Tying Up Loose Ends…

I am finally home in Colorado after 4 trips out of state over the holiday season (business and family) and it feels good. I like traveling to an extent, but that many trips in such a short space of time is kind of exhausting. It’s so nice not to be living out of a suitcase anymore! But everything was worth it.

I got to do my first install in Portland, and though those 2 trips were nightmarish on a grand scale, I still learned a lot. After that, we drove to Oklahoma City to see Tim’s family (a loooong drive) for Christmas. Then after New Years, I flew back to Portland to visit my family and to manage the install takedown. I just got back on Friday. Needless to say, I was homesick beyond belief and nearly delirious with happiness at seeing Tim again.

I can’t understand how people leave their homes and spouses for extended periods of time. It’s so difficult. So, my plan is to try and keep my solo trips to 3-4 days in the future, and if it’s gonna be longer, find some way to take him with me. I might get to fly to Hawaii for a presentation in the spring, and I’m already scoping out tickets so that Tim can fly out too. Hawaii would be fun, but without him? Meh…

While I was out in Portland, there started to be a lot of talk about our 10 year high school reunion. A large percentage of the class is on MySpace and we have a forum there where things just started to snowball. It looks like they are going to do it in Portland (YAY!) at a resort (YAY!) and it’s going to be a multi-class reunion.

My school was incredibly small, and my graduating class was only 26 people. As a result, most of the people hung out with everyone else. Upper classmen, lower classmen, people that had graduated 3 years earlier. It was a giant dysfunctional family. To be fair, I hated almost everyone and I’m pretty sure no one was very fond of me.

Still, I’m excited to go and see a few of the folks who I did bond with. A few friends have mentioned not wanting to go, and at first I felt the same way. I don’t have a lot in common with most of those people. I don’t even have a lot in common with most of my friends from high school that I am still friends with. I’ve branched out in my own direction. My best friend has lived a completely different sort of life from me (abroad, and now in New York), and the girls I spent time with since childhood still live in Oregon. Out in Colorado, I have my own circle of interest that is far from where I thought I’d be, and far from where most of my class is.

But, I am happy. I’m not looking for acceptance from the small town people or anyone else. I still feel a twinge of anxiety when I think about how cruel some of them were, but then again, most of them have grown beyond that. I doubt very much that this reunion will be anything more than a good time. I went with Tim last year to his 10 Year and it was so fun. I didn’t even know any of those people, but I got to meet a few of Tim’s old friends and we all ended up having a blast.

Anyways, if the whole thing turns out lame, at least we’re in Portland. Maybe we could just drive to the coast or something…

That’s all for now,

~e