Category: Uncategorized
-
Push off
“don’t go where the path may lead, go instead where the is no path and leave a trail.” Ralph Waldo Emerson The day has arrived at last. We’re all packed, and at the weight limit with all if our bags. The next hurdle is the trip itself. This isn’t one of those cross-country, eight hour…
-
Logistics. Bureaucracy. Processes.
Transferring money to Romania is becoming more cumbersome than it needs to be. My transfer was cancelled once, after I was called and confirmed my identity and the purpose for this transfer three times. And I was locked out of my online backing account four other times. I learned about the last lockout a few…
-
Ooh ooh! Pick Me!
Vio told me this story today over coffee: “A teacher took out a picture of a family and laid it out in front of her students. One of the children in the photograph had a different color skin than the others. A little boy yelled out, ‘I know why! That kid is adopted!’. And the…
-
Faith
I recently saw a movie. The first half of the script was played from one of the character’s perspective, and then the same story was told from the other side. Gary’s message today was confirming, encouraging and pushed me over the edge of imagination… So how about the other side of the story? “For you…
-
Heavy or light
I’m friends with excitement and anticipation. I welcome it as I perceive mostly the positive by default. Recently we started taking ourselves too serious and it got heavy. I just remembered a clever saying: “Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly.” Yes. This is a stressful time of anticipating crazy changes (home ownership across…
-
Impatience as Self-Preservation
People who know me know that I tend to make decisions relatively quickly. Whether it involves what apartment to rent or whether to propose marriage to the woman I had just met, I’ve been resolute. Some might say rash, but it’s worked out so far. I’ve been thinking about why that is recently, and I…
-
Time stands still
It doesn’t get any better than this. Or in laymen terms: I am happy – Right here – Right now. I am grateful for friends, for the beautiful weather, wine and barbecued veggies, the Ocean and the sound of the waves, the smell of eucalyptus and I am most grateful of little boys’ kisses. The…
-
Thoughts of Packing
As it’s only two-and-a-half weeks until we leave, we’ve begun packing. This is a different type of packing than we’ve done before though. Of course there is the various collection of laptops that we’ve been asked to carry back for friends and family, but that’s normal. We’re not moving permanently (yet!) but we are intending…
-
Expectations
We’ve been been talking about living in Cluj almost since we met in January of ’07, and since then, I’ve been dreaming about what might be the best-case scenario for our life there. Of course, over the past seven years, those dream situations have changed and evolved. First, when I decided to change careers from…
-
Give & Take
I love the brave and wise comment and wish a friend made: may we go to Cluj not for what it has to give to us but for what we have to offer, as people and places may disappoint. I completely agree. Selflessness saves us from disappointment, much like parenting, and much like marriage. We…
-
Encouragement
Being private is comfortable and safe, but you might agree that it is also sterile. On the other hand, vulnerability is freeing and inspiring though it leaves a bitter, lonely aftertaste. We are not in need of approval, and occasionally we enjoy stirring up the air and the waters. It doesn’t take much. Conrad expressed…
-
Cluj & Heritage
We are not the first American/Romanian couple to meet and fall in love, nor are we the first within our church. The third in fact, and not the last. We jokingly call it a tradition and playfully hint to the high school boys that they should go to Cluj after graduation to find a wife,…