Spring is (almost) here

[istherehope]

Hi to anyone out there who still reads my infrequent ramblings and updates...

The last time I posted was right before our 10 day vacation, so wanted to share a bit about how this went.

We'd had a trip to Brazil planned that we'd been planning for several months. I had organized the accommodation etc., while my H's work had paid for the flights as part of an incentive package. Anyway we had a very long flight from Europe to Brazil, 2 stops, and nearly 24 hours including connection times. The leg of our flight from Amsterdam to Sao Paulo was about 12 hours. When we got to Sao Paulo, we were so happy to have arrived, around 11 PM local time. Turns out that we needed a visa which we did not have and could not buy there. I was so shocked. I have never before failed to look into something so basic when planning a trip. I panicked and thought my H was going to flip out and blame me, as I had been the one doing most of the planning. The thing is we had to get on the flight back to Amsterdam, only about 1 hour after arriving. He suggested that we could just go home and not use up the vacation days. I started crying a little bit. To my great surprise, H hugged me and said "ILY very much, and I would never hold this against you." He then went on to say how we could make another vacation, and this would be the adventure vacation. We started talking about the different options, and planning as much as we could in the plane on the way back to Amsterdam...So, it was an adventure for sure. We of course did end up spending loads of extra money as we had to buy new flights, but on the other hand we got to go somewhere my H had always wanted to go and that I had actually been planning as a surprise for his b-day. We ended up staying 1 night in Amsterdam, 1 in Madrid, and then going to Morocco for 5 nights. On our way home we stayed in London with mutual friends for 2 nights.

Things were definitely different on this trip than they had been in a very long time. There were a few minor moments of bickering, but for the most part there were pleasant surprises. In Madrid we went to a long boozy lunch, and H was playing with my ring and commenting on it. He's still not wearing his, but at least he's acknowledging mine. In Amsterdam he mentioned our anniversary in passing. (We flew on our 5 year wedding anniversary) In Morocco we were just together a lot, and H started saying things he hasn't said in ages like "you're so pretty" etc. Finally, it was great to stay with mutual friends in London. The last time we saw them was actually about 2 weeks before the bomb, at their wedding in Italy. During that wedding I knew that there was something seriously wrong, but I could not put my finger on it. Even looking at pictures of us at that wedding, I can see that my H was not happy at all. This time was different. We talked about having them come to visit us. The friends also have no idea about the troubles, and actually said that they were surprised with all of the moves and stress we've been through that we managed to stay together-that most people would have split up. H sort of made a joke of this, but I think it got to him.

So now we're back home, and back to reality. So far so good. Yesterday H even went through a weird 10 minutes or so where he kept saying things like "you're cool", then "you're a really good person", "you've been so sweet lately." He woke up during the night, put his arms around me, and said "you're so beautiful". Of course we're not back to work yet, and so not really out of vacation mode, but I am feeling more content than I have in awhile. I am not looking forward to work on Monday, but I need to suck it up and remember how fortunate I am to have a good job right now, and not screw this up!

Anyway, I will try to post more often; even if nobody is reading anymore, it is nice to sit here and express myself.

Hope everyone is doing well!

ITH