Just Thee More Days (I hope)

Wow, that was strange. I was just typing away at this blog 15 minutes ago, and the power went out. The water went out too, i guess they are connected. Well, here i go again. I'm going to have to save a bit more often now, i think. I just reread my last entry and, i just have to tell you, i'm fully aware of how terrible my writing is. So many typos and clunky sentences. Heck, i'm even too lazy to capitalize my "i"s. I guess you'll just have to get over it. Its always been my full intention to rewrite story of this entire trip when i get home, from a more holistic perspective, rather than just as a list of things we did or endured. But that would require some amount of thinking, which is way beyond me in my current satate of perpetual exhustion and heatstroke. Not too much has happened since i last wrote, well, actually, nothign has happened. but since i have absolutely nothign to do right now other than type, you're going to get teh details of the last 12 hours, whether you want them or not.

After we got home from our awesome dinner (it was so much fun that i hardly noticed sweating the entire time i ate) we hung out in the office, which doubles as a social area. Our actual beds are .7km down the road. Very strange setup. Oh, one more thing i want to tell you about the meal. We paid just 50Luv for the entire meal, including tax and a good tip, which might be about $40. Considering how much we ate and drank, and how nice the place was, i wouldn't be surprised to pay $100 to $200 for teh same sort of meal in the US. I wouldn't go so far as to say Romania and Bulgaria are super cheap for Americans, but the converted dollar goes so, so much farther than it does in Greece. We missed the bargins in Greece by about 15 to 20 years. Oh well. So, what was a saying? Oh, yes, i was relaxing and sweating on this bench with a thin padding on it, waiting for my chance to blog, which i got. Eventually i got my spot back. I'm not sure where Cameron was this entire time. I think i thought he was outside like he was once before. I just kept waiting for him to return because he has teh only key to our room, and knocking would do no good, because you have to unloce two solid steel doors before you can even get close to teh bedrooms. There is simply no other way in other than with key. (Boy do i miss my cell phone, i think many of you have forgotten how reliant you've become on it). I just keep waiting and waiting for him to get back, because i simply can't go to bed with out the. We got back around 8:30, and i had been waiting, bloging, talking, and resting until about 10:30. The next think i know after that is waking up and checking my watch. 4:30AM. I had fallen asleep, and everyone just left me alone, possibly thinking that i had passed out or something. My back hurt terribly from sleeping on something that was not much better than the floor. Not that the beds are so great here, but they were much better than this bench i was on. I had a terrible taste in my mouth, my teeth felt fuzzy for lack of brushing, i despertly wanted a shower, but everything i owned or could use was locked away in another building far away. What could i do? I simply waited, and waited, and waited, until they served breadfast at 8:30. Even though we've only been here for two days, i feel like i've gotten to know the workers and guests here better than anywhere else, and it feels like i'm been here for weeks. I think the passage of time as lost all meaning for me. Breakfast was actually pretty nice. We all felt like we knew each other, and had some very nice conversations about everything under the sun. After that, i just started writing this, waiting for Cameron to wake up. I don't know how he can sleep so late in this heat. If i fall asleep, as soon as i wake up, i'm just too uncomfortabe to fall back asleep. There's actually a guy still sleeping in this room, despite the terrible racket i'm making with this crazy noisy keyboard with sticky keys. We're supposed to check out within the next 20 minutes, but i can't do anything or go anywhere until Cameron eventually saunters in.

Amy told me in her last email that she sees the value of couples spending some time apart to see how they really feel about each other. I think we both knew that before i left, considering how much we missed each other when she went to Utah or DC for work. Even one night apart was something to deal wiht. But this near month apart remind me of fasting. It's like i'm denying my body food for a week to completely purge all the toxins and everything from it. But in this case, i'm purging all the little negative aspects of our relationship. I can't help but think of some of the stupid and insignifcant things we fought over our last year together and, even though they were all water under the bridge just hours or days later, this month has put it all in a new perspective for me. I'll be the first to admit that i'm a pretty emotional guy, and i can get worked up over some things sometimes more than i should. In many ways, my wife can be much more level-headed then myself. When we don't react the same way to certain situations, i sometimes found myself getting frustrated and worked up. And yes, i understood the errors of my ways soon after teh situations themselves, but this is different. It's much more powerful. I can examin everything from afar, all at once, all together, and the effect it's having on me is massive. This adventure might have gone overbudget, things went wrong, the terribly hot sun knocked the life out of me on so many occasions, and many times did i wonder why i did this to myself at all. Why spend so much money to suffer so often? But despite all the wonderful things i saw and experienced, perhaps the single greatest aspect of this whole ordeal is that it will make me a better husband for years to come. And i know what Amy is thinking right now, and what she would write back to me with, "but honey, you are a wonderful husband already." Yes, thank you. She will think that and write that because she is such a great wife. But i know myself pretty well by this point in my life, and i know i have it in me, after this adventure, to simply be a better husband than i was before, however i was before.

Ok, that was probably all to personal to publish in a public blog. Maybe it's my heatstroke typing, or maybe it's the fact that i think Amy and maybe two other people are the only ones who read this at all, but i think it's important that i "publically" hold myself accountable to a higher standard. I know my mom would go crazy if she knew i wrote such personal stuff in a blog, as she is such a private person, but considering she could no sooner access a blog as as she would stay in a hostel on Bulgaria, i think i'm safe. (And if you read this and know her, don't mention it, OK?) In fact, my mom is "reading" this through Amy, and i believe she does a pretty good job giving her the version of my adventures that my mom wants to hear. Oh, how i love my family.

It's a good think that Cameron finally returned (he says he thought i had my own key. OK, that's reasonable), because i think i might be able to go on darn near forever at the rate i'm going. That's it. Next stop: Varna. Our last city, YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!