Father's day
It's been quite a month- again! I spent most of yesterday purposely not thinking about Father's day. Fortunately it was never something we really celebrated at our house. I am still missing my dad, but it tends to be worse on holidays. All in all it's starting to feel a little more normal that he's gone, but that feeling sort of comes and goes.
I got through my senior project for school. I had it printed and bound- so it was all official-like. It was a load off my shoulders to turn it in! I'd been working on it for months and the hardest part was *stopping*. It was so hard to just say it's Finished! My teacher said it could be published in the future if I worked on it some more- so that's an exciting thought. Moving from being a student into a published author is a fun idea for now.
I also got through my graduation week. This was my last week before school, and somehow or other it got extremely busy. This wasn't intentional, and frankly was a little stressful. But it was all things I really wanted to do. I took Al to see a local production of "The Tempest" which was fun. Then we had a birthday party that actually required us to go out on a school night and go to a bar. In spite of it being karaoke it managed to be quite fun. I also went to a concert with my mom. There was a local quartet playing Haydn in a beautiful old church near the CAL campus.
After all of that was my actual graduation weekend! We had three full days of school, and then the ceremony on Sunday afternoon into the evening. The graduation was full of hiccups - but nothing that kept us from enjoying the day. I feel like we are well and truly graduated. I even got up there and gave a speech that I wrote [in my copious time during the previous week!] and that is something I loathe doing. But it was for my family, and that's how I feel about my teacher and fellow students - we've all been through a lot in the past few years. So we had a blessing, speeches by our teacher and by me as the student representative. We had cake and champagne and lots of lovely food. We had a wonderful time meeting each other's partners, parents and children. It was really great all in all.
Then two days later we were off to Paris! That's why time has felt rather speedy lately, too many deadlines. We arrived on Wednesday and worked a few days in the office. In fact we are there now! We work through tomorrow and then we are officially on vacation. I think it was a great idea to work out our jetlag! Plus it's given us a chance to meet the folks in Paris, and get ideas of where to go.
This weekend we spent more than five hours in the Guimet Museum looking at Asian art. We took photos of the Eiffel tower at Trocadero. We went to Pere Lachaise cemetery and had lots of fun wandering around- seeing graves for Moliere, Oscar Wilde, Heloise and Abelard and so many many more. It was very peaceful and gorgeous. Then we went up to Sacre Coeur and explored both the dome and the crypt. We love our tiny little apartment in the 12th arrondissement. Across the street there is a bank, a pharmacy, a cheese shop, a butcher, a fresh fruit/veg seller, and several patisseries and cafes! You can't ask for more than that, really. My favorite part of this trip already is just stopping in at little places for a coffee and a treat, or just walking around holding hands [unlike other places we've traveled where that is frowned upon]. For some unknown reason- not sure if it's me or the country, or both that has changed- this trip is the exact opposite of the last time I was here. EVERYONE is being super nice, friendly and I've even gotten compliments on my French. Compare this to when I lived here for six months and people said my accent was crap- I hardly believe it's improved over the last twenty years. At any rate, I'll take it! It's making the trip really easy and fun.