I have not abandoned my blog. I just stole some time away from my desk, some much needed time. To start, I worked at Angela's school for almost a week at the end of the school year in June. I didn't get paid and we worked between 10 and 15 hours a day. It was tiring and fun and used different parts of my brain and made me feel useful for a while. Volunteering has a way of doing that.
Then I flew away to Michigan for a month. Yep, a whole MONTH. It was glorious. It was just what my soul needed. It was restful and busy and fun-filled. I spent time with my family and friends. I swam a lot. I sat in a boat and closed my eyes and felt my hair fly in the wind. I wore a lot of sunscreen. I drank slush and laughed and drank some more. I ate ice cream, almost every single day. I went through boxes of old photographs and listened to stories of family members past and present. I played golf and almost got two holes in one. So close. I roasted marshmallows and played hide and seek and caught fireflies. Hundreds of fireflies.
When it was time to come home I was so deep into vacation-mode that it was hard to re-enter "real life". But slowly, I've figured it out. I'm back at my desk, I'm writing again, I'm prepping the next quarter's classes. I'm dealing with the mail and the empty fridge and the idea that I'm not on vacation any more. But it's hard. It was such a good month. Every single day.
But I'm back. We've started back up at church (finished the year-long 26 lesson study on Romans this week we've been doing in our Sunday school). We went to see The Producers last night at the Hollywood Bowl and laughed and laughed and cheered. We've made the Costco runs and called in the exterminator (the ants beat us back from Michigan). I've set up appointments with my writers' group and a television consultant. I'm on track.
Life is good. It's in the memories that I get to remember that every day. And it's still only July. It's still just the middle of summer. And we've got days and days of Olympic events left to watch. Go athletes! Go USA! Go world! Oh yeah, and baseball. There's still lots of baseball to watch. Go Tigers!
