White unlined paper
Dear Mom,
Well if you read the other side of this, you’ll see I got a new job – no longer a clubmate. The good of this is that I have regular hours and 1.5 days off a week. The bad is that it’s WORK and I work hard. It takes a lot to run a department. I miss the sun and aerobics but I don’t miss the guests. Japanese was not as easy as French to learn. They wanted me to commit to a year and I said no. What it does look like though is I’ll be home for my 10-year reunion in June. That means to get my traveling in, I’ll leave here in April or May. It’s hard to think of returning since I like the lifestyle here. I like not having to think about rent, utilities, traffic, etc.
The food and beverage executive is Filipino and needed an escort for dinners for a week when he had friends visit. I got to go to some great restaurants. I was stuffed silly every night. This guy is the best to go to a restaurant with since he knows all the other food and beverage people on the island. Had lots of champagne and great desserts. PIC had a wine tasting – all Australian wines. I guess my taste buds have grown accustomed to CA wines but I can’t adjust to the Aussie taste. Unfortunately Australian wine is more available than CA wine. It was good nonetheless to drink wine instead of MillerLite (I‘d drink something with more taste but with the quantity of beer consumed, I need a low calorie beer.)
Houses on the island are nice. They look like CA homes. I’ve made friends (non-PIC) from the Hash so I’ve had the opportunity to see how others live on Saipan. Two of my friends are brother & sister. She had a b-day party at her parent’s last week – her father is a judge here and the house was exquisite. I felt like I had to have manners for the evening. The Hash people like me. PIC people like me too. It’s weird to be in the “in” crowd – makes up for adolescence. One of the women from the Hash is a PhD psychologist. She has a private practice out of her home. I walked into her office and it was weird to be in a familiar environment. Her library was fantastic too. Too bad I refuse to read anything educational for a while.
Sounds like your illness is really rough for you. I’m sorry that you have to through all of this bullshit. You wonder why the body just can’t keep functioning the way it always did.
Your cruise sounds great. Aunt Alice wrote to me about it as well. I hope you all are well enough to go and have a great time. We even need vacations from our sick leave.
The guests often participate in the activities. When clubmates are scheduled to do volleyball, etc, we make an announcement over the P.A. in English and Japanese and then go around and recruit guests for the activities. The guests are shy so you have to invite them to join. If they don’t want to come, they say no.
I’ve done little or no “counseling” here. I’ve taken a lackadaisical approach and I like it. I’ve switched off my processing ability and am enjoying life from the inside instead of just looking at it. People can tell me about a weird dream and it’s just a weird dream, I don’t see it in terms of what the symbols are, what their conflicts are, etc. Just real tired of counseling – that’s why I’m here in the first place.
I’ve not grown taller but I am lanky in pictures and the video. Sometimes I think I’m way too graceful from my ballet to do any really good funk moves. I’m the second tallest woman here so I’m big, I’m one of the thinnest – see the video? So when we play water basketball or polo, I have an advantage.
So the video I’m sending is what I’ve been doing for a while. The first show I was in got cancelled so I couldn’t send you a video of that. We’re set to debut its replacement in two weeks though. We were supposed to open last week but the dress rehearsal was so bad, the entertainment manager refused to open. It was her own fault but a good call all the same. After seeing the video, i think we look like a bunch of high school students – but then again we’re not professional and we’re having fun so what the heck.
Today was my day off so I went for breakfast on the beach, kayaked up the coast with a friend, laid out in the sun with a bunch of women friends and will go for a spaghetti dinner at another friend’s house. While laying out in the sun, I drowsed and though I was in SoCAl. It might be dangerous for me to stay 9 months here because I’ll miss it even more when I leave, like I miss things in CA now. I like the community feeling here – I imagine it’s what it’s like living in a small town. No where in the US has perfect weather conditions like this. Even in “bad” weather i.e. typhoons, you can still wear your shorts and a t-shirt. I like wearing shorts for my job. The only thing that changed with my new job is that I wear a PIC collared shirt like regular staff. Get teased by clubmates about it but I’m proud of it. I also have to wear nice sandals – no flip flops.
By the time I wrap up the video, it’ll be time to eat so I need to stop here. I love you.
