredible, life-changing, so-excited-I-can-hardly-stand-it news.That I'm not giving you yet.Because this news deserves a post better than I can write at 1:00am. But in the mean time, I'd like to tell you about three things that have made me terribly happy, and I'd like to tell you about them in pictures:
Football games- So American. The frito pie, the Sour Punch Straws, the ups and first downs, the stands full of people you know. I took this picture sitting next to my sister on one side and my oldest friend on the other. And see there, that third of five white dots at the back, the one on the 45 yard line? That's my sister on 3rd bass drum. She's out there playing, and after the half-time show, she marched with the drumline to the front of the stands to play cadences like a high school rock star. I played in the drumline when I was in high school, so the combination of watching her play, realizing that my baby sister is old enough to be in high school, and remembering the sounds of drumming and the cool fall air on a Friday night, all of it is wonderfully overwhelming.
Family time! I can not get enough! After two years in Peace Corps, a two hour drive with them to a Friday night football game is such a luxury I can hardly stand it. I can't get enough of floating in the pool with my Mom, chatting with my Dad while cooking dinner, or dancing to this with my baby sister in the living room.
Reunion- Tonight was so special. My Grandmother who lives an hour away invited us to meet her and her siblings for dinner. My grandmother has two siblings. They both live in their home state of Indiana, and it has been years and years since the three of them have all been together. Until this dinner I had never met them. My Grandmother, on the far right, has been all bright, shiny stars anticipating their arrival, and tonight at dinner she was the happiest I've seen her in a long time. I, of course, planted myself right down in front of these people I never met, made sure I was close so I could get as many stories as you can cram into a dinner. I heard tales involving a flying tub of cottage cheese, a nunnery and high school sweethearts. They were charming and kind-hearted, and after my time with them my soul feels incredibly full.