It's been a week of catching up with old friends and spending time with family and good pals.

-Sunday I talked to my Gram for the first time probably since the winter. I miss her and she's even further away now that she's in Buffalo. I'll be very happy when I see her in July.

-I emailed a girl from the orphanage and she wrote back a day or two later. It was completely in Spanish which is further motivation for me to attempt to learn the language.

-One of my kids from Oakland called me. She's thirteen now and we talked mostly about cats. I feel so privliaged that children I knew at age six and seven still want to be my friend when they're all grown up teenagers.

-I love having Beth around more!

-Teresa and I took a day trip up to Erie to see our long-lost friend, Tish and her kids. We met up with her at Waldameer Park which I have always loved. It's old and tiny and perfect. Tish's son and his friend rode the same kiddie roller coaster about ten times in a row (they claimed it was a thousand) while we caught up on what was going on in each other's lives and laughed about all the silly things we did when we were younger.

-I heard from my old youth pastor. As always he had many good things to say and was his usual encouraging self.

-Tuesday was a super late mother's day dinner for our moms. We ended up also inviting our dads over as well and had a nice Rosemeyer/Chiarizio evening. We made clam sauce and had chocolate rasberry bundt cake for dessert and looked at photographs from our trip out West (Jay and my parents are not readers of my blog). It was an incredibly nice evening.

- I went to see an exhibit of Pulitzer Prize winning photographs with my pal from Pitt. We had breakfast at the Quiet Storm and talked about meeting famous people and what we were like in high school. Turns out we were both wannabe punks : ) The photography at the History Center was heartbreaking and inspiring and wonderful. I'm really glad that I have a friend with whom our relationship is based on going to events/places around Pittsburgh.

-Hopefully I will also see Chrissy at some point this weekend.

The feeling the comes from seeing/communicating with old friends is addicting in a way and now I want to keep up these communications and reconnect with others whom I've been lost touch with!