Since I last updated, I spent ten days with my aunt and Grandma, who came to visit me in Prague. They stayed in my apartment with me and also traveled to Vienna for three days so that they could see the city and meet Chris.

Chris has given up drinking and has not had a touch of alcohol in…a month? Longer? He seems to be largely the same person but maybe a bit more patient and less wild. And he’s readier to move forward in our relationship. He is now ready for me to move to Vienna. Separate apartments, still, but he used to be nervous at the thought of me doing that in a year. A year from now, I expect that he’ll be ready to live together. We spent three consecutive weekends together and he’s realized in that time that I don’t require as much attention as he thought I did and that it’s very easy to hang out with me. Perhaps I put too much emphasis in our early months on doing things together when we were together, and now he realizes that I don’t actually require that. I can play around on my computer while he plays on his, and I’m happy to call that a Saturday afternoon.

Things with Chris may not be moving quite as fast as I would like but I know they’re moving in the right direction. He’s ready for me to be in Vienna, and I can’t be there for another 9 months or more. The more is dependent on job prospects for a non-German speaker. I’m going to ask him in the coming weeks if he can help me to procure a copy of Rosetta Stone.

David had to move out of his beautiful apartment at the end of June. He is now renting a room in a shared flat and wants to leave Prague in a couple of months. He’s looking into places like Macau and the United Arab Emirates. I told him that if he goes some place exotic, I’d love to visit him. I have no idea what has become of his wishes to go to the United States, but I could tell that he was really sizing me up on Sunday when I was at his apartment for the last time. He was trying to determine how much weight I’ve lost, which hasn’t been much at all. I’ve been stuck at my current spot for a few weeks because my focus shifted away from dieting to entertaining family and I hope to get back on track in the next couple of weeks.

[Edit at 2:57 to add: I think David still wants to go to the US but he's weighing his options. And also weighing me. He asked me when I plan to leave Prague and I said I didn't know.]

I put up pictures on Facebook from my family’s visit and he sent me a message to say that I looked “really good” and “well done” but I think I look thinner in them than I am and he was probably disappointed when he saw me on Sunday. Also, he was sharing photos with me of his trip to the US but we also looked through pictures from a party he threw in December (a party that I mentioned before in this blog because I was NOT invited), and he said multiple times that it was such a great party and an amazing party, and it was just sort of weird that he was sharing that with me instead of brushing it under the rug.

I will miss him when he leaves, and I will likely stay in touch but I feel properly detached from him right now. I guess that I feel whole right now, so I don’t need his approval. I feel good, loved by my family and friends, and by Chris. I am happy with my job, happy with my apartment and my little spot in the world. Things are good.

And now a few photos:

This was in the gardens of a palace in Vienna. It’s my new Facebook profile picture:



A little blurry, with my aunt:



Me again (I’m also showing off how much weight I’ve lost, even if these are completely deceptive):



Chris:



Me with my Grandma in Prague:



See, I look less thin:



And that’s enough. I hope I don’t anger the gods by not putting this behind a cut.