Thinking About Love

On Saturday night we went to a house concert here in town at the home of some friends. They hosted singer Amy Correia. Just last week her new album You Go Your Way was named “Album of The Year- Singer/Songwriter” by the Independent Music Awards. Pretty great considering Bruce Coburn was #2 and the judging panel included Tom Waits and Keith Richards. She sang a slew of great songs including the one above called Love Changes Everything.

Love really does change everything.

The concert lifted my spirits as we are officially empty-nesters now. Our youngest began her gap year in Guatemala last week where she will be interning at a school in Guatemala City until the holidays. Having traveled to an orphanage in Nicaragua three years ago, I have a feel for what she could potentially encounter while there. This made it especially hard to let her go. The first night she was gone I awoke to pee, and as my feet touched the cool floor in the darkness of the night, it hit me how empty our house has become. All I could do was cry myself back to sleep.

I am however finding some positive things about being an empty-nester. For instance, it's been almost two weeks since I've grocery shopped and no one is complaining. Yet. But I'd trade this in for having my babies back in the nest in a second.

Two other things:

If you'd like to read more about our trip to the Nicaraguan orphanage, click on the tab "Nicaragua" at the top of Lines of Beauty. It's a long piece, which I wrote as therapy upon our return, but the photos are worth having a peek. If you read anything, read the paragraph that I starred about Dole Foods, and perhaps the last paragraph about what made the trip worthwhile.

The other little tidbit is that I was interviewed on a lovely blog in Norway called A Butterfly in My Hair a few weeks ago.Many thanks to Vibeke for finding me, and for helping to share my mission here on Lines of Beauty.