I managed to get my scale home in a large, inconspicuous bag but I forgot to weigh myself when I was at Caroline’s on Friday, so I will simply use my weight from this morning as the starting point for my diet. I’m a bit concerned that the scale I bought is a piece of crap, because I was on and off of it a few times this morning—setting it back and forth between kilograms and pounds—and the first time I was on the scale, I weighed five pounds less than I did a few moments later. Maybe I’ll have to get on it a few times and take averages. What a joke.

Last week, I had a feeling that I ought to confirm the appointment I made with Telefonica O2 to fix my internet. It would, after all, suck if I took a day off of work for them to service the line and then they didn't even show up. So I called them on Wednesday. No answer, so I left a message. They did not return my call so I repeated the process on Thursday. No response so I decided to see them in person on Friday. I went to one of their stores and told the woman that I just wanted to confirm my appointment. She found my account in the computer but then said that she didn’t have access to the same database as the technical support on the phone. She said I should call them. I told her I had been calling them, which, of course, earned a shoulder shrug from her. Sorry, she can’t do anything for me. Oh, well.

I called again that evening. No answer, left a message. No response.

And so I went again to Telefonica O2 but to a different location—one that had been more helpful. And what I learned, first of all, is that O2 had mailed me my new modem but it seems that they mailed it to my old address, where I haven’t lived for more than 13 months. They said that the modem was still at the post office, though, so they printed me out a receipt and said I could still pick up the modem. I will do this tomorrow.

As for the appointment? Nope, not in the system. Just as I suspected. So they scheduled a new one. Fortunately, it is still on Friday, so, hopefully I will have internet by then. Provided that the appointment stays in the system and provided that they show up at the right address and provided that I am able to pick up my modem at the post office.

I’m so sick of them that I contacted a cable internet provider on Friday. They called me back today but we had a serious communication problem and she said (in Czech) something about an English operator but I couldn’t tell if she meant that I need to call the English operator or if the English operator will call me. I didn’t find an English number on their website so I’ll give it another day or two before I try to contact the Czech line again and maybe I’ll get someone who might direct me towards the appropriate line.

Finally, I took the train to Vienna on Saturday—leaving Prague around 6 am and getting into Vienna by 10. I was quite tired but I caffeinated myself like crazy and had a wonderful time. When I had to leave yesterday evening around 7 pm, Chris was the saddest I had ever seen him during one of our goodbyes. I was less sad because I knew I’d be back in just five days. If you count actual hours, this will be the shortest break between two of our visits, and so I feel/felt great about it and only mildly sad.

But he told me that he felt sentimental and sad and pleaded with me to stay—but only half-heartedly. It was more an expression that he wished I could stay but knew that I could not.

He keeps asking me if I will leave him ("You will never leave me, right?" he says) and telling me that he will never leave me. It feels wonderful to hear that but I keep finding myself wondering about the logistics of our staying together.

I’ve been in touch with my friend Amy again in the past week, and her (Czech) husband Martin, whose English skills aren’t so good, can’t find a job in the US. And so, he may come back to Prague. She may come with him. I realized that Amy is Chris and I am Martin: she/Chris is employable anywhere so she should be flexible about where they live, while Martin/I lack(s) language skills that would make us employable in our partner’s home country. And while it has become very clear to me that Chris wants me to move to Vienna eventually (I think it was his saying “move to Vienna” that really drove that one home), I don’t know if it’s realistic.

But I’m not going to focus on that at the moment.

Chris said this weekend that we are a good match because we are what the other needs. And then he pantomimed himself as a sort of gruff, prickly, hard-edged person (which is not how I see him at all, but he does have those characteristics), and then he did an impression of me as a sweet, mild-tempered, caring person. In his mind, I need him to be more confident and to assert myself more—to reach out and take what life offers and not feel guilty for enjoying it, and he needs me to be softer, more loving, and more considerate. We fit.

And once O2 fixes my internet on Friday (please God, please), I will take the train to him to enjoy my supposedly gruff Valentine with a heart of gold.

Fouad called me at work yesterday to ask me for the password to one of his 853 (rough estimate) email accounts.  First of all, buddy, we broke up 10 months ago and, while I had several passwords to several of your email accounts, I don’t remember them.  Plus I’m pretty sure that the one you were requesting the password for is the one secretive account that I was never allowed to read.  This is what happens when you keep (approximately) 853 email accounts, each with a different password.  I mean, duh.

 I think I’m like his mom in Prague.  I’m that person he contacts when he is needy and desperate and doesn’t have anyone else to turn to.  But, in part because I am <i>not</i> his mother, I feel less and less guilty about not helping him.

 A couple of months ago, he was trying to hit me up for several hundred dollars so that he could fly home to Algeria.  I felt bad that he couldn’t raise the funds to see his family but there was no way I was going to pay for it.  Somehow, though, he managed, and I will always wonder how.  But he flew home to Algeria in mid-October.  And then he proceeded to text me and do that call and hang up thing, from an Algerian phone number.  I did not call him back.

 On Saturday, he returned to Prague and asked me if he could stay with me for a week, but I turned him down, simply saying that my landlord was going to be visiting this week.

 Frankly, now that I know that he was fortunate enough to come up with the money for a plane ticket back to Algeria, I can stop worrying about him.  I guess I’ve been feeling a bit guilty and thinking that I still owed him something after we broke up in January, but he can take care of himself.

 My annoying friend Lenka might stop by tonight after work so that she can pick up her mail, which she is still getting at my apartment 10.5 months after she moved out.  Actually, she only contacts me now because of her stupid mail.  Caroline told me that I should take Lenka’s name off of my mailbox and that I should have done that months ago.  And Caroline is obviously right.  But we all know I’m a pushover, and so I haven’t.

 I think my subconscious has opted for the annoy-her-until-she-no-longer-wants-to-get-her-mail-at-your-apartment plan.  I’m totally cancelling on her tonight, in part because I think I’ll go grab a few drinks with my friend Leslie.  But also because I’m a bitch who is tired of being used as Lenka’s personal post office.

 I saw Amy and Emmy today for the last time in Prague.  If I ever see them again, it will happen stateside.  Amy was talking today about women dating/marrying men exactly like their fathers, and she asked if I had done this.  I’m not really sure, frankly.  I don’t think Leon and my dad were anything alike.  And certainly not Fouad.  Chris has an outgoing personality that might be similar to my dad’s but their beliefs, ideas, and views of the world are so completely different.

 Anyway, I was describing my dad to her as an extroverted, talkative person, and she stopped me to ask how my seemingly friendly, outgoing parents could have produced someone like me.  “You’re so quiet!” she said.

 It made me stop to wonder how she perceives me.  Our friendship was sort of built around my listening to her problems.  She had to go through that hellish pregnancy and birth; she had to go through one particularly hellish job here in Prague; she had the general hell of dealing with a foreign land and people who aren’t, by nature, very helpful or friendly; she had some arguments and issues with her husband.  And so I listened.

 Yes, it’s true, I am a quiet person.  But I was quiet out of the kind of respect that I think my parents taught me.  And that, I guess, is how my friendly, outgoing parents produced someone like me.

 I really hope my new sofa and armchairs are in my apartment when I get home, but 20 koruny says it ain’t so.

Either later today or tomorrow, I will write another post about my weekend with Chris, and when I say "write," I mean "upload a lot of photos."

For now, I want to write about one relatively small component of the weekend and of our relationship. That component is love.

Aww.

Actually, it's not so "aww" because neither of us has said it yet. But I'm about 95% certain that he's in love with me, but he doesn't want to be the first to say it. I don't want to be the first to say it either, but for a different reason.

I have been in about five relationships in which the L word was mentioned. In only one of those relationships (with Leon, actually, if you're curious) was I the first to say it. In all the others, I think it came out of the other person's mouth too soon.

In three of those cases, it was viewed as Not A Big Deal, as something completely casual. In the fourth, I knew it was coming because he told me that he had something he wanted to say to me. And it made me uncomfortable. All of these situations made me uncomfortable, because I was not in love with any of them when they first said it. Was I supposed to say it back? Say "thank you"? Smile and nod politely?

What should have been a beautiful moment in our relationship was awkward and uncomfortable and that is why I am waiting with Chris. I will say it when I think he wants to hear it back. Also, I am trying to make sure that it's what I feel for him. I'm generally of the "you just know" opinion when it comes to being in love, but I had very strong feelings about a certain someone not too long ago (gee, who was that?) and, while it was reminiscent of love, it was not actually love.

But I will be the first to say it with Chris, because I know he won't say it first. It has to do with his attempts to be "cool," like I explained in that dog tail wagging analogy a few posts back. And I don't care that I will be first; I'm just pacing myself and ensuring that it will be well received on his end. I'd say all signs point to yes on that one.

He and I have been talking a lot about mature and immature views of relationships, and he thinks I need to grow up a bit in this regard. He's probably right. Anyway, I took this to mean that he thinks I have an immature view of love, so I asked him, when I finally tell him that I love him, will it not mean anything to him because my views of love are immature?

This is when he explained to me that he thinks my views of love are mature; I only need to grow up in terms of relationships.

"Oh, ok," I said.

Silence.

"Why do you ask?" he said. "Is that just a hypothetical question?"

And I explained why I asked and then said yes, it was hypothetical.

"...Oh," he said.

Right before I went with him to the train station yesterday to send him back to Vienna, we were talking about promises--specifically, I asked that he "promise" that he would do something. He joked that he is incapable of forming the words "I promise."

"Ok, sure, whatever" was my response.

Then he asked if there were any other combination of words that I thought he'd never say, and I know he meant "I love you."

I told him no. Because I know that he will eventually say it. After I say it.

And as affectionate, caring, and considerate as he is, I don't care that he hasn't said it yet. We'll get there, possibly when I'm in Vienna two weekends from now.

Here's the only photo from this weekend that I've put on Flickr:



I'll get the rest up soon, but this is possibly my favorite anyway. Well, it's a shit picture of me but he looks great. We went to lunch on Saturday with Amy, and here I am holding Emmy while Chris puts away a quesadilla. I think he's so handsome. Sigh.

My friend Amy is moving back to America on November 15th, but the Czech Republic wanted desperately for her to take a piece of it back with her...

As I think I mentioned before, she had a C-Section. The surgical scar from that hadn't healed last week (which may or may not be normal) but she started getting very sick. So she went to the doctor, who discovered that the scar was infected. Infected, because some surgical instrument had been left inside her.

So the doctor just reached inside the scar, searched around a bit, and then dug the foreign object out with his fingers. He then held it up for her to see ("Ta dah!") but she isn't sure what it was because they told her the name of it in Czech and, also, it was covered in blood. As was everything in the vicinity. Blood, blood, blood.

Not that this was some kind of horribly invasive surgery in which they didn't sedate or numb her, but, still, that sounds really fucking gross and painful. She has been through hell, and I know that for her, November 15th can't come fast enough.

A few other things:

I had my first German lesson with a native speaker named Robert last night. I thought he was a good fit for me, so I'll see him next Wednesday. I'm also having dinner with Caroline tonight and she is giving me a lesson. I know I can't set a schedule with her because she's too busy and I think it would stress her out so I'll let her teach me every week or two when she's available and keep Robert on for the full-time gig.

I contacted my sister about the wedding, but I haven't heard back. I just want to say that I'm not upset about it even though I do sound pissy in that entry, as a couple of you noted. I'm not going to make any decisions about travel until I talk to her, and I think that's only fair.

Yesterday during my lunch break, I walked under one of the bazillion construction sites in Prague and got some kind of debris dumped on me. The guy working there kind of shrugged about it, and I wasn't sure if I should be annoyed that they hadn't blockaded the sidewalk when making that kind of mess or embarrassed that I hadn't kept my distance. Anyway, the splatter seems to have washed out of my jacket.

I have a few remarks that I want to make about Chris but I think I will save that for another entry.

Yesterday, I got take out Thai and went over to Amy's to have dinner and spend the evening with her and her 3.5-week-old daughter Emmy. Which sounds very simple, I know.

But nothing ever seems to work that easily for me. It took me a full hour to get from my work to Amy's--something that shouldn't have taken more than 15-20 minutes. The problem was that there really aren't a whole lot of take out restaurants between my work and her home, so I volunteered to pick up "whatever," which turned out to be a choice between Subway and Thai.

I deemed the Thai to be tastier and also closer, but I still had to take the metro (subway) and then a tram. Which made a simple gesture of picking up dinner into a full on ordeal.

The opening sentence two paragraphs above this nearly read, "But nothing ever seems to work that easily in Prague," but I imagine that, for many people, things are that easy here in Prague. But even though Prague is a relatively small city with great public transportation, I find that I spend far too much time getting from place to place. It can be good exercise and a great way to keep up on my myriad podcasts, but it's also a huge social deterrence--often I have to ask myself if I would rather spend 45 minutes traveling to another part of the city (and an hour coming back, because public transit isn't as available later into the evening) to meet friends or stay in? As the weather gets shitty, I'll be staying in. And so will Caroline, as I already noted about her winter hibernation schedule.

Maybe having a boyfriend will keep me social this season. We shall see.

Anyway, after an hour rushing about the city, a delightful evening was had. Here's Amy and her daughter Emmy:

Dirk can be such a self-centered, whiny baby manchild asshole poopyhead.

He called this morning and we chatted for a few hours about our respective lives, and he is apparently so jealous of my new relationship with Chris that he rescinded his offer to have me visit him in November. He's now pushed it back to January, February, or spring. And while I know those will come about rather quickly, I would not be surprised if another 2+ years elapsed before I saw him again.

Ugh, whatever. He's been a shitty friend in the last month. Hopefully by January, February, or spring, he will have improved upon that.

Anyway, last nights I drank massive amounts of burcak (the unfermented wine) with Caroline, Amy, and later Jirka. I'm recovering from that still, and chatting with Chris.

I've asked my boss for the week of the 13th off and I will spend the week in Austria, visiting Chris's hometown, meeting his parents, and hanging out in Vienna. I hope it goes smoothly.

This morning, in the span of less than ten minutes, I heard two different coworkers refer to two completely different entities as "retarded." It caught me by surprise, because I have a strange sensitivity to this word, thanks to my friend Amy's involvement with Fragile X research and awareness. Her brother has Fragile X, and so it is a topic that is near and dear to her heart.

My understanding of the disease is limited, unfortunately, but I'll never forget her reaction to hearing someone remark that a classmate looked like he rode the "short bus" to school. Since then, I have tried not to use such humor or the word "retarded," much as I refuse to ever refer to something as "gay" when I mean to say "stupid" or "lame."

Earlier this week, Amy called me while I was walking home from work. She said that she was really tired, and, perhaps because of this, she wasn't very talkative. I tried to make conversation by asking her what she thought of giving panhandlers money (someone had asked me to spare some change at that very moment plus Amy worked with the homeless her first year out of college).

Somehow this transitioned into my telling her the story of the $40 man, which is a story I can't seem to tell without saying multiple times, "I'm so stupid" and "what was I thinking?" With this particular telling, I decided to throw in the thought that "I'm just so socially inept"--only, I didn't say "inept."

…Yes, I said "retarded," and the silence that followed seemed to last forever. I knew almost immediately what I had done and tried to cram the word back into my mouth. Alas, it was too late.

"Oh, Amy, I'm so sorry. You're never going to want to be my friend again!" I said.

I don't recall how she answered me, perhaps because I was so embarrassed. But, once again, I seem to have done something that could be conceived as unforgivable. Granted, I think it was an honest mistake and she seemed willing to let it go. Still, I would understand if she couldn't be my friend after saying that.

I wonder why it is that I think so many of my recent actions justify people abandoning me. Either I am a terrible person or I've got to stop second guessing myself.

I received the following email last Wednesday:

Kate,

It has taken me long enough to write you back. Part of that was I was waiting to meet with my Spiritual Director and get some help with him to sort all this out. He said it would be an interesting Ash Wednesday in light of this...so I waited until Ash Wednesday to respond.

Well, I can still say that I am hurt and disappointed. I am no longer mad. It will take time for those feelings to pass as well. I can understand where everything was coming from, but I expected more from you than this. Part of the hurt resulted from the fact that I really needed to talk to you the week before you left, and despite calling and leaving two messages, you did not call back. I needed you, and you were not there for me. Then add into it the whole not talking to me for 4 months and not sharing what was going on in your life. I make it a point of being there for my friends no matter what, and I know I expect a lot of my friends as well.

I do not hate you, and I want to be able to forgive you for your sins.

I have prayed to God to help me get over the hurt, but I am just not able to yet. I need to let God in and be with God in my hurt and be healed before I can move forward. I do not know what this means for our future friendship.
I need to deal with me before I can let you in again in anything besides the "superficial" stuff in my life. This is something that I will be working on during Lent, and hopefully I will be at a place where I can let you into my life like I used to.

I hope you can understand this and take it in the honest, straightforward, and loving manner it is presented.

~Amy

My response, which I am about to hit the send button on:

Dear Amy,

When you called me two weeks ago and told me that you still wanted to be friends (but that you'd need some time to work on the details), I was so relieved that I cried. I even have been referring to your willingness to forgive me (or willingness to CONSIDER forgiving me) as the best thing that has happened in 2007.

Now, you can take that one of two ways: either my life has been so shitty lately that the mere thought that we could revive our friendship was the light at the end of a very long and very dark tunnel (true) or your friendship means so much to me, despite how I may have acted recently, that keeping it has been the highlight of my year (also true).

Even if you're struggling with forgiving me at this point, I think it's a good sign that you have talked with your spiritual director about this. That shows me that you do care and want to work these things out. Okay, maybe that's something that you've never doubted, but I wasn't sure when I wrote my last email that you'd even want to talk to me again so it sure comes as good news to me that you're focused on resolving this.

I read your letter to my therapist, who is kind of like my secular spiritual director, and there was really only one thing that she pointed out that was helpful. It was that I didn't know that you needed me when you called in October. She proffered that had you left a message that said that you urgently needed to talk or could really use a friend, I might have pulled my head out of my own ass and called you back.

I think she makes a good point, but please don't interpret this as me putting blame on you. You are in no way at fault for what has happened, and I know that. But I'd like to believe that if I knew you needed me, I would have called you back.

I have been incredibly self-absorbed over the past few months, which really doesn't lend itself to being a very good friend. But there were so many times when I thought I might burst from the pressure, the anxiety, and the self-loathing that I guess I was hoping that you guys would be there when I came out of this, ready to forgive me for this selfish period. Obviously, this is expecting a lot, which is kind of funny because I don't think of myself as someone who asks a lot of her friends. I guess I just want them to understand that when I withdraw inside of myself, it's not because I intend to be a bad friend; I just haven't ever learned a better way to deal with my problems.

What's strange in this is that now that you know what this all has been about, I have been looking forward to talking to you about it, because I respect your opinion and, frankly, could just use a friend.

...Kind of like you needed a friend four months ago, and I wasn't there. And I'm sorry. If I could take it back, Amy, I would. Obviously I can't, but maybe I have shown myself as a good enough friend in the six and a half years that we've known each other that my inexcusable actions can somehow be excused.

Love,
Kate

Any suggestions?

Milo ate the stem of a spinach leaf yesterday. It was the first time he ate, without the aid of Leon or me, in nearly a week. I took it as a sign that he will get better, and Leon and I intend to pick up some softer fruits (oranges, grapes, bananas) tonight in the hopes that Milo might be reminded that eating doesn't have to hurt.

His consuming that tiny bit of food isn't exactly the shining beacon of hope that one might expect, though, as Milo stilll spends all of his time curled up in his Pigloo (that's a plastic igloo house for guinea pigs, obviously), perhaps saving his strength for when the Big Ones come along and jam food down his throat.

But he did eat something, and I think that news is enough to merit the title The First Good Event of 2007. "But what about this supposedly first good event?" you ask. Well, it seems I misinterpreted that. When Amy called to tell me that she still wanted to try to be my friend, I assumed that she had forgiven me. That she had understood that my not contacting her for a few months was caused by me going through some personal drama and not caused by me actively neglecting her (if neglect can be "active"). But the email she sent me last Wednesday tells a different story, and I guess that in my desperation to hear any good news, I made a big leap from what she said to what I thought that meant.

So, for now, the possibility that Milo may not die in the next week or two becomes the year's greatest event, overshadowing the forgiveness of one of my best friends and her acceptance of me back into her life. Because, you know, that second one never actually happened.

Last Thursday, I emailed Amy to tell her almost exactly what I posted here: that I was sorry, that I felt her reasons for being upset with me were justified, that I am just a shitty correspondent who is shitty about opening up to people.

She phoned on Saturday and the call was brief--less than five minutes--as she was en route to a gathering at a friend's house. But she wanted me to know that she had received my email (and that it was well written!) and she had thought about it and decided that she didn't want to lose my friendship. I think she's still uncertain about how we'll move forward, because it would be premature to say that everything is peachy, but…we'll work on it. Because it's worthwhile to both of us.

It was a good thing that the call was short, because when I hung up, I started to cry--tears of relief and tears of joy. It seemed like the first good news since the beginning of the year. Remember how the shit hit the fan a few weeks ago (as I am so clever with my euphemisms)? Well, not to mix metaphors, but it finally came to a head (one big windy, shitty head) on Friday night. And while I am not at all pleased with the outcome, I have accepted it. It might even be for the best.

Oh, how vague.

But I would still like to tell the whole story. To do that, I'm going to have to go back several months to when this began. This experience has been so life-altering that I'm tempted to make it the subject of my book (you know, the one that all bloggers secretly wish to be writing). A few months ago, Caroline said something to the effect of, "Wow, you should turn this into a short story. They'd totally publish it in Seventeen Magazine." Maybe so.

But I don't know if it's a good story simply because it was unexpected (though not uncommon) or if it's a good story because it is uniquely interesting. And if it's the former, could I make it uniquely interesting with my writing?

Time will tell. For now, let's just remember last Saturday, February 10th, as the first truly good event of 2007. There's going to be a lot more tears if I have to wait that long for the next.

Amy called. The fact that it was her calling and not me responding to her message is probably all you need to know to predict how the call went or, at least, a subtle reminder of my continuing shittiness.

Anyway, she called, and we talked for probably a half an hour, in which I explained to her my "bad news" (I really need to come up with a better euphemism) and apologized for my inexplicable behavior of the past few months.

She was pretty shocked by the bad news, I think, but she also seemed to think that my disclosure was a way of avoiding the main topic. And at one point, she sort of refocused the conversation to point out that telling her the bad news would not make up for my lack of contact. And I didn't really expect it to, but I wanted to let her know that I was sorting things out over the past few months and waiting for some clarity before I talked to her.

This was not the right thing to say, evidently. Instead, she was hurt that I hadn't shared the bad news sooner (or that I had specifically not called her because I didn't want to talk about said bad news). She said that she now feels like our friendship is superficial from my side and that I apparently don't trust her to tell her what's going on in my life.

"Amy, I didn't want to tell anybody."

"I'm just 'anybody?'"

Toward the end of the conversation, she told me that she does not forgive me. I felt so genuinely sorry and thought her feelings were completely justified, so I didn't even bother to tell her that she's planning to become a priest and should therefore feel obligated to forgive me. No, one thing that I have to respect about Amy is that she is always straightforward about her feelings. And the conversation didn't make her feel better about me or the situation between us, so she has every right to feel that way. And to tell me.

After she told me that she needed some time to think about things, I asked if she wanted to talk to me later this week. She said it would depend on how the week went. I told her that I'd email her. And, aside from that email, I largely feel that there's not a lot I can do about this. I have apologized and explained the situation, and it is up to her to accept the apology and the explanation. If she can't, I guess that puts an end to a friendship of nearly seven years, which is too surreal to even grasp.

Yesterday when I came home from work, there was an unsettling phone message from my friend Amy. It basically said this: "I haven't heard from you since October, and I've been waiting for you to call me, but obviously that isn't going to happen, so I'm calling you."

It stung. And it stung, perhaps, because it made it clear what a shitty friend I am. Who goes more than three months without calling one of her best friends, when she knows that friend wants to hear from her? Well, I do. But who else? Undoubtedly other shitty people who are shitty friends.

I was thinking today that the call hurt a lot, because it pointed out a flaw in me. It felt like Amy was calling me out on something, and it was something I couldn't deny. I hadn't phoned her, and that was shitty.

What's more is that the reason I didn't call her was because I wasn't yet prepared to tell her about my "bad news" but didn't want to lie and avoid the topic either, so instead I just avoided her. Shitty on two counts: not contacing her and the reason.

To say that I felt bad about myself last night is an obvious understatement. I felt like a loser, a wimp, and just an overall bad person. It was not unlike a feeling I had last summer, when four people from four very different facets of my life gave me four individual reasons to believe that I was not a very good person. And what hurt so much about that was that they were right. I realized then that I wasn't as good of a person as I wanted to believe that I was, and I felt awful about myself for quite a while. Last night's message was a glimpse of that time, and it made me feel wretched. I cried.

But then, a series of wonderful things happened.

The first is that I had Leon there and he played cards with me and listened to me talk and sat with me while I cried, and it felt good. I think he's often the unsung hero when times get rough for me, but there he was, again, at my side and in support of me.

While Leon and I were playing cards, Dirk returned my phone call (I had called him while I was upset and left a message), and he was very kind despite being in a bit of a funk himself. He told me that he wanted to cheer me up, because I am a good person. I couldn't help but believe him, even if only a little bit.

Finally, I had a Skype date with Caroline. I thought about telling her that I didn't feel like talking, but what occurred to me was that what I needed was...a friend. And it just so happened that I had scheduled time to talk to my best friend, who is in the Czech Republic and therefore not all that easy to get on the phone.

In the end, our call wasn't so successful. Her boyfriend was spending the night and she didn't want to wake him, so I called and gave a monologue while she typed responses back to me. And then our call was cut off again and again and again, but just having her there and listening to me made me feel good.

Today has been an especially nice day at work, and I had a very enjoyable lunch chatting with my coworkers Barry, Maggie, and Lindsay. It had been months since we last had lunch as a group, and it was just...good.

A few weeks ago, when "the shit hit the fan," I was feeling like my life was empty and like I needed to fill it with more people who actually cared. Some of those same people rallied around me then, and they rallied again yesterday. And this has made me feel like I actually have several people in my life who will be there for me when things get ugly, and I've never quite felt that way before.

Perhaps when attention is paid to what a bad person you are, you don't even feel that you deserve to have a support system. And maybe you don't; maybe I don't. But, nonetheless, I have one. And it feels…really fucking great.

Sunday morning, Lacey and I got up and ate our free breakfast downstairs. Then we showered and dressed and headed to the room my mom had reserved for us our hair and makeup done.


Ruth gets an updo.


Amy didn't want to wear makeup because she never has to (look at that perfect skin!), but the makeup artist convinced her to wear some for pictures.


My mom gets a good looking over before she's made up.


Ruth, Caroline, my mom, and Amy in various stages of getting ready.


Isn't my makeup artist adorable?

After hair and makeup, we put on our dresses and headed to Forest Park to get our pictures taken…

While we had all of this prep, the boys and their girlfriends/guests had lunch at the St. Louis Bread Company:


Michelle and Kareem.


College roommates: Kareem, Leon, Colin, and Jeff.


Random picture of St. Louis looking beautiful.

And off we went to have pre-ceremony pictures!

It isn't fair for me to write about the wedding without providing pictures, so I'll start with the events leading up to it and hope that my professional pictures arrive in the next couple of weeks.

Thursday the 6th, we took the red eye from San Francisco to St. Louis with a layover in Charlotte, of all places. We left around 11 PM PDT and got into St. Louis around 8:30 AM CDT. I got roughly 3 or 4 hours of sleep--and that's a high estimate--spread out in various 20-30 minute incriments.

I had hoped to check in to our hotel and sleep for a few hours in the morning. Instead, I showered and rode with Leon back to the airport to pick up Amy, my reader. She was ecstatic to see me, and her positive energy proved to me that it was going to be a fun weekend.


Amy loves having her picture taken.

By this time, I had also seen Caroline, who looked stunning. We didn't chat for long because she had coffee and lunch plans with various St. Louis residents. Leon and I had made lunch plans to eat with my parents on The Hill.


Caroline dresses up.

After lunch, I was tired as all hell, so I drank a huge caramel frappaccino and sat around my parents' hotel room with them, Leon, and Sam. We laughed a lot and had a great time. I also called my sister Sara and Lacey, who were driving to St. Louis together. They were stopped at a Target and I told them to get their butts to the hotel, because I was dying to see them. I could tell from their reactions that they thought I was some sort of deranged person (I made everyone in the hotel room yell for them to hurry up), but I didn't think much of it.


Leon and Sam goof off.

When they arrived, though, I was sensing some definite tension. They didn't want to go to dinner or out later for my bachelorette party. I had thought that the whole point of them arriving on Friday was so that they could partake in exactly that. I was hurt so much that I got all weepy and had to go to the bathroom to try and regain my composure.

After a few minutes, Sara and my mom joined me and told me that I had misinterpreted everything. Lacey didn't want to go out, they said, because she was worried about money and about fitting in with my other friends. She was, after all, my only high school friend who was even invited to the wedding. The rest of the wedding party (and guests) were largely made up of family and friends from college.

Sara, meanwhile, had been given strict instructions not to embarrass me. It made me feel even worse that she was so concerned about embarrassing me that she thought she couldn't participate in the wedding events. I convinced her that I most definitely wanted her participation, and I pulled Lacey aside to explain the same thing. They decided that they would go to dinner after all.

Before dinner, though, a good portion of us congregated in our hotel lobby and enjoyed happy hour (three free drinks!).

Sara, Jeff, Helen, and my dad patiently wait for the bar to open.

Even my mom drank--four screwdrivers. She never drinks. She was pleasantly tipsy and adorable. (I wish I had a picture of that.)

We eventually got our own room, because happy hour was so packed. We proceeded to play Pictionary, which was a lot of fun once we got into the "Debbie Does Dallas" and "Buttery Nipple" phase of the game.


Jeff proudly displays his drawing of Silence of the Lambs. (That's Lacey on the right.)

After dinner, we took a caravan to the Galleria, where a few of the guys (Leon, Jeff, Sam, and Charlie) were able to pick up their tuxes at After Hours. We had dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen, where I split a roasted red pepper and goat cheese pizza with Caroline.


Hooray for dinner!

Before dinner, I was able to treat Sara (and myself) to a pedicure and we wandered around various stores and did girly things (like deciding who has the firmest butt--Caroline thinks I stole Amy's firm butt crown). After dinner, we split up into several small groups and my bachelorette party commenced, but I'll have to write about that later since my lunch hour is up.

Amy called over the weekend to ask what hotel we're staying in for the wedding, so that she could book a room. I have absolutely no idea what hotel we're using. I understand completely why she'd want to book now, but I haven't thought that far ahead. Oh, stress.

Lacey called twice over the weekend and left messages, and I haven't called her back yet. I know that she's going through a tough time and needs to talk to me. I am such a shitty, shitty friend.

Leon and I played miniature golf this weekend--two rounds of 18 holes. I beat him both times; I think that's unheard of.

There was a birthday party at the mini golf course, and at this party were at least 20 kids under the age of 8. There was also practically no adult supervision, and these kids were climbing on the windmill and other parts of the course. They were scampering all over the greens as Leon and I were trying to putt, and they were playing in the fountains and streams. Leon and I were convinced that a kid was going to drown. We were also convinced (ok, I was) that the parents of these children were absolute dicks. I'm no child hater, but seriously, people, corale your damn kids.

Leon bought me a 40 GB ipod. I've wanted one for months now, but I feel so guilty. I almost hyperventilated in the store when he purchased it, because I thought that, no matter how much I love it, it will never be enough to justify him spending so much on me.

I'm having lunch with Lindsay today, which makes me nervous in the way that spending one-on-one time with people I don't know very well makes me nervous. I'm afraid that I'll say something stupid and that one stupid thing will outshine everything else in our conversation. Or that I'll just be really awkward because I am really awkward.

I'm filled with stress and guilt and nervous energy, but otherwise I'm good. How could I have just played putt-putt and not still feel some of that happiness? But otherwise it's Monday, and the consequences of two restful days are obvious.

My friend and former suitemate Amy called Tuesday night, and it was great chatting with her. She recently moved to Philadelphia to intern at a church and its homeless shelter. She wants to be an Episcopalian priest but is taking advantage of life's opportunities for now.

We talked about my dotcom job a little and she asked, "Is it really boring?" which definitely caught me offguard. I'm used to people saying "wow" or "that's cool." I know that a lot of them are just blowing smoke up my ass and it probably takes someone like Amy to share what people are really thinking of the 9-5 desk job, but I still think it's cool. And I know that, as a contractor, I probably shouldn't be allowed to feel cool about my job. But I do.

Amy thought that needed debunking. I also didn't do a very good job of explaining that it isn't boring, because, frankly, some of it is. There are a lot of repetitive tasks. There is filling out of Excel sheets and web templates. It can get a little formulaic. But that doesn't take away from the overall coolness of the job. Still, I failed to give Amy that impression.

She also said that she couldn't imagine me doing this job, but, then again, "Always in front of the computer, now working in front of the computer." I'm not sure what she meant by that, as I'm the one who is often AWOL from AIM and currently MIA from all other internet-related communication.

But whatever. I may not be as cool as she is, saving the homeless and the hearts of sinners, but I'm still cool. My job is cool. Period.

A lot has happened in the past couple of months, and I haven't been good about documenting it. I don't want to bore anyone with a 50 page update, so I'm just going to post some pictures to give you an idea of what I've been doing in the past month and a half.

( Pictures! )

I haven't been writing anything lately, so I'll throw out something small.

Leon and I just got back from Nik's Wine Bar. Kirsten called around 11 and invited us to join her and Brian. So we tried some new drinks and stayed until last call. It was fun.

Brian and Kirsten are such a perfect couple; I wonder if Leon and I look that way.

Anyway, it's now Brian's birthday. He's 24. Geez, we're getting old.

I went to Sasha's Wine Bar last weekend (have I mentioned how much I enjoy wine bars?) with Leon, Caroline, and Amy. We had a lot of fun and then went and saw Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind while we were a bit tipsy. I really enjoyed the movie. We then went to another bar at which we kind of looked around at each other and kept asking, "Are we too preppy to be here?" The answer was yes, so we finished our drinks, I closed our tab, and we left. It was a fun night, though.

I haven't seen or talked much to Caroline since then. I hope all is well with her. I guess we're starting to get busy, since we're graduating seniors and all.

So, that's part of what's been up with me since I got back from San Francisco. Nothing important, but I thought I'd post.

I went to the movies tonight with Amy, and we saw Welcome to Mooseport, which was okay, and Miracle, which I liked a lot. Afterwards, we visited Caroline, who was busy packing for tomorrow's flight to Mexico. Amy leaves Monday to go home to West Virginia.

Meanwhile, Leon and I still have several days before we take off for our spring break trip. It seems a long time from now, but I am awfully overwhelmed by everything that I have to do before then. As expected, I'm already behind a day on the little calendar that I made. I told myself that I'd do some cleaning today and almost did when I considered that Amy might want to come upstairs before or after the movies. I decided to just shrug it off. So pathetic.

I'm still high off of Cory's letter but trying to think of every potential negative outcome. There are many. But, of course, I've already written back.