What could have been

Tags

Life, Music

I don’t usually write when I’m on vacation. Partly because this is the internet and there are creepers everywhere, but also because I like being at least somewhat unplugged while I’m away. But after tonight, I have to break my rule and write.

I’m currently spectating at an international piano competition, one I’ve always dreamed about attending. It has been spectacular so far; I have had a total blast attending the almost 8 hours a day of piano recitals (not consecutive hours, they let us out to eat and use the bathroom once in a while). These pianists are, in a word, fantastic. Of course there are some who are clearly more polished than others, but these guys are the best of the best.

Anyone who has been in my house and/or who has heard me complain about my weird tiny living room knows that I have a piano. It’s not the concert grand I dream of, but it is in good shape, holds its tune pretty well, and was a bargain on Craigslist to boot. I love love love it. See, once upon a time, the only thing in the whole world that I wanted was to be a concert pianist. I wanted lessons so badly that I started to teach myself how to read way before kindergarten because the teacher who taught my brothers would only accept students who could read. I started accompanying choirs when I was in 3rd grade, not because I really enjoyed accompanying choirs, but because I LOVED being on the stage under the lights playing my heart out.

Why am I writing about this tonight? Well, during the second of the three performances tonight, the pianist played a sonata that was the last piece I learned in its entirety before I stopped playing. Not surprisingly, he played it better than I did. But he is also 8 years older than I was when I played it, and he’s received formal, conservatory level training for all of those 8 years, something I never got the chance to do. I always thought I was pretty good at playing the piano, but I don’t think I ever thought I was really that good…good enough to play whole pieces that real life, actual professionals played in competitions. But watching him nail that Beethoven tonight and knowing how well I actually did play it** made me feel like I was watching what could have been my life.

I cried during his performance…partly because he really played the hell out of it and partly because it got me thinking about what my life could have been if I had been able to keep playing. If I could have afforded the medical treatment to fix the problem I had which made (and sometimes still makes) my left arm numb after too many repetitive motions. If I had been more proactive with finding teachers who could connect me with professionals. If I had believed that I was good enough to warrant the expense and the time.

I’m not unhappy with the life I’ve chosen. I have an interesting job that may turn into an interesting career. I have a wonderful, supportive, and sexy husband who I can’t imagine life without. I have great friends near and far, many of whom I would never have met if I had chosen another path. But I just can’t help but think that I gave up something fundamental in myself when I quit playing the piano competitively. And now that I know that that piece is missing, I don’t know how to continue on the path I’ve chosen without at least trying to get part of it back.

**I’m not just tooting my own horn, I swear. I competed with that sonata at both the county and state level and both times I received almost perfect marks.

Monterrey

Tags

Foreign Service, Life, Mexico, Travel

Guys. Everything you’ve heard about Monterrey, Mexico and how dangerous and terrible it is, is a lie. Ok maybe it’s not entirely a lie…it’s still a dangerous city and there are precautions there in place to protect diplomats for a reason. BUT! While officers there do have to deal with the security situation, they have the benefit of dealing with the security situation in a city where there are world class museums, groomed outdoor running trails, gorgeous national parks, and some seriously incredible food options. And believe me, I took full advantage of all of the awesome things about Monterrey on my month-long TDY there back in March.

The whole point of my TDY was to help keep the NIV wait time down, so I did a whole bunch of NIV adjudications while I was there.  Actually, I managed to set my all-time-adjudication record there, which felt awesome. The work in Monterrey can be overwhelming in terms of numbers, but they have a great team of officers and in spite of some spacial challenges they function as a truly well-oiled machine. All the officers and the local staff were so welcoming and kind and I really enjoyed my work there. As for the city, I could live there forever. Ok that’s maybe a lie–I don’t think I could live anywhere forever–but it’s a pretty incredible place.

For starters, the mountains there are like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I love mountains, especially big, tall, spiky ones and the Sierra Madre did not disappoint. Actually, I have to admit that Mexico in general is a lot more mountainous than I was expecting. I’m not really sure what I thought it’d be like, but every city I’ve been in with the notable exception of Cancun/Playa del Carmen, has had gigantic, spiky, gorgeous mountains in, around, or cutting through it.

One of the best parts about the mountains in Monterrey is that there’s a great big gorgeous national park, Chipinque, that encompasses a large portion of one of the ranges. The entrance fee is subsidized by the government so it’s super cheap ($20 pesos for pedestrians, about $1.65). I spent a gorgeous Sunday there with my fellow TDY-er and we had a great time hiking and taking in the scenery. After we hiked up the mountain about 2 miles, we got to the top of one of the peaks where there’s a visitor center, a small restaurant, and an amphitheater where they program children’s events. That afternoon, apparently what seemed like half of Monterrey was there with their families picnicking and enjoying nature.

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Monterrey is also home to a bunch of fantastic museums, including Horno3, a science museum that used to be an old blast furnace back when Monterrey was a steel town. The museum is located in the middle of what used to be a huge foundry but is now a big park full of museums, public art, a great big arena, and a convention center. The main exhibit at Horno3 is definitely more geared toward a younger audience, but being kind of a museum nerd, I LOVED every second of it. The other great part about the museum is that you can take a cable car up the outside slope of one of the walls to a catwalk that covers the whole length of the museum. It was a perfect place to get a 360 degree view of the city and an even better place to watch the sun go down. They actually keep the cable car open after hours so you can walk the catwalk at night. I didn’t get to do the night tour, but it’s on my list for a future trip to Monterrey.

 

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I know bidding is upon us, and Monterrey is on the list. It’s still a no-EFM-under-21 post, but for outdoorsy people who enjoy city life, I think it would be a great post, and someday when I come back to Mexico, Monterrey will be one of my top choices.

A tragic end; a joyous beginning

Tags

Family, Foreign Service, Goodbye, RIP

On April 20, one of my colleagues from the Consulate was murdered.

It’s taken me a long time to be able to process, and I’m still kind of trying to wrap my head around it. Victor was one of the guys on the maintenance staff at the Consulate. He worked on the team that does all the maintenance in the homes of officers, so most of us knew him well. Actually, he was in our house the week before he died, fixing our struggling air conditioner and testing our iodine filter.

2 weeks ago today, Victor was at a children’s party in his neighborhood with his wife and kids. Mid-party, a group of gunmen burst into the house and demanded to see one of the men who was attending the party. Victor tried to diffuse the situation by talking calmly to the gunmen but they weren’t having it and they shot him, in cold blood, in front of his wife and at least one of his 4 children. According to news reports he died at the scene along with 2 other men who were attending the party. I don’t know anything about the other men who died that night–who they were, or what they were involved in–but I know that Victor was a law-abiding, brave, dedicated man and I don’t and probably will never understand what could possibly have been so important that it was necessary or worth it to take his life. It just doesn’t make any sense.

The Consulate had a memorial service for Victor the last Friday in April. In addition to memorializing Victor, speaking of his kindness, his valor, and his dedication to his work and family, the Consulate presented his wife and children with the generous donations that had been collected in the preceding week. Funds are still being collected, as the family not only has to pay for Victor’s funeral and all the costs surrounding that, but they now are without a primary breadwinner and all of his 4 children are still in school.**

 

We missed Victor’s memorial service because we were on the east coast celebrating the marriage of one of my husband’s cousins. It was a gorgeous wedding ceremony: sunny skies, sparkling water, bright pink flowers, beautiful vows, and lots and lots of love. While I wish we could have been present at Victor’s memorial service, it was heartening to get to watch the happy couple say their vows,  exchange rings, and start their new life together. I wish them a long and happy life together and I pray that they won’t ever have to go through the heartache and grief that Victor’s family is experiencing.

Life is fragile and precious. Don’t take it for granted.

**If you’re interested in donating to Victor’s family, please email me at the address found in my About section and I’ll tell you how.

Another goodbye

Tags

RIP

I didn’t know Anne Smedinghoff, but I could have. She could have been any one of my coworkers. She could have been me.

I had another blog post about my trip to Monterrey all written up and ready to post, but it seems crass to skip over something that illustrates one of the worst, scariest parts of the Foreign Service to post about one of the best, most fun parts. This job has its perks, and I am happy to be able to get to benefit from them, but there are sacrifices involved in this job. Huge sacrifices. We sacrifice being close to our families, attending birthdays, weddings, and graduations. We sacrifice being close to our friends and being involved in their everyday lives. We sacrifice being able to stay together with our own spouses, partners, and children. And sometimes we sacrifice our lives.

Anne’s death should not be skipped over. To allow her to become another war statistic betrays what we stand for. She is not a statistic. She was a friend. She was a daughter. She was a diplomat. She was a patriot. And she died trying to deliver books to children in a foreign land because that’s what she believed in. Because she wanted to make the world a better place. Because she loved her country.

Rest in peace, Anne. Rest in peace.

Santa Fe

Last month I turned 29. My birthday usually falls sometime near Presidents’ Day so I often get to celebrate with a three day weekend. This year proved no exception and I got to spend my birthday in Santa Fe, a place I’ve wanted to go she I was a kid.

We drove up on Friday night right after work and got to the hotel around 10:30. My awesome husband booked us in a swanky-ish bed and breakfast so we were greeted in our room by a cozy fire, warm, fluffy robes and a big comfy bed. The hotel was walking distance from the main square in town so we planned a whirlwind weekend of walking and window-shopping.

Saturday morning we walked to a donut shop I had heard about from a fellow blogger (hi cakespy!) where I ate one of the most interesting and tasty donuts I’ve ever heard of: blue corn, posole, blueberry donut with lavender glaze. It. Was. Incredible. After enjoying our donuts and some yummy locally roasted coffee, we headed to get real breakfast, at above cakespy recommended restaurant: Tecolote Cafe. Those of you who know me in real life will not at all be surprised by the fact that I ate what equates to 2 breakfasts on my birthday. I effing love breakfast. It is hands down the best meal of the day, even if you do (normally) have I get out of bed to enjoy it.

Second breakfast was delicious and put me in a great mood for window shopping and church touring. Mid-afternoon we met up with some other CJers who happened to be in town and enjoyed some microbrewery beer and people watching from a rooftop bar overlooking the square. After a drinks, my husband and I headed back to the hotel to relax a bit and so I could play with my totally awesome birthday present, the shiny, new iPad I’m typing this post on. I have wanted an iPad for such a long time and I was completely shocked when I opened up the package. I had no idea may husband liked me that much. After a couple of hours of reading the news, playing games, and figuring out settings, we got all fancied up and went to dinner at Cafe Pasqual’s. Dinner was incredible and I couldn’t have asked for a better birthday.

The next 2 days we spent going to museums and just enjoying being able to walk around outside. We ate good food, drank good wine, listened to great music, and all in all had one of the best vacations I think we’ve ever had.

Here are some pictures I took while we were there:

Winston Alexander

Tags

Family, Life

I haven’t posted in what feels like forever. So much has happened since my last update that I sort of don’t know where to start, but I think that for now I’ll start at the end and work my way back. I will blog about my birthday, the awesome, awesome gift I got from my husband, our trip to Santa Fe, and my CJ birthday party in the coming days and weeks, but first I need to tell you all about Winston. 

When I found out last fall that my eldest brother and his wife were expecting their first child, my first niece-or-nephew, I was over the moon. I immediately started window shopping to find the perfect welcome-to-the-world gift for the little guy or gal. I think my husband initially thought I was crazy, but I know he started to get really excited about it too as time pressed on.

My husband can tell you that I’m a really vivid dreamer, that I almost always remember my dreams and the people in them in great detail.  Sometime in mid-December, way before the doctors were able to tell them the sex of their baby, I had a dream about him. We were at some kind of a zoo or public park, and my whole family was there. It was cold, so we all had winter coats and scarves on. I was sitting at a picnic table when my sister-in-law walked up with my brother, who was holding their little boy. He was about 3 years old in my dream, old enough to talk a little but not so old that he really understood much about what was going on around him. He had on a dark blue coat, black rubber rain boots, and was carrying a red balloon. The wind had blown his little hood off, and I could see that he had dark, thick hair and big, blue eyes. He was beautiful. I don’t remember anything else about the dream, just that he was there, and perfect, and we were all so happy. I didn’t tell my brother about my dream until he started polling my siblings in early January, the day before the got the ultrasound that would tell them their baby’s sex. He said he had been thinking it was a girl, but I told him that I was sure it was a boy, and that I had seen him in a dream.

I was right that it was a boy. But I was wrong that it had been him I saw in my dream. Last week on Tuesday, I missed a call and a text message from my brother mid-morning. He’s usually pretty savvy about my interviewing schedule, so I knew something was up, but I was in the middle of a crazy day at work training a new officer, interviewing in front of a Congressional visitor, and prepping to pick up my sponsee the next day to welcome her to Juarez, so there was no way I could step off the line to call him back right then. At lunch I called him from the car on the way home, and as soon as he picked up the phone I knew something was wrong.

At 26 weeks–6.5 months–the baby had died. And because she was so far along in the pregnancy, my sister-in-law would have to be induced into labor to deliver him. It was a long couple of days and on February 15 and 12:28 a.m., my perfect, darling nephew, Winston Alexander, was born still. Over the weekend, I kept in touch with my brother as they made arrangements and grieved for their lost son. On Monday, when we got back from Santa Fe, we booked plane tickets so we could attend the Friday evening funeral service.

It was the saddest thing I have ever witnessed. I don’t really know how we all made it through. I played a piano solo, a last-minute arrangement of one of my brother’s favorite hymns, and I accompanied a friend of theirs who sang this song. My brother spoke, and I honestly don’t know how he held it together, but he did, and the service was really beautiful.

My heart is completely broken for my brother, his wife, and our family, but I am so grateful that we were able to be there for them this weekend.  I don’t know if we’d have been able to find tickets last minute that were even in the realm of affordable if we hadn’t been serving in Juarez.  I know that I sometimes complain about CJ and about the weather here, and the dust, and my job. But today, I am grateful that we were posted here. I’m grateful that my bosses were kind enough to let me take Friday off to attend the funeral. I’m grateful that my husband was awake enough to direct me through the Philadelphia Airport on Friday at 6 a.m. after a red-eye from Phoenix to catch our 3rd and final flight to western NY. And last, but never least, I’m grateful for little Winston, even though I didn’t get to meet him, or watch Star Wars with him, or feed him oodles of candy on Halloween, or a million other things.

Goodbye, little guy. We love you.

Marfa

Tags

Relaxation, Travel

Right after work on Friday I got into a friend’s car and headed the 3-ish hours away to Marfa, TX. Famous for the Marfa lights, Marfa now serves mostly as an art enclave and tourist attraction for diplomats like us. 7 girls in total from work went on the trip, and we had a blast. There was shopping. There were late-night grilled cheese sandwiches from an incredibly weird little cafe. There was karaoke. And, deliciously, there were Girl Scout Cookies.

I didn’t take a ton of pictures, but here are a few that I snapped over the course of the weekend:

Big news!

Tags

Foreign Service, Travel, Washington

Big news, people! BIG NEWS. Last week, my husband flew back to DC to take the Foreign Service oral assessment (aka the last exam-related step on the road to becoming an FSO) and HE PASSED!! Hooray! I am so proud of him I could burst and I’m really excited for him to finally be able to realize his long-time dream of becoming a diplomat. He’s actually the one who convinced me to take the exam back when we were in graduate school. He had taken the written exam a couple of times by that point so he was invaluable in helping me to prepare for the exam. When we took the orals around the same time back in 2011 and I passed and he didn’t, I think I might have been more shocked than he was because he seemed (and continues to seem) infinitely more qualified for this job than I am. He’s done a lot of really interesting things since then, and I knew going into it this time around that he was going to blow it out of the water.

Since his exam was on Thursday and he wanted to have a couple of days to get used to the time change (the exam starts at 7 a.m.), he flew back east on Tuesday. I stayed here in Juarez and took a mid-day flight on Thursday. All morning I was on pins and needles waiting to hear if he had passed. He called me while I was picking up some dinner during my connection in Dallas and I actually shrieked out loud in the line at the restaurant. I couldn’t wait to get to DC to give him a giant hug and a kiss. We spent the weekend celebrating and visiting a bunch of our friends. There was much brunching, nerdy board and card games, and some really awesome friend reunions. It was fabulous.

For extra fun, on Monday we went to Inauguration. We didn’t have tickets so we just walked to the Mall and found a good spot near a jumbotron. It was cold. My feet were freezing by the time the ceremony was over, but even though I was shivering and starting to get cranky, I’m so so so glad that we went. I really felt like we got to see the completion of something awesome. We were in graduate school back in 2008, and were living on the south side of Chicago. We waited in line for more than 3 hours to cast our votes that year, and on November 4 we sat in Grant Park with 250,000 people and watched history unfold. We weren’t able to be at the 2009 inauguration because of school schedules etc, so it was really special to be able to be there this time.

Now we’re back in Juarez and are preparing to embark, yet again, on the wonderful journey of medical and security clearances. It’s going to involve a lot of patience, tons of paperwork, and probably at least 2 trips to medical facilities, but I’m pumped to get started and to finally become tandem FSOs!

Long week

Tags

Foreign Service, Goodbye

It’s been a long week, even though I took Monday off and Wednesday was an administrative day so we didn’t have any interviews.  The first week after any vacation is always kind of hard, but I wasn’t expecting it to hit me quite as hard as this. I am definitely happy to be home, but it’s been a uphill battle this week to say the least. I’m glad it’s the weekend.

We did do some fun things this week, however.  Sunday evening we went to a great Orthodox Christmas party with no less than 40 of our closest friends and colleagues here.  It really was a hell of a party, and I’m incredibly impressed that the 2 officers who planned the event were able to do so in such a big way with relatively little time to prepare.  I’m pretty sure everyone’s new year’s resolutions regarding diet were completely thrown to the wind due to the copious amounts of homemade perogies, potato pancakes, and poppy seed roll we all consumed.  Later that night we watched the Season 3 premier of Downton Abbey with a newly arrived officer who was still without TV in her house.

On Tuesday night, after what seems like an eternity, we were happily reunited with some of our good friends here who, for various reasons, we hadn’t really hung out with since before Thanksgiving. I made bacon, white bean, and spinach mini-pot pies and we just sat around drinking green chile wine and talking. I’ve really missed hanging out with them so it was really nice to just have a chill night at home to catch up with them.

 

Today at work I said goodbye to three of my favorite officers at post, all of whom are moving on to some seriously incredible 2nd tours (Turkey? Denmark? Mozambique? Yes, please!).  While I am utterly thrilled for them and can’t wait to hear all about their next adventures, saying goodbye was sad. Like, really sad. Officers have been coming and going pretty steadily since we got here but today was the first time officers that I got really close to have left and I’m still not sure how work is going to go on without them. Seeing their empty desks as I left the office today was just crazy. I guess I need to get used to it though, because this is pretty much going to be the way it is from here on out and it’s only going to get harder.

I’m already counting down till we reunite.

I’m back!

Tags

Travel

We’re back from an amazing week-long vacation in the Yucatan. We woke up this morning at 3:15 to finish packing and get to the airport for our 6 a.m. flight out of Cancun and we arrived in Juarez mid-morning to about 3 inches of mostly melted snow and a house that was FREEZING due to our hippie-energy-conserving-reduced-heat-while-on-vacation plan.  Thank god we had enough foresight to only turn the heat down to a respectable 63 degrees so our pipes didn’t freeze.

After a delightful post-holiday brunch at the home of some good friends, we came home and crashed for most of the afternoon. Now, most of the unpacking has happened, we’re sufficiently hydrated, and I’m yet again heading back to bed to sleep off the weird airplane hangover I always get when I travel, especially when I fly in the early a.m.  I feel like I’ve been completely useless today, but going to bed at 9:45 p.m. means I’ll be up bright and early tomorrow, right?  RIGHT?!?*

 

 

*Anyone who knows me in real life knows that it really doesn’t matter what time I go to bed, I don’t really like to be up before 8:30 or 9 a.m. Anything before that is just uncivilized if you ask me, which clearly is why I work an 8-5 job for an organization known for being relatively inflexible regarding work hours. Apparently I am a masochist, but I think that’s another post for another time.