Christmas is coming!

Everything is hurry up and experience it for the last time. I am exhausted by the prospect of goodbyes I have no desire to make. Why can't I have here and home all together? Someone has tried to console me with thoughts of heaven and no more parting.
Last night we played volleyball with some youth group kids from Magda's church (many of whom we had met before). It was so much fun and it seemed to lighten everyone's mood in the face of preparing to leave. Volleyball made me think about how often we amuse ourselves here with free entertainment. Ping-pong, volleyball, card games, boardgames, any kind of game, walking and walking and walking. I haven't really missed all that expensive high technology in the states. Well, maybe once or twice. Makes me think twice before I spend some money, or rather I hope it will.

The other day one of the kids, Lavina, came up to me in the hall, just threw her arms around my neck and asked, "Ce face fata?" (How are you girl?) and then told me she loved me and chased some other kid down the hall. I am going to miss that. So many relationships feel like they have just begun and now are about to end.

Christmas is very different here. I have not been bombarded with it the way I usually am at home. In some ways it has left me feeling like the season isn't here and in others that it is just a quieter version. One thing that happens around here is a long fast through the Orthodox Church. Some who practice Orthodoxy don't eat meat or dairy products for several weeks before Christmas. Joel tells me it helps to demonstrate and mirror to your soul the truth and contrast of light and darkness in the coming of Jesus as a little child. There was darkness and then the earth saw a great Light! I think it is beautiful - a tradition I want to investigate more fully. Besides, he tells me that Christmas dinner is going to taste oh, so much better this way.

The Christmas lights are up and we took this picture with a timer one night after playing ping-pong. This place is a few minutes walk from the apartment where I live.

See you all soon.