Hello 2006 (in March?!?)

3:29 p.m.

Yep, that's right. I said "Hello 2006". As you can see, quite a bit of time has passed by since my last post. Let's see if I can recap all the important stuff that's happened since then.....

Honeymoon in Europe - a wonderful experience! Would certainly do that again, but I think I'll skip over that part where gypsies tried to rob me. It's a complicated story that requires visual cues to explain how they wanted to pull it off, but needless to say I kinda saw it coming and I hip-chucked the "pregnant" girl who tried to push me into her accomplice's waiting hands. Really gay moment right there - my thanks to all the people who tried to teach me how to dance.
(Then again, maybe I won't skip that part.) Anyway, it was magical to say the least. My personal favourite moments are:
- watching the Eiffel tower light show at night, crepe and espresso in hand, sitting with the hubby in the plaza.
- being serenaded by an opera tenor on a gondola, full moon and clear skies, going in and around Venice, sitting with the hubby in a boat.
- having an orchestra and soloist in the Piazza de San Marco (St. Mark's square) play "Happy Birthday" for me, champagne in hand, sitting with the hubby.
- eating truffle ice cream (THE BEST IN THE WORLD BAR NONE - worth the 10 euros per bowl) at night sitting by the beach on the French Riviera, the sound of waves lapping on the shore, hubby sitting by my....well, you're starting to get it, don't you?

There's tons more wonderful moments, but perhaps I'll share them over time.

As soon as we got back, we got to the business of packing up. Boxes upon boxes upon boxes....our social lives took a little hit then because we really had too much stuff and too little time to do it in. But finally, November 26 came and we hauled our stuff over....twice!! One trip from Public Storage, and two more from our old place. The biggest challenge? Getting the sectional down to the basement. After a few short-tempered moments, we were able to get the thing down there with a bit of McGyver-ism (otherwise known as let's-unscrew-the-stair-rail-so-we-can-have-the-half-inch-we-need).

Think that's it? Well, Marc had to leave the next day for Australia for 3 weeks. Which meant I had to unpack. I gotta tell you, after I put all our clothes up, I never ever wanted to buy another piece of clothing again. I looked at all my clothes and said to myself, "What the &^*& was I thinking?" Suffice it to say I still have no idea to this day how we managed to fill up a 2000-square-foot house coming from a 765-square-foot condo. And we were living comfortably in that condo to boot!

Christmas and New Year's came and went - I've been telling Marc that this was my favourite time of the year, but for some reason, this year I did not "feel" it. Somehow the magic wasn't there...I think the child in me went to sleep to rest after the big move. But in the midst of all the chaos and the unsettledness, I still found time to thank God for all the blessings that were given to us this year. That's what's important.

Finally, the latest big event was the choir concert. We rehearsed for a good two-and-a-half months to put on a concert and live CD recording over 3 nights in March. Yours truly was the ticket guy. Well, really, at first I was doing it to help out Mark (a dear friend of mine from the choir), but somehow it evolved. He was the original ticket guy, but somehow his role also evolved to Associate Producer (oooh). He sold close to a hundred tickets though, so in my mind, he's still ticket guy extraordinaire! I have to say that his enthusiasm and good spirits has been an inspiration to me through the whole process, as it always is any other time.

I gotta tell you, I'm still feeling the energy from that concert days after it was done. Truly it was a labour of love, but I think I appreciate it more this time around since I was part of the "Thursday Club" and I saw the amount of hard work and patience that it took to pull this all off. Up there on the choir loft, though, it wasn't any work during the performance. I was truly enjoying myself through the whole show, and actually got a couple of compliments on how animated and happy I was through it all. I hope I done Jeannie proud......

The wrap party was a blast! We got rid of a lot of the excess energy after that. I was so glad that Marc came and got to know some of the people I "work" with. They are really a lovely bunch.

So here we are, back in the good old grind. When I think back at everything that happened in the past few months, I have to say that it does feel strange having some down time (finally). Again, thoughts about life in general come creeping up as they normally do in quiet times like this. You know, the usual "is this all I am" stuff.

Sometimes I wonder if I am destined for something else other than what I am doing now. Of course, it is normal for all of us to aspire for greatness, but sometimes I wonder if that aspiration gets confused with sensing your destiny. Are we supposed to be something greater than what we are, or do we just feel like we should?

Then I remember some lyrics to a song (Oh *why* can't life be a musical where we can all just burst spontaneously into song? Why don't people jump up in the cafeteria singing "La Vie Boheme" on the tables?) It goes....."Forget regret, or life is yours to miss. No other road, no other way, no day but today."

And so I do.