Friday the 13th

I arrived safe and sound on Tuesday, having sat next to an executive director for a Zurich bank and watched The Devil Wears Prada and The Fugitive on the plane over.

It was a whirwind of everyone arriving; clothes being fitted, brunches, staying up until the wee hours talking - and those things unique to visiting your home country for five days: swapping out Birks and Tevas for Adidas and Danskos, realizing you've forgotten how to use a mobile phone, jet lag, etc.

Abby's boyfriend, Ben Rasmussen, did the photographs. He took about 1,000 and he doesn't even like portraiture. If we could all do the thing we hate so well, this world would be a different place. At the time of press, this computer is rejecting the massive images, so the fact that this is the only one I've managed to load does not mean I think this picture best represents what happened on Friday evening. Tara was stunning, they had 14 people stand with them, 11 grandparents, proud parents, lots of love, deepest promises, a good party.

I'll be back in Rome on Monday. I don't wonder that I'll have some tears tomorrow afternoon as I leave Sioux Falls. Before, I was saying goodbye for three months, now it's until next August or so. Part of me is arguing that I don't have to get back on the plane, but the other part knows I've set my sights on Jerusalem (and Istanbul and Nalchik and Nairobi and Melbourne, ad nauseam).

There is only one place I could go now that would be easy, and that is Arkansas. There I have a concentration of friends, know my way around, would be fairly well positioned to get a job, love my church, and my sister is there for another seven months. It also holds the distinction of the last place I want to settle. So back I go to do what I've set out to do. And it's not such drudgery, but I now have quite a better idea of what it means to be traveling alone than I did in July.