season's greetings

spoiler alert: this isnt your average holiday message filled with sugar plum fairies. it's christmas day and i've just roasted a pan of vegetables, wrapped a box of artisan cheese, rearranged my tea/herb collection, vacuumed the house, and am headed out to walk the dogs. 5 days prior my family gathered for xmas at moms and i've been depressed ever since and dreading this day. aubrey dropped off his dog for the day and jumped in his family caravan to gwinnett. i am truly alone on christmas.
BUT, so far, its not actually bad. my time is TOTally my own. the day has warmed up and the sun has come out. and i'm receiving texts from folks who envy me. hmmm. well even if i'm not sure if this is a good thing, at least i had the buffer days to sulk and get it out of my system b/c i'm not actually bummed today. i didnt expect this, i figured it'd be worse than all the days leading to it. but thankfully one of the things i have learned in 46 years is that i dont like being depressed and can usually pull myself out of it within a reasonable period of time. i'm all about, feel what you feel and let it out...but i just need it to move on down the road and let me be. so i'm feelin a little chipper, looking forward to dad passin thru town in a few days, cooking a few meals with some friends in town over the next week, and catchin some hoops. somehow i think i have survived christmas alone. i dont recommend it, but its doable i guess. season's greetings y'all.

annual december rant

yea its that month that i'm just trying to make it thru again. made all the more enjoyable by finally facing up to the irony of my life nowadays. the traveler has a dog that doesnt travel. not well anyway. as if mom scheduling the family xmas gathering 5 days before xmas isnt bubble bursting enough, it turns out my one faithful and trusty companion that i bring to the gathering of little nuclear families gets car sick. so add to the event the stress of a 4-hour journey in atlanta holiday traffic with a sick dog. boy could i use a f*&$ing massage about right now. no worries, i'll have plenty of time to schedule one if anybody is open this week b/c i have nothing else to do for the next 5 days. peace and joy everybody.

trade-offs

a friend left to work on a federal AIDS project in mozambique, africa in september, another friends wife went over to ethiopia with doctors without borders, another friend led a group of students from kenya to cape town setting up meaningful service abroad contacts, and yet another went with a women's initiative here to support a co-op in kenya, and lastly we ran a study abroad to tanzania from my office for the last 2 years. sooooo, i decided it was my time for africa and mary agreed. i figured the xmas holiday break was a good stretch of 'free' time off and although a tad too hot for my constitution, i'd make the journey.

simultaneously i decided to pursue graduate school what with the poor economy and it being no time to change jobs and thus i began the process of taking the GRE, gathering recommendations, and writing a fine statement of purpose with the editorial help of good people who know me. and for two months i have waited. yesterday the ball dropped. i had just tried to confirm flights to jo-burg using a delta buddy pass when a red flashing screen alert notified me that a travel embargo was now in place for all buddy pass travel between, yep, you guessed it, ATL and JNB from Dec. 20 to Jan. 4. their reasons were sound:

As a proactive measure, buddy pass travel is embargoed for all flights to/from Dakar (DKR) and Johannesburg (JNB) from Dec. 20, 2008 through Jan. 4, 2009. During last year's busy holiday season, the Dakar and Johannesburg stations experienced a tremendous backlog of stranded buddy passengers. Many were removed at the stopover in Dakar in the middle of the night!

yikes! not exactly the kind of risk i wanted to assume so africa is out...for now. i can only hope that mary's project is extended and she is perhaps still there at spring break. meanwhile, i still haven't heard about graduate school and i know that as of yesterday folks are registering for spring classes; so i write another email to the admissions staff and receive no answer...well not right away anyway.

and then today...it happened, they let me in! yep, i'm allowed to pursue a masters of public administration. yahoo!!!!!! AND they tell me, make sure you are here on January 2 for a mandatory orientation. whew, good thing that africa trip fell through or i'd woulda missed it. so i guess things really do happen for a reason and i'm glad i didnt fight it too much. it all worked out in the end. trade-offs and my new home, baldwin hall.