Standing Back

So, I've had an incredible week. I've:

-Spent time at home, talking with my parents
-Spent time at Brian's home with his family
-Ridden my first (two!) rollercoaster(s) ever, survived, and reaffirmed that I do not, in fact, have any fear of heights or high speeds or anything but that I do strongly dislike not being in control.
-Visited the Air & Space Museum, The National Gallery of Art, and the Botanical Gardens in DC
-Gone into DC on the fourth, paddled around in a paddle boat with Brian, heard the Air Force Band play, got stuck in the downpours and ran inside the Jefferson Memorial for shelter, and finally watched the fireworks over the Washington Monument with Brian, some people from work, and some people from CMU
-Gone camping and hiking in the Shenandoahs, gotten stuck in the rain in a not-waterproof-anymore tent, played 20 questions for hours and hours, gone frolicking in streams, and eaten MREs
-Gone to Mass in the church Brian grew up in
-Gone to Mass in the church I grew up in

The time away from work, computers, phones, and people in general did me a world of good. It has been an extremely long time since I've done anything without worrying about what's coming next, without being preoccupied about other things, or without worrying so much about making other people happy that I forget to care for myself.

My birthday was wonderful. I got to celebrate with my family (opening my presents late the night before my brother headed back to school), with Brian (right after midnight on the 5th!), and so many people left me kind voice mails or facebook messages. Laura sent me a sweet Opus card, too. Thank you all - I am so lucky to have such caring people in my life. Brian gave me a shirt with Tux on it, and also huggably sized stuffed Tux (that would be the Linux penguin). It is absolutely perfect, and snuggly, and awesome. My family gave me a giftcard and a lot of books - yay!

I took a lot of pictures, but I wish I'd taken more. I didn't get any of the group on the 4th, or any of the time in Shenandoah (mostly because I was worried about ruining my camera). When I was younger, and even somewhat now, I almost always just took pictures of *things* I saw. It always seemed silly and overly sentimental to take pictures of people, or silly situations, or anything of the sort, but I'm starting to really want to do more to hold onto those memories. I realized that when I do have kids, I want them to see exactly what my life was like and I also want to organize and keep memories of all the good times from here on out. It's like this week made me realize just how much *fun* life is, and now that I've gotten that in my heart I don't want to let it go or just fade into a distant memory.


Ah. I think I'm finished waxing sentimental. But definitely...more pictures in the future. Oh, also - I added the Mercury photo to the entry about my grandfather.