The last few days

So, I'm sitting here quietly in the minutes before I head to bed and realize that it is the perfect moment to write on my blog.  My aunt, uncle and cousin Sarah have all gone to bed, one of their dogs (Possum) is curled up beside me under a blanket, and Chiaki-san and Kiesa (the other canine members of the family - Sarah's chiwuawa that, thank God - and I mean that literally - she has trained not to yip, although it does lick hands rather convulsively if given the chance, and a medium sized dog whose breed I cannot specify, although I know it has one - i.e. it is not merely a mutt.  Possum is a grayhound - the miniature kind) are also already asleep.  In the background, a soloist sings, "I need thee, oh, I need thee... every hour I need thee" and I find myself in a rather dreamy mood.  Therefore, this will not be the much-anticipated (haha - did anyone even read it?) continuation of the last post, but instead a more quietly reflective and probably/possibly less controversial piece.  In fact one thing I would like to do is capture the last few days for immortality because they were truly lovely, love-filled and joyful.

I arrived in the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) airport Monday morning around 8:00 Central Standard Time (noon São Paulo time) and was promptly swept up and taken to breakfast by my aunt - Jennie Kornfield (formerly Brown).  After wandering around a mall (unsuccessfully) looking for exciting Christmas gifts for my cousin Claire, we headed back to get Sarah from DFW, as she was coming in from an early end to her semester up at U of Penn, where she is getting a doctorate in comm - specifically gender roles in the media; a fascinating area of study about which we've had many delightful conversations recently.  Eventually we headed home in time for a lovely walk with the dogs and a nap before heading to a bee-keepers convention dinner that evening (my aunt is spasmic about bee derivatives - i.e. honey and wax - and their many uses and my cousin is a walking encyclopedia on the topic - if you're curious how that came about, ask her sometime).  After a delightful 11 or so hours of sleep (it is very difficult to sleep on the overnight plane ride from Brazil), I spent a day being utterly lazy.  I needed it.  It was so bad, I didn't even change out of my pjs (this was also occasioned by the glass aquarium I attempted to transport to the US for my sister Karis, which promptly broke on the way here, covering my clothing with miniature - but nonetheless cutting - bitsies and pieces of glass.  Oh well... sorry Karis.  Maybe next time!).

Three days later, we have not only shaken out and washed my clothes to assure that they are free of glass, but we've also managed to remove the slight mold smell that accompanied them from my wardrobe in São Paulo. It turns out I'm alergic to mold, so it was delightful to be coughing, sneezing and snuffling a good deal less.  Not to mention the watery and itchy eyes.  Thank you A. Jennie!

So, in the last days, I have also had a delightful time watching sit coms that include both a male and female main character and that Sarah is analyzing for her doctorate, chatting with my aunt about her nursing work (she has been recently been examining and scolding a bunch of firemen), hearing about my cousin Claire's enjoyment of her work as a speech-language therapist and thoughts of doing a doctorate in philosophy, in part to get away from a nasty headmaster at one of her schools, and bike-riding and hanging out with my Uncle Bill, my dad's quieter, less ambitious and insightful younger brother and Kiesa (the bike-riding part.  Well, she was on 4 paws but generally kept me going about as fast as I was up for!).

Today I also managed to get some left-over work done on the MAPI site - go me!  Tomorrow I'll hopefully send out the first MAPI e-news letter in Portuguese, after my Dad has time to make corrections.  So much progress... hopefully to soon cease as I plunge into vacation full force.

This delightful paradise of good food, good laughs, delightful insights and meaningful conversations, well shift to a different set of mouths as I head north to Pittsburgh on Saturday.  My sister Val gets there the day before I do (Dec. 18th) and my brother flys in on Christmas Eve.  Everyone else is already there.  Hurray for family! What would we ever do without them?

Love and blessings,

Rachel