I think that's the best way to sum up the past two weeks. I needed that.
Okay, I would have survived, but since I have such a luxury of taking a vacation, I'm glad I was able to because it totally rejuvenated me. It was exciting, fun, relaxing and so very not Israel. People dressed well in a variety of ways. Superficial, I know, but it feels like such a radically high percentage of Israelis dress so poorly, it was nice to see a diversity of clothing styles that weren't offensive. And yes, wearing your clothes 3 sizes to small is offensive to me.
But that's just the beginning. Despite rumors, the food was awesome. Sorry about the people who got bum deals and had bad food - the food we had was great, and we do not lack good food here amongst the diverse peoples found at the Baha'i World Centre.
Plus, we stayed with friends - or friends of a friend who became our friends - the whole time. That rocked. We met tons of wonderful people all the way along. The Baha'i community of Toledo will remain particularly clear in my memory. They were exuberant, cheerful, loving and patient. We had a wonderful holy day celebration with them (the Birth of Baha'u'llah). The children performed a skit, we played games, Mark & presented a slideshow of Haifa and Akka - and we had yummy food from Peru, mmmm. Good stuff.
Then we headed out to the Basque country, which was beautiful (like the rest of Spain) and restful and fun because we were with our friend Krisia. Yay!
I will tell more, I swear, but I have to run to rehearsal.
By the way, I had a life changing experience last night. If I don't write about it eventually, nag me :-)
And Rae, you (and you alone) are allowed to nag me about definitions of success and failure. I have thought about it, though I don't know if I have definite conclusions. I do like some of my thoughts though :-)
And Sjona: I LOVE YOU!!
Did the life changing experience involve that evening where we had encouragement for the encouragers and rich chocolate cake? If not, did I miss it?????
I love your new title!
Absa-smurfly!
And you know what? I wrote the title and the sub-title months apart ... but they fit so well together, no? Eerie...
I'm a middle child too...which is why you're title doesn't say the middle child...just don't want to be forgotten or exluded;)
You got it, Rae! That's exactly why I didn't write that I was "the" middle child :-)
That's right folks, the girls in our family are sandwiched in the 'middle' - the boys are the bookends!
Life changing experience that involves chocolate . . .hummmmm!?! I could think I could go for that.
Success and Failure. I am not nagging you for definitions, but putting in my two cents worth. Take it or leave it.
I have found that not only have my definitions changed over time, but specific failures and successes have shifted from one column to the other with time. Slippery little buggers.
I'm bringing the dry ingredients for Schmeeze with me and will make it for a dinner party. Try and stop me if you will! (Do you have an electric mixer? Not having one might be enough to stop me. A blender?)
We do have a blender. Electric mixer ... uh, yeah, that too.
Success - yeah, I've realized that, too. There's very few things I can think of from my past that I would categorize as 'failures'. Hmm....