biggest loser...china taste

for those tracking with me on my biggest loser journey toward awesomeness, after 1 week of biggest loseriness i lost a grand total of 1.1% of my total body weight. ha ha. well hey...losing is losing right? slow and steady wins the race maybe??? here's hoping!

as week 2 continues i've found china both welcoming and receptive to my loseriness. first, i joined a chinese gym. i've gone a few times now and on monday when i went i had an ummm interesting yet helpful experience. so the chinese gym i should say is pretty nice. the equipment is decent and in fairly good condition and it only cost me 1400rmb for a full year membership (that's $205 for those who don't know what 1400rmb is!). so you know, great deal really. the one major drawback is that in china as with their water, they like it hot. they have a few small fans and some open windows and that's it. so the amount of sweat one can generate in 45min. on an elliptical is quite amazing. my first time, i was sweating so much i had sweat not only forming on my fore arms but actually dripping off. (i consider my fore arms to be an area of my body that would not typically sweat copious amounts!)

in any case, i'm still down with the gym and have been going faithfully every other day. so on monday i went in and put my stuff in my locker and then started to change into my workout clothes. for the ladies, you'll understand that sports bras are made particularly tight (for obvious reasons) and so they can sometimes get all twisty, thus making them a bit tricky to get on. in this case, i had a few brief struggles with my sports bra and was standing there tugging at it when i suddenly felt someone's hand on my back. eek! then i realized my sports bra was being oh so nicely tugged down into place. so my first awkwardness subsided and i thought, dang that was nice and helpful, i should say thanks. so i turned around and found chubby chinese lady standing there completely naked all smiles! i quickly said thanks and finished changing!! what can i say...helpful and strangely motivating for my workout!

the other strange occurence which is slightly less tied to loseriness but still crazy. i actually know and have interacted with someone who apparently now has swine flu! crazy crazy! i went to a bday dinner for this girl and apparently she had a friend fly in from new zealand to surprise her for her bday. i guess the girl who flew in got or had swine flu and then gave it to her friend here. happy birthday...here's your swine flu present! anyway...as far as i know all swine flu was acquired after i saw the girl so i seem to be symptom-less, but we cancelled our small group tonight...just in case. though i suppose if i should come down with anything it could prove to be a helpful biggest loser weightloss technique. what do you think? no? :)

anyway...here's hoping i can muster more than 1.1% this week! :)

we're here, we're hungry, get used to it brunch

....yes some of you have caught the pop culture sitcom reference in the title....you're correct...i'm now hooked like everyone else. for those that didn't catch it...you can go on thinking i'm really really funny...that's right....blog five!

so anyway...for the 3 people who read my blog you prolly already know and may even be a part of the new international version of the biggest loser that yours truly has crazily enrolled in. my $100 entrance fee buys me 23 weeks of low cal, high exercise fun. and, if at the end of 23 weeks of more-fun-than-a-person-has-a-right-to, i have the highest percentage of weightloss, i'll get something like $1000. sounds good right?! yeah....well....i think it is. course, i don't think i can win, but i do hope to put forth a better showing than my fantasy football team did last year. now the league has morphed into a keeper league and the truth is when your team finishes dead last there isn't much you'd want to keep!

but i digress.

so the biggest loser is underway in week 1 and so far i'm tracking calories, doing pilates every morning, and joined a gym. now i just need to go to the gym and i'll be on a sure path to not-last-place! woo hoo.

i've told a few of my friends here about our little competition since i'm the only contestant representing all of asia and so i thought i could use a little positive reinforcement. so i suppose the response at lunch on sunday should have come as no surprise to me. we're sitting at johnny moo's, shanghai's version of a fake american 50's diner that serves burgers and shakes (think johnny rocket). i'm casually flipping through the menu to figure out what to order and i mutter to myself, "now what would the biggest loser eat?" immediately, my friend hannah reaches over and flips my menu to the salads page and then smiles at me. i laugh at this bit of a joke/hint and think over the choices. when my turn comes for ordering i go ahead and order the grilled chicken ceasar salad and no sooner do the words come out of my mouth then everyone at the table sponaneously begins clapping. it was just short of a standing ovation! lol. now that's what i call positive reinforcement.

to all my fellow contestants....i know you're trying hard, but i fail to see how i can be beat when i get a standing O every time i sit down to a meal!

may the biggest loser win! :)

summer road trip

so i'm planning on a road trip this summer with my friend amy. i've got the route pretty well mapped out but haven't completed decided what we'll do at each stop. any ideas on what to look for? here's where we'll be:

san fransisco - 1 1/2 days
yosemite - 1 day
vegas/red rocks - 1 1/2 days
utah - 1 day at some random amusement park!
denver - 2 days
missouri - 1/2 day (really just a stop to camp on the way elsewhere)
ohio - a day at cedar point
baltimore - 5 days

i'm hoping to camp most of the way to bmore and maybe stay with a friend or two along the way. any suggestions or fun ideas would be great!

anybody else doing anything fun this summer? anybody wanna meet up somewhere along the way? i'll be down in florida in early july as well.

hope to catch up with everyone on my whirlwind tour of the u.s. this summer!

waiting to be

shanghai, as with most big cities, is never quiet, never quite still. plopping down in the middle of a bustling city is not what you would imagine for the perfect contemplative moment. but as with any place you live for a while, you come to appreciate its charms, its smells, and even its bustle. and soon, you come to find the quiet niches that tuck themselves away like stolen moments with a lover.

5pm in shanghai is just such a moment; a hidden quietness in the midst of chaos, a gentle blush of color before a crushing dawn. at 5pm, most aren't home from work and those who don't work are at home preparing food for the evening meal. things slow almost imperceptibly. the streets go vaguely quiet, seeming briefly serene.

i walked into an eerily empty restaurant to have some dinner. after picking up my own menu, i took it back outside to read a book and wait for my food in the waning light of a beautiful spring day. hardly more than 2 or 3 people passed and they seemed as much lost in their wandering as i was in the pages of my book. and just when the air chilled enough to stiffen my fingers around the pages of my book a few small, steady changes began.

the local dvd sellers wheeled up their cart for the night's work. they began to unpack piles of movies and tv shows and lined them up down the sidewalk. it seemed strangely cathartic to see them setting up rather than happening upon them after they've magically appeared. i took it as my cue to wander home. it's often in that quiet walk toward the comfort of home that my mind usually wanders. letting my thoughts drift lightly from idea to idea...never really staying long in one place.

crossing the street, i looked up to see the sun setting. it wasn't dazzling or brilliant. in fact, it was rather ordinary. the sun was a full, clear, yellow-orange, resting gently atop the city skyline. and for just a moment...the city seemed still. the bright calmness of it mesmerized me for a few moments. then i continued my walk home. continued watching the shanghai night unfold. more and more vendors were rolling up to take their places along the street. there were 2 or 3 dvd sellers in a row just beside someone selling english cd's. these were followed by a strange assortment of items for purchase, cheap toys, baskets and wooden boxes, specialty cigarettes and cigars, books, fake wallets and multiple flower peddlars selling their wares from the backs of bikes. but no one was asking you to buy anything. no one was shopping. there was barely the hint of a word. people just moved about quietly setting up in preparation. half empty blankets and cardboard boxes waited to hold the promised merchandise.

further down the street a somewhat pleasing aroma of grilled meat and vegetables caught up to me. food vendors were setting up on either corner by my apartment selling assorted fresh meats, vegetables, and sweets to be grilled and sauted over searing flame and ash. their long heavy tables were strewn with food in every color and shape you can imagine that drew me in to almost buy something except that i was still much too full from my dinner. these street chefs pulled out numerous plastic tables and chairs, as if they'd pulled them from some baltimore city backyard bbq, and set them out on the sidewalks and by the curb of the street, making ready for the evening's diners.

shanghai is a city of extremes, of opposites, of eccentricities. it's sometimes a place that defies reason. it exudes an air of ancient history and modern progress in a mingled and pungent odor that you can't quite escape even when you leave. and at 5pm, on an almost warm april evening, it is, like me, a city waiting to be...

strange but hilariously true

i've been collecting stories and strange but hilariously true happenings of life of late. some even come with pictures!

my favorite strange but true moment? i wore my flops today....feb. 12 and it was that warm.

so for those from home who read, you may know that alisha came for a visit before cny. she came to help kristen get settled in and hang out. the two of them checked out lots in shanghai and i helped them arrange a quick trip to beijing. i only joined them a couple times as i was swamped with work...and really what do the young chickys want with an old fogey like me anyway?!!

• on our first jaunt on the metro (i was taking the girls to the fabric market) we were chatting it up and laughing over some random stuff. i don't remember much of what we were laughing about but i know that we were talking about how crowded the metro can be at times and how sometimes you have to push to be sure you can get on and off. then i was cracking some jokes about having to box out. just after this, i heard the announcement for our stop so i nodded to the girls and said, "this is us." 2 seconds later this chinese dude looks at us takes a step back, motions with his hand, and in perfect, american english says, "do you guys need to get off?" uhhhhh.....yeah....we smiled and then spent the next 60 seconds replaying every word we'd just said trying to remember if we'd made any rude comments. we hadn't....but ummm...note to self....sometimes the people who understand english blend in surprisingly well!!!


• my next trip on the metro brought one of those priceless china moments that are so hard to describe to people. just those moments that pop up when you least expect it and all you can think is....dang i'm glad i have a camera on my phone. i'll let the pics do the talking:

alisha left for the states just a day before i left for my little cny adventure to thailand. poor kristen was left in shanghai all by her lonesome....she seems to have held up pretty well armed with my 200 movie dvd collection and working internet connection.

thailand was, of course, amazing. from private pool access hotel rooms, to snorkeling in crystal clear waters, and taking in the sun at the beach where lots of old european ladies thought it would be cool to go topless (old boobs should never be seen by the light of day!)!

i particularly enjoyed a sort of random superbowl experience as we watched the cardnials GIVE AWAY the game to the always hated steelers in heartbreaking fashion from some picnic tables and chairs set up on a sidewalk outside a street bar at 6am in bangkok. i never imagined watching the steelers win the superbowl from a sidewalk streetbar in thailand with 2 canadians would be a good time....but hey....it may be strange...but it's all true!

• but despite the apparent strangeness of the superbowl, it paled in comparison with the wildlife shenanigans that thailand offered! it was really just 1 fateful tour that joy (pictured above) and i signed up for. one of those touristy things that you never really do but every once in a while for lack of better planning or ideas it seems like it's worth it. we'd already be snorkeling at the hidden beach location where the leonardo dicaprio movie "the beach" had been filmed. we were taken in the by the charm of pukhet and i guess we figured our touring luck would persist. so we signed up for this tour that included some random sight seeing and an elephant trek and sea kayaking. i thought the elephant trek (according to the pics) would take us into some jungle type area and that we'd get some cool looking pics and what not. what we got was a 10-minute jaunt around a dirt track made for sad elephants who have to wonder in the heat of the day with 2 chubby tourists on its back. so i think our elephant decided to fight "the man" if you will. in the less than 10 minutes we were on his back he stopped to take a dump, which was ok, not entirely surprising. then like 10 seconds later i hear what sounds exactly like a fire hydrant that's been let loose in the summer time. joy points out it's the sweet sounds of an elephant peeing. so i think ok...we've taken care of that the old boy is ready to be on his way now. then about 30 seconds later, i hear a sound that i'm not sure i'll ever really be able to adequately describe. i'd say wind-tunnel-ish would be my best try but really that doesn't do it justice. all i know is i was looking around like...what the...and joy busts out laughing and says so sweetly in her canadian accent, "He's farting!" really....how many people get the farting elephant?


• after our disappointing elephant "trekking," i was a little less excited about the sea kayaking but i still held out hope that it would be as cool as one of the other trips down the thai canals i'd taken in bangkok. of course, before we hit the kayaking they had to make a stop at cashew nut factory so we could learn about the cashews and, of course, buy stuff. (side note: did you know that a cashew is a fruit and a nut? yup...a cashew fruit grows on a tree and a cashew nut is on the bottom of the fruit. you can actually make cashew juice out of the fruit...it doesn't taste half bad.) so anyway, we sample the nuts and snacks and make some small purchases and then head off to our sea kayaking adventure. as we are pulling up i point out to joy the swarms of monkeys that are all over the place running all through the trees and even hopping in and out of the water that's coming up to the land. we hop out of the van and head towards a long rickety, wooden bridge that leads to a floating restaurant and then beyond that the kayak docks. just as we are coming over to the bridge our guide stops and says, "be careful of the monkeys. they will bite." so i'm like...ummm ok....and i'm looking at all the monkeys frolicking around me and they start to seem less frolicky and more menacing by the second. then the guide stops again and says, "oh! you don't have any food in your bags do you?" no i'm thinking, "you're kidding right? you just took us to a damn cashew nut factory and told us to buy stuff. OF COURSE WE HAVE FOOD IN OUR BAGS." but all i calmly inform him is that yes we have food, but it's not open. he says it doesn't matter the monkeys can smell it and they will still try to get it from our bags so we should be careful. so i'm like...gee, thanks for the tip buddy. and, of course, as we head onto the bridge the eyes of the monkeys are going from menacing to downright rabid in my mind's eye. then after 2 steps onto the bridge, the guide stops and says hold on. he runs off the bridge and then quickly comes back with a whole hand full of rocks. so i'm thinking this is comforting...this guy wasn't just playing a little monkey game...let's scare the tourists...he's serious about these things. so we head out onto the bridge and he's trying to shoo them away by yelling at them, stomping, jumping, throwing rocks whatever. most are not all that afraid and our progress is slow. now, i should point out, i'm at the back of the pack with joy in front of me and the guide in front of her. so with each passing step i'm thinking, "sure, the monkeys will run away from the guide and then circle back around and all pounce on me." i'm gripping the straps of my bag tighter and tighter but i have dancing images in my mind of me whirling around in a circle with 25 monkeys clinging to my backpack and my face and like ripping me eyeballs out. so you know....i'm a little freaked out and we aren't really moving fast enough to make me think it's gonna be over quickly. so i sort of lean forward toward joy and make a groaning noise as i start to say that i'm gonna hold onto her cuz i'm freaked. apparently....joy only hears the freaked out groaning and not the warning that i'm gonna hold on. when i grab her bag, joy screams and swings around wildly and looks at me. of course, her crazy outburst sends me into a screaming fit. as the two of us stand there screaming and looking at each other the guide just starts laughing. meanwhile i'm saying to joy, "what are you doing?!!!" and she's yelling back, "you scared me. you grabbed my bag and i thought it was a monkey!!!!" and i reply, "well you're screaming like crazy and that scared me half to death so now i'm screaming." we both kinda nervously laugh and then proceed to make our way to the end of the monkey bridge of death as i like to fondly remember it. by this time everyone in the restaurant at the end of the bridge as witnessed the white people hysterics and is laughing right along with our ever helpful guide. as you can imagine, our trip back down the bridge after kayaking was not something we were looking foward to. but this time, we had braced ourselves and felt ready. joy reminded me NOT to touch her this time and i told her i definitely would not. our guide had a long stick this time and so we were ready to go. i was some how at the back of the line yet again and so visions of multiple monkey attacks were still dancing in my head but i was ready to push through the fear. now i should clarify that monkeys don't just sit nicely off to a side and stare at you while they think about mutilating your face so they can get to your food. their tricky little buggers who bounce around like rabid 3-year-olds on a suger overdose. they hop from branch to branch and run all around the sides of the bridge and you never really feel on balance. you sort of think that you can't keep your eye on any of them for long enough to ever really be sure that they aren't running a diversion tactic or setting a screen of some kind so they can just pound you with an aerial attack. so all this is happening as we creep back down the bridge. we get about 1/2 way down and the guide stops. there are 2 monkeys a couple feet in front of him and they won't move. they are just sitting there...and i promise, one is growling. seriously, teeth showing, low noise coming from its throat growling. i kid you not...monkeys growl...and it is truly sinister. the guide is waving the stick and yelling and banging the tree branches and trying all kinds of antics to scare the pesky fiends away but they just aren't having it. after several minutes one jumps down first. then, the other sort of slowly splashes down off the side of the bridge but he refuses to do more than take 1 step off the bridge. once he's in the marshy water he stays right next to the bridge watching our every move. so we begin our forward progress once more and i'm just ready to give up and die of heart failure right there. then, i make the fatal mistake. just as we are passing the evil monkey, i sort of slow and look to the side so i can get a look at him. who knows what would possess me to do that...maybe i just wanted to be sure i could look death in the eye before it came at me...i don't know. but whatever the case, i glanced over and i see this little dripping monkey, hair all spikey everywhere, water dripping from the ends of it's furry head, and then....well how can i write it without showing you? then....he just lifts his arms next to his head, bears his teeth, and makes a hissing growling sound as he stares right back at me! needless to say, i was off that bridge in 2 seconds flat! of course, the best part was for the rest of the weekend when paul said something we didn't like, joy and i could just look at him and make the scary monkey hissing growling face. and then i would say, "i'm gonna come at you like a spider monkey!"

i know it sounds strange...but i kid you not....it is all hilariously true.

in search

i've been thinking i should post something for weeks, but even though i've had lots to say i didn't seem to have the motivation to write.

but then i watched this movie tonight that really got into my head for some weird reason. it's a great flick if you're not offended by some crassness. it's called "in search of a midnight kiss". the whole time i was watching i kept thinking...this is so my brother's life...he has to watch this. but i was really connected to it as well. it's definitely very "real life" i guess you'd say. i don't know. it wasn't all prettied up to make it more comfortable to watch. if you've lived life you've either been there or known someone who has and so it just feels real.

anyway, it got me thinking. the last 4 weeks have certainly been full of events worth writing about, line dancing in nashville with the fake johnny cash, cancer scare over thanksgiving that lengthened my stay by a week, christmas in china with friends and choosing to cook together and play games and just enjoy the company and forget the gifts, and new years in china watching pirated philippino cable as they countdown the new year in some language i don't understand while i'm drinking grape juice and playing charades and other ridiculously hilarious games. these have not been holidays like any other that's for sure. but i've enjoyed them more than some and they won't be soon forgotten.

but this movie has made it all seem strange. i had the craziest flash of memory from about 5 years ago that was so vivid it was like it happened just yesterday. you know the sort of memories that grip your insides and squeeze out all your breath till your completely full of the smells, tastes and sounds of them.

it was september...the weekend of my birthday...actually...it was the 6th...my actual birthday. i was turning 25. my little brother was living in charleston, sc at that point and i had driven down to hang out with him for a few days. my bf and i had broken up just a few days before and despite the craziness of how i was feeling i was glad to be visiting with my bro. as i always used to tell him, his life was a vacation for me! i worked a 9-5 at a medical publisher. i edited medical textbooks, played in a sports league, went to happy hour, volunteered at church and was thinking of buying a house. i was insanely normal. my brother on the other hand...runs out of the house and up to my car the minute i pull up and says happy birthday sis and shoves a 5th of tequilla in my hand (his favorite not necessarily mine! ha ha). this was his life...though. living in a house where is bedroom door was off the hinges and leaning against the wall. where the teeny tiny tv got no actual tv stations but could play any 1 of the 3 movies they owned (i remember watching donnie brascoe until about 4pm when the boys in the house finally started waking up for the day.). so here i was for my birthday weekend vacation.

and he delivered. my bro is a great host and knows how to have fun and make everyone else believe they are also having fun. i had a blast. i remember he graciously agreed to buy one of those cheesy buckets o' margarita mix for my tequilla since that's really the only way i'd enjoy it. we put it in the freezer before we left to go out with some of his friends and roommates. we went to this local restaurant type place cuz one of the guys worked there...i don't remember the name. it was a little more chain-like than his usual hangouts but they got cheap drinks and could hang out with their buddy who was working so that's where we ended up. i remember being crammed into a wooden boothe with ronnie, chris, and bentley. i don't remember who else was there....there were a few guys. but i was ron's sis and it was my birthday so for once...i paid for nothing. i just took my free drinks and laughed and talked and enjoyed the merriment. when the place was closing my brother said everyone was gonna come back to their place and so we'd head home just ahead of them. now, i should say, i've never been a big drinker and even in my wild days i still was not much good at holding my alcohol. so by the time we got home i was ready to just sleep right where i was standing. ronnie sat me on the couch and told me not to sleep before everyone came over. then he went to check on the margarita mix. next thing i remember i wake up on the couch and the house is full of people. ronnie comes over grinning from ear to ear telling me he's glad i woke up from my little nap. my little nap seems to have sobered me up enough to realize that the margaritas must be done and i should at least have one because ronnie gave it to me for my birthday afterall. so i tell him as much and he and i head into the kitchen to get one. we arrive to find a very large and very empty margarita bucket and i just bust out laughing and say, "you know...i didn't even get one drink of my birthday tequilla!" ha ha ha.

ronnie was sorry...but when he saw i really didn't care it was all fine and the night went on. but everything about that was so indicative of my brother...always the best of times and the worst all rolled into one and yet you always came out of thinking it was ok. ha ha. i was happier than being alone on my birthday thinking about my ex, for sure.

everyone stayed late into the night, as was customary. i wondered a bit and eventually found a spot in a corner of couch and mostly just watched and listend as was MY custom. i was really just a guest in their world. i knew many of his friends and roommates, in fact, i'd introduced him to some of them in college, but i never really KNEW them. this was ronnie's world. a world with its own language and expectations. a world i often observed from the fringes but never really comprehended. but on nights like that one, i was almost a part of it...as long as i sat quietly and just let it all happen around me. people eventually started to trickle out. some drifted off to bedrooms and quiet corners. many went home or slept in cars. my bed was the couch so i was sorta just hanging out waiting for things to die down. but there was a guy...a friend of one of ronnie's roommates that i had had my eye on. i couldn't resist. he was nice looking in an awkward way. i think he was ronnie's age...so a bit younger than me. but that didn't really matter. he had that same indie, emo, i'm in a band, i don't make much money, i'll prolly get you in trouble kind of look and attitude...except....well...he was tall and kinda big. not big like fat...just big...like when you're tall and so you can't be delicate if you're really tall. i don't know...i just remember thinking that the clothes and the long dark emo side swept hair and the aviator shades seemed oddly out of place on him. i would have expected him to look more comfortable on a football field than in a rock band. but there he was...but like i said...he wasn't unattractive...he just stood out more from the homogenous crowd of rockers and bettys.

at some point, some how...we started talking. and we kept talking. i have no idea what we could possibly have been talking about. but i remember sitting on that little dirty couch that was my bed in that shit hole of a house talking for a very long time to this guy that i had been wanting to talk to. and the whole time i remember clearly thinking 3 things: 1. i can't believe a guy i actually think is cute is actually talking to me for this long. 2. he can't possibly think this is really that interesting to talk about. 3. i wonder when he's gonna ditch me to get outta here? stupid right? why spoil the whole thing with all that self-doubt? who knows? it's who i was...and who i try not to be now...but i digress.

so crazy thing was....he didn't leave. he kept talking. eventually it was clear that everyone had dispersed except he and i...well he and i and ... shoelaces, the drummer in my brother's band. i know, it's sad...i can remember the drunken drummer's name, but not the cute boy! but come on, they called him shoelaces. i know that's not what his mother named him, but if she gave him another name i swear to you i have no clue what it might have been. to me and to everyone i knew, he was shoelaces. and he was completed wasted. apparently, as i discovered later, he was always like this...had some issues i think. but that night...it was funny...cuz you know....drunk guys don't really realize when hey...this is awkward i should leave the room. so he's sittin there and everyone is gone and i watch him nearly fall over to pick up another can and crack it open. the pop of a fresh can just made me laugh so hard. me and hottie were cracking up at shoelaces who took about 3 sips before passing out in some alcohol induced coma on the opposite couch. and all i could think was...alone at last! ha ha. i didn't even care about the drunken shoelaces anymore. who was this girl? was that me? that's so not my style. for a moment, i thought, perhpas i could be a part of this world. maybe this was me afterall. and so, i said i was tired and cute boy let me lay down on the couch and you know what he did....he grabbed a blanket and lay on the floor just beside the couch and kept talking to me. i know...gasp...i couldn't believe it either. i don't know if he was waiting for something more...i think even then i wondered....but it didn't seem likely with my brother in his doorless room not 10 steps away. but whatever the case...i didn't care what was on his mind...he was there talking to me. and so we kept on talking through most of the night. he took my hand at some point and i know that he kissed me but that was it. he slept on the floor. i slept on the couch. and the next morning i drove back to baltimore.

i was friends with him on myspace for a while. i would look at his pictures sometimes. but really...i never saw him again.

a month later i bought my first house, 823 e. 34th street, baltimore, md. i loved it. by july, i started going to a little church called grace fellowship church up in timonium. and my life started change....i was headed down a path that would change it forever and i never even saw the turn. that following september, 1 year later, i started to volunteer in the high school ministry. i made some friends, 2 of whom have since come to visit me in china...never would have guessed it then! another year later, and i had quit my job at the publisher and was working at gfc part time. and another 2 years after that and i would move to shanghai, china to accept my first full-time youth ministry position.

and now, here it is, a year and half in and i look back and it's so hard to imagine. it's 2009. the last conversation with the cute boy that never was happened in september 2003. a night that was in essence the last of its kind for me. a night that set me free to take a different journey. in many ways, it's good that those days and nights are behind me....there was a lot of emptiness and hurt in those times. but it's also a passing of my youth i suppose as well. a passing of a time when i thought things would never change, that maybe even i would never change.

but things do change. incredibly. my little brother? married now...with a beautiful baby girl and another one coming and a wife who's able to match his quirkiness with a few of her own. and me? well....who knows....you can't look back without wondering what you'll miss from today.

but hey, ronnie, chris, amy, bill, patty, and elise, i don't want it to turn out like that cute boy from the party. i don't ever want to forget you name and just revel in the memory. don't ever let me lose you....no matter how far we go in search of only god knows what.