Moving

I never know how to begin....hummm....we saw UP yesterday. Another movie that once again reminded me to live in my moment because life goes so fast and I don't want to end up wondering why I worried so much, or wasted so much time trying to change what is and just be in my life, embrace every movement, every minute and everything I do. It's the most difficult job for me and also such a crime to miss out on my life the way I do. With the amount of stress I put on myself and then realize the day is gone and I missed most of it.

If Im not in my moment, which is almost never, Im constantly thinking about what needs to happen next, tweak the moment that Im in, think about what needs to happen in the future and what has happened in the past. I relate this all somehow to the moment that I am in and the result is never being content or happy with the life Im leading, which, by the way, is amazing and all I have wanted for years. To be out of my crazy job, to be in love, really in love, and to have time.

I realize whenever I move I do the same thing. When I Moved from LA to San Francisco I HATED SF. For almost two years I hated it. All I wanted to do was move back to LA, which, by the way I hated by the time I left. I wanted to get out of the 365 days of summer, I wanted to get out of the dirt, the traffic and move to a beautiful city that was clean and where I did not have to drive. When I finally let go of LA I fell in love with San Francisco. But it was not easy. It was so hard to let go of my friends there, the amazing parts of LA that I loved, the craziness and insanity of it and the people that live there. I thought I would NEVER be able to make friends like the friends I had in LA. And after I let go of LA I met the most amazing people in San Francisco. Same thing happened when I left Minnesota. My group of friends there was amazing. So now...Im here...not loving the small village, the fact that I have no friends and I will never make the type of friends here that I have in SF and bla bla bla....my GOD how I let history repeat itself. Im amazed I move around as much as I do when Im so reluctant to change really. I want the change, Im so desperate for it and then I get it and I hate it and want to go back. I swear I cant stand myself sometimes :) Im exhausting.

So anyway...my point for GOD SAKE...is that it's the fact that I am never in my moment. If I were I would stop thinking about what this village and England isn't, and focus on what it is. Especially now that it's Fall. It's October, my favorite month of the year. The leaves are changing, it's getting colder, the birds are chirping, the sky is clear today and Im completely in love. I love my days. I just need to relax and shut down the mind. Meditate more and stick to my yoga.

We got up this morning to do yoga and meditate and it felt so good. Of course my meditation consisted of planning our trip to Bristol next weekend to go to H&M to get me leggings and a cute raincoat......practice ;)

The mind is amazing really. It can do all this thinking in the blink of an eye. Faster than the speed of light. It's a difficult beast to tame.

Missing the City

I miss the city. I really do. I wonder how I will do here for an extended period of time. Today Im not so sure I can make it in a small village. As long as I don't look at it like we are going to be here forever than Im okay. I can do it for a year but not sure if this is the life that I want. I like my social life, I like to have all my friends around me, I like to have the option of drinks or dinner with friends any night of the week. I miss the convenience of it and I miss San Francisco. I also miss the energy from a city and the energy that it gives me. Lights and night and tall buildings smashed together. Loads of people walking around the streets morning and evening. Just being able to get in the car and go to the ocean or the mountains.

Makes me think that Tim and I need to get out more! We do but there is also a lot to see here too. Ireland, Scotland, lot's of things right next door. Just need to plan them out. So...I guess not quite done with it here but honestly...Im not so sure Im cut out for small village living. I need the energy of the city to feed me and I need my friends around me. Anyway...3 months in..I think Im just really homesick. Im on an adventure right? This is always my problem, I think that were ever I am that is it. This is how it's going to be forever and then I feel trapped and get scared and want to get out. So..taking it easy, breathing, enjoying this experience as I DO KNOW that it will not last forever and love being here, in the beauty of this village and the life I have here and know that it's amazing in this moment.

The other thing is that I miss my girlfriends so much....because of my recent trauma even more. Going over to one of their houses, sitting on a couch in my pajamas and crying or talking or whatever. I do have some great friends here already so that is the good news. My friends Vicki and Ben and Steve and Rachel are amazing. We had a dinner party the other night and Steve was talking about my blog and Tim said, "oh, well then I guess you know about the miscarriage." And Steve just took my hand and said, "no, I have not got that far, are you okay, my God Im so sorry," and we all got to talk about it. And they are amazing. They are totally my people. So open and non judgmental and so fun and at the same time so loving and I feel really lucky to have met them so soon. Although now two of the 4 that I have made might be moving to Hong Kong so that sucks for me. Good for them though.

Anyway...maybe if I loved the home I was in. Once all the paper work is good to go with immigration and we know we can stay for a while we are going to move into a bigger place with some more character. Once that happens that will help too. I need to love the place I live in. Im a cancer....as social as I am I also love to hibernate in my home and create projects for myself. All and all just unsettled, homesick and it's cold and grey here today so whaaaa....being a big baby really.

Okay..got to run. Just wanted to complain about how horrible my amazing life is.

Time

Time..it can be an angel or a devil depending on your mind set.

I guess it will take some time for me to slow down. I just realized how fast I was going this afternoon for no reason. I wake up to a tight stomach and the heavy burden that there is something, a million things that I must be doing right now and they all need to happen right now.

I guess it’s years of production and not slowing down and now...I have no idea how to. Im beginning to think it’s a part of my genetic make up. Yesterday I was in bed writing most of the morning, got up, dyed my hair and started on dinner. So really I did not do much of anything but the entire day that FEELING..that tightness in my stomach was there, getting tighter and tighter so I just forced myself to relax, to say in bed, to write and to just lye there and feel it. It didn’t go away. I woke up with it again today and started working on the list of things in my head that I need to accomplish by the days end.

Then, as I was reading my macrobiotic cook books and making yummy macrobiotic vegan cornbread at the speed of light, I realized what is my rush? Why not breathe with every movement, go as slow as I can, relish everything Im putting into this cornbread, think about each ingredient, where it came from, what it will do to my body and Tim’s body when we eat it and put some calm and some love into this cornbread. And it’s working. I look at that cornbread on the counter cooling and it relaxes me. I ate a piece and it calmed my nerves. Which then reminded me that if you love whatever it is your doing and put love into it, it will be amazing and with food, it can be healing and healing to others.

I was watching this cooking show a while back. It was a show with this woman and her husband. They were from the south and were cooking everything I would NEVER. Eggs, buttermilk, more butter and than heavy cream with bacon and lard and bacon grease on top of biscuits and they were laughing, telling stories, loving one another while they were cooking it and I thought, I bet who ever eats that food is going to be IN LOVE by the time they finish. For me it’s macrobiotics but it can be anything, any food that you enjoy or it can be a job or a scarf your knitting for someone or whatever. If we do it with love, if we give ourselves time to think about it and enjoy it, we could heal the planet. If all that we consumed had the energy of calm, of serenity and of love...we would feel it. Anyway..off on a new age tangent.

But I was reminded of a few of things.

• I have been cooking macro / vegan full on for 2 days now and I already am starting to feel more grounded and forgot how much I truly LOVE to cook in this way so really need to make the macrobiotic school happen in December

• That I may just be a nervous person and as much as I try to fight it the worse it gets. Not sure how I can heal myself from that but Im going to try. Yoga, meditation and moving to small village in England is a start.
• Coffee is bad for me
• Do things slow and with thought and rushing is a waste of time.
• Embrace where I am, where my body is, love myself in this moment and stop trying to constantly tweak myself into this person I think Im suppose to be. I think Im suppose to be all macro and healed and healing the planet and calm and serene. I already am who Im suppose to be and doing exactly what Im suppose do be doing right now.

• Cherish where Im at right now as it will change.

• I dont need to give myself a project. I can just be for once.

So anyway...I’ve got the afternoon to do nothing. Im going to take a nap, eat some lunch, food shop on line and read my books. Attempt to enjoy it all on this grey English day and take it easy on myself.

A longie

There are bugs everywhere in this flat. I refuse to kill any of them as I wont even kill an ant but will let them gently out of the house if they are big and scare me. In every corner of this place there is a spider about to feed on what to him is a delicious meal,or a moth stuck to the side of a lamp curtain just waiting for me to turn the light on like a dog waiting for you to throw a bone. To me, killing a bug is like killing a cow, and killing a cow is the same as killing anything else so I just don’t kill anything. Unless of course, it’s by absolute mistake. Like when I suck up dead bugs with my hoover and accidently a live fly gets slaughtered in the process. I seriously want to open up the bag and let him out. I guess if I accidently sucked up a cow or cat into a hoover bag I might be inclined to let them out..so...there is a food chain in my mad process but still...I just try not to kill anything. Thus, loads of bugs in my house at the moment. Evidently all trying to survive the English autumn by taking refuge in our flat. I like to think of us as a “safe house” for all bugs. Any race, color or creed. All RIGHT then...enough of that before you think I’ve all lost my mind living in this small village.

So..I’ve been debating weather or not to write about this as it’s pretty personal but then again my blog is pretty personal and big part of the reason I write this blog is so that I do not internalize my thoughts and emotions and feelings like I tend to do. It’s an exercise for me in not worrying about what anyone else thinks, what is right or wrong and to just write. Thinking that this blog is meant for another purpose as it already has proven. It went from keeping in touch with my friends and telling my journeys to what it is today. It has opened me up even more than I already was and keeping me honest with my likes and dislikes, weaknesses and strengths, and most of all teaching me I truly don’t understand why myself or anyone cares if they are right or wrong? Seems like such a waste of time. Or to even care what anyone does with their lives. We are all just a witness to this life anyway so why not just be full of love and support and stay open rather than closed. Support rather than judge. Either way its a place for me to say fuck it. Who cares what I am like? Im sick of keeping it all in to make myself comfortable. Of doing the “right” thing, of not speaking my truth all the time and of just not being 100% myself. All of which I’ve had a problem with in the past and all of which Im so tired of. Im exhausted of the filter that I have always put on my mouth, which then leads to a filter on my mind and all of a sudden Im closed minded and think that if someone does not believe what I do, think like I do, behave like I behave then I need to what? Tell them how to do it? Not be their friend? Why? Because Im scared and close minded? Scared I might be wrong? Or doing life wrong? So..this is what my blog has morfed into. Me keeping myself honest and open and fearless. Even though it’s scary, its something Im walking through and trying to be fearless with. I once read, in one of my countless self help / spiritual / eastern philosophy books, “the more I learn I realize I know nothing.” I read that years ago and thought, “well then why in the hell am I reading this? I want to know SOMETHING!!” And now finally, years later understand the true freedom in realizing I know absolutely nothing, Im right about nothing and my views on life are strictly my own and would never preach them to anyone because Im sure they are not right. It’s absolute relief and absolute freedom to know that. I get to stay open and have no opinions on others lives and so I can enjoy everyone and all views on life without judgment. It’s so much for fun this way although alot more confusing and scary times....

So to the thing I was debating writing about and instead have been stalling and babbling....

I had a miscarriage on Friday. I only KNEW I was pregnant for about 2-3 days but was probably pregnant for about 2 weeks. It’s strange. In my head when I think about it my brain says abortion rather than miscarriage. I wonder why? Part of me thinks it might be my fault? I was wearing the nicotine patch every day, I was drinking wine, not to excess but was drinking, I drank coffee every morning. So did I abort my baby? Then I think well fuck that, Courtney Love shot heroin throughout her entire pregnancy and her kid is just fine, I know lots of women who drink and smoke through their entire pregnancy and they have healthy babies. Just look at the 70’s. Our Mothers were popping pills and smoking and breast feeding. Not saying I would do ANY of that but just saying that maybe....I did not kill my baby. On the day I really KNEW I was pregnant It hit me and there was just this intuitive feeling that I knew I was pregnant. Besides all the other signs, like my boobs were huge and sore, I was bloated like I’ve never been, I was tired, my brain was not working right, and I found myself for the last week every day at about 2pm standing over a cake counter in broad daylight devouring a large piece of non vegan chocolate cake like I had not eaten in a month. So the signs were there but it takes while for your brain to register. I kept thinking, “Im just off because Im not a vegan anymore, because I moved 3 months ago and left my friends, my financial security, my country and moved to a small village where I know absolutely no one except for my boyfriend who I have only known for 7 months.” So I was bound to be stressed out and my body was just reacting to the stress of change. I have never, in my 22 years of being sexually active, ever been pregnant so had no idea what it felt like.

I woke up on Friday and was spotting and decided I better take a pregnancy test just to confirm what I already knew. I got up, biked to the pharmacy and took the test. Which said not pregnant. Then my spotting turned into full on bleeding and within about 3 hours I had my miscarriage. I don’t need to go into the details but I knew what it was. Mostly because the second that it happened I started sobbing uncontrollably. Like I knew I had lost something. I can’t really compare it to when my Mom died but it was the same type of feeling. When I got the phone call that she was on life support but not dead yet, I knew she was dead and the sobbing leapt out of my body before I even had time to feel it. It was just a knowing. This was the same thing.

So I know I was only pregnant for 2 weeks but it’s traumatic. The entire time I was pregnant I kept thinking about our baby, about being a Mother, about having a family, about how much I wanted it and how I have never wanted it in my life but for some reason lately, since I met Tim really, I have wanted a baby. That I have been looking for this thing that is missing and it’s our baby. I guess I always knew when I met “the one” that I would want a baby but I would not want one a minute before then. And I didn’t, and now I do. But it’s strange. Now that Im not pregnant anymore Im okay if we do not have a baby. That feeling of wanting a baby has faded a bit. We both want a baby. Now might not be the right time because we have so much to sort out and still have not heard from immigration yet so who knows where we will be in a few months AND (deep breath) our entire lives are up in the air and let’s just top it all off with the fact that I have no health insurance and am pretty sure the NHS is not going to support my entire pregnancy without ever paying into it or being legal in this country. I know..stupid. Ya all can tell me how stupid I am for not keeping my health insurance going in the states but it’s over 500 American dollars a month and me, who does not believe in western medicine ANYWAY (except of course when I need it when Im pregnant ;) decided not to have it since I don’t have a whole shit ton of expendable income at the moment so decided to cancel it.

SO.....the good news is, I can get pregnant, which I was starting to think I was not capable of since I’ve never had ONE pregnancy in all my years (and believe me...I was not the most careful girl on the block, especially in my 20’s). The bad news is that Im scared that I cant carry a baby and that if I do get pregnant again I will have another miscarriage.

Im trying to not let my mind get to me. To know that if we get pregnant again it will be the right time. To know that there is never a “right” time to do anything and things happen how they happen weather or not I plan them. I also know that we are both okay if we can’t have a baby. Tim and I talked about it and he just held me and told me he loves me, he wants me regardless of what my body can or can not do, and if we don’t have a baby we will just have lots of pets and will deal with life how it comes. Reason number 101 why he is “the one”.

So Im fine. Tim is fine. It’s pretty crazy what your body does so quickly when you do get pregnant and it also feels good to have my old body and mind back for the moment. Believe me I would trade it in a second if I was still pregnant though. It felt really good being pregnant as confusing as it was. I felt whole, I felt like a woman, It’s hard to explain but if your reading this and you have been pregnant before you know what I mean. It’s an amazing feeling. One I hope to feel again soon. Maybe not too soon though. If we can plan it at all, it would be nice to have all the “what ifs” in check and some health insurance handy. It also makes me realize that you don’t have to PLAN to have a baby. I always thought everything needed to be in the perfect order and it doesn’t. And I don’t want to be one of those Mommy’s anyway. I want to be a hippy Mommy. Take my kid on my back across Europe, live unconventionally, home school (KIDDING), but you know what Im saying. I want to live an abnormal life. I realize I have most of my life anyway but now I’ve finally embraced and accepted it. I dont need to have a 6 figure income to have a baby, or the right house or the right car, or the right anything. And what is right anyway? I don’t believe in right or wrong anymore anyway...right?

A quickie

Im attaching this picture that Tim took with photo booth. I woke up yesterday morning and found it on my desktop and just love it. It's taken from our living room which he has made to look like a fairy tale.

Loads to tell but have to run. Were going out of town this weekend to his parents house in Bishops Waltham which, by the way, I have difficultly pronouncing. Sounds much better with and English accent. My American accent butchers it into sounding like some hick town in the south. Im looking forward to it. I really like his family and love his sister Rachel who Im getting close with. She's another Cancer like me and so has broken in Tim quite well on how to deal with us sensitive creatures. Anyway...must run...

Relationships

Dear God I have no idea what is wrong with me. Tim is driving me crazy. He can’t do anything right. I want him to be something he is not yet even if he was that something I would find fault in that. And why? Why does this insanity happen? I swear it’s this 6-7 month mark that I have always had such a hard time moving through. Or maybe it’s something else? Maybe it’s quitting smoking? I’ve been craving a cigarette lately like you can not believe. Im still using the patches. Maybe my body chemistry is fucked up. Why then do I take it out on the person closest to me? Tim is the only person driving me crazy at the moment. Why? Is it because our partners are direct reflections of us? I read this over and over in all the “self help” relationship books but I don’t know if I believe that honestly. I feel like I think so totally different than Tim. Im inherently methodical. It works in my brain faster than the speed of light. I see something, anything, any situation or thing that needs to get done and understand immediately, without thought, exactly the order in which it’s suppose to happen and how that order will make everyone around it and in it completely comfortable and peaceful.

Just that statement alone has absolute beauty in it and a recipe for complete disaster. The thing is, I believe all women have this trait and probably why we prefer to hang out with our own tribe most occasions. Then sometimes why we drive each other mad and prefer to just have men around so there is not a bunch of control freaks in the room dictating how dinner should be served or where the furniture should go. I guess that’s where the “one woman in the kitchen” statement comes from (not saying we are all in the kitchen...I just like to use the analogy because I like to be in the kitchen). Anyway...it makes it hard for me to understand then, why the men in our lives do everything the exact opposite and completely backwards way from us? And so we, meaning me, as Im not going to put all my ladies in my insane category, get frustrated because I cant then, understand why all the men in my life, Tim being my most recent victim, does not do it the way I would. It is why I love hanging out with my girlfriends. No thought is involved. It’s just a natural flow. So I guess that is it. I have not had to move through this in a really long time. I’ve been alone for over 3 years and that’s the easy part about being alone. You only have yourself to deal with. The hard part is you then only have yourself to blame, which then, has constantly sent me into a world of therapy, self obsession, and self help books constantly trying to heal this obsessive, controlling mind I have but then I realize, being in a relationship, no matter how much “work” I’ve done on myself, they just pop up again and are magnified regardless of all the knowledge I have. I have not put it into practice with anyone in a really long time. And lets be honest, I have not had much success in the past anyway.

Yesterday I was watching this older couple. This sweet cute old man had ordered a scone with cream and jam. I watched him, very pleased, carry his scone back to the table where he and his wife were sitting. I was smiling as I watched him sit down and then I looked at his wife who had this look of complete annoyance and anger on her face. She barked, “why on EARTH did you order a scone with CREAM!!! Where is your butter???!!” And he replied with calmness but a hint of anger and frustration, “it’s just how they serve it here.” He put his head down to eat his scone no longer with excitement but in silence and not about to enjoy it half as much as he would have about 5 seconds earlier before his wife gave him shit about the cream. I thought to myself, “I will NEVER be like that woman!!”

WELL....I am. This morning, totally annoyed with Tim because he put his wet cold hand on my forehead because he thought I was hot and thought it might feel nice to have a wet cold hand on my forehead. That made complete sense to him. If he were hot he would want a wet cold hand on his forehead but to me I got angry because I hate it when there is anything wet on me when Im dry and I have been waking up Mrs. Crabby Panties every morning for the last week for no apparent reason other than my body chemistry is a bit off so I take it out on Tim. The one I love the most. And there I was..the old lady in the cafe.

I guess being in a relationship is a great and easy way for me not to look at myself and my own shit but focus on someone else's shit so I dont have to be wrong, or work on myself, or worst of all, feel my feelings. Im quitting smoking, Im angry, I dont want to feel the anger inside of me and need to get it out so I bark at Tim rather than deal with it on on my own, know it’s about me, and has nothing to do with him. I also think there was of course a better way for cooling me down which did not involve the wet cold hand ;) I remember this was one of my great lessons in production. I used to say all the time, “there are a million ways to do one thing, none of them being the right way,” Of course secretly thinking my way was the right way, the most efficient way and the most cost effective way but I had to be patient so that others around me could feel empowered and not micromanaged as I had been so many times in my life. Which I know, from personal experience, creates fear and insecurity and then you end up with a bunch of scared people who cant think for themselves anymore or just give up and do it for the money and go home and bitch about their jobs. I’ve been in that place. That place of being scared, not wanting to do something fearing someone will think I did it wrong, re-do my work and in turn, I stopped thinking for myself and just become a drone when I worked for that person. So when I became a producer and had a crew I vowed never to treat anyone poorly like I had been in the past. Same rules apply in relationships. It’s just easier to do it with co-workers. You don’t have to live with them or have a personal attachment to how they do things because your not thinking in the FOREVER terms with them like you are with your partner.

So Tim’s way may not make sense to me, may never make sense to me and may never be the way I would do things but that does not mean I have to do anything about it or manipulate it into making it into my way. It’s my lesson. To remember not to take it personally and to constantly take a deep breath, count to 10, think about my words, then speak. The wet hand on the forehead..I want to take personally. I want to, and did. I bitched at him that IM not the one that wants the cold wet hand on my forehead, that is what HE wants and he needs to KNOW what I want. Granted...I need to tell him in a loving way what my needs are but I don’t need to get pissed off at him that he does not know what I like and do not like or that he forgets what I like and do not like. That’s just who he is and I love him for who he is and thank GOD he is not like me otherwise it would be a house hold of nervous worrying neurotic energy tweaking everything constantly and trying to make it the way I want it, which is of course perfect.

I apologized to him for being a biznatch this morning. He just gave me a big hug, held me for a moment and kissed the top of my head and said, “I love my little grumparilla in the morning.” and left for work. That is the beauty of Tim. He lets everything role off him and doesn't take anything personally or even think about it. He hangs onto nothing. He is this natural yogi. Pretty much at peace, content and happy with everything. He’s not bothered by much and over thinks nothing. He’s my exact opposite and more like the person I have been trying to become and hope to be some day. It’s why I do and have done all this yoga, meditation and therapy over the years. Just to be at peace and be happy with what is...in this moment.

Another lesson, and one I know, but have to put into practice over and over and over again and do it until it becomes a part of me. And probably relearn it over and over again.

“They” do say...a relationship is your best practice and where you learn the most about yourself.

Lost in the Forest

Last night Tim and I committed to getting up every morning at 5:45 and doing yoga together for the next 40 days. It’s typical in Kundalini yoga for you commit to a 40 day set. Basically the theory is that if you do something for 40 days it becomes a habit. So...hopefully it will become a habit. I’ve got so far away from my practice. I know that I’ve always been freezing or boiling with no in-between. In the past if I was doing yoga, I was a vegan, I was a macrobiotic, I never drank and never smoked and got my 8 hours of sleep and was a good person who helped old ladies cross the street. If I was NOT doing yoga I was drinking, smoking, using alot of western medicine for any ailment and popping any pill I could get my hands on and eating cheese and butter. So...I’d like to try the in-between and I think I might actually be at a place in my life where I can do it. Not because Im forcing myself to but because it’s where Im at. I am going back to being a vegan though. I just feel better. Im sure I’ll eat the occasional dairy product so I don’t have to starve if that is my only option, but for the most part just stop eating all the crap and doing yoga. Besides I have to get myself ready for macrobiotic school. Which actually will probably put me over the deep end again. Whatever. Can’t fight nature.

The good thing is that I have a man in my life who wants to get up and do yoga with me. And Kundalini yoga at that. Its not your average yoga and a little freaky. So I feel really blessed about that. It’s something I have always wanted but have never been attracted to the yogi men so thought I would just end up doing in on my own. Anyway...what else

Getting a nice social life again which is so important to me. Spent Tuesday night at the Cafe with my new friend Vicki making Apple chutney and telling each other our lives stories. Then on Saturday, Tim and I went out with our friends Steve and Rachel. They came up from Bristol and we did the Wrington pub crawl. Wrington is the village we live in. The village has one gas station, one very small market with vegetables and some organic products, another market that rents movies and sells smut magazines and booze, a florist, a hair dresser that does manny petties for 50 pounds (like 80 american dollars - girl has lost her little English MIND charging that much) and two pubs. So...We started at the Plow which is pronounced Plow but spelt differently and I can’t remember how, and ate a horrible dinner there, ten we went to the Lion where everyone in the village goes. There was an English man dressed as Elvis singing songs Karaoke style and he even brought his own mini light show. So I was pretty excited about that. Because everyone lives so far from one another if you go out with someone you spend the night at their house so that is fun as well. Then we got up and brought them to the car boot sale where we bought a bunch of garbage and ate deep fried veggie burgers and drank cokes. They are so much fun and Im so so so happy that we are making friends.

From there we came home, took a nap then Tim decided that he really wanted to take me on this hike he has been talking about. I agreed but it was already about 6pm. We took a flash light “just in case” we were walking part of the way in the dark. All of this sort of went against my better judgement as I thought it was a little late to be going on a “hike” but decided to not be complainer and just go with it. As we walked, and walked, and hiked and the sun was going down more and more, I said to Tim it was probably not the best idea for us to be walking in the forest at night and I actually did not have really any interest in that at all and how much further was it before we got to the cliff where there is this great look out he is talking about. He said we would be fine, it would be an adventure and it was only about 15 more minutes and then if we wanted to we could walk along the main road on the way back. I was doing my best to erase all the horror films in my head where the couple goes on an innocent nature adventure totally ill prepared and gets slaughtered by the in-bred family living in the trees, but only after torturing us for days on end. As the sun started to set and it started to get dark Tim started walking faster and faster, taking us now off the main trail (another recipe for absolute slaughter) to cut through the forest to get to where we needed to go. Finally I yelled, “are we lost??” and he said, “well, I think I know where we are, I think it’s just over there.” Well...let’s just say, we got off the path, got lost, and finally Tim turned back to me and said, “I have no clue where we are and Im scared.” My immediate thought was, “the only thing you have to be scared of is me at the moment.” But I did not say that, I kicked myself for not listening to my intuition and my judgement, which officially I’ve decided is much better than Tim’s :) and took a deep breath and said, “it will be just fine honey, we have a flashlight and this forest isn’t that big, we will find our way back.” We held hands and started walking really fast though the forest, found a trail and eventually, after hiking through the dark forest in the pitch black, found our way out of it. So...3 hours later we were home..Enough said. Though we did look on Google maps satellite view when we got home and that forest is huge and we were lucky not to have gotten completely lost. The good think about England is that there are not wild animals here like there are in the states. I guess the bears and wild cats never made their way over to this island so that gave me some peace, though Im not so sure about the in-bred families.

We got a letter from immigration saying that they received our paper work and not to leave the country....which we can’t do anyway since they have our passports. Bit of a nail bitter......Everyone send some good energy our way. We should hear back soon.