Only 9 days left in Madison. It's quite sad, I really love this place. Things I'll miss:
- the tiny door out to my back porch
- corner patio at Genna's
- Mango Mojito at the Icon
- Jolly Bob's
- beer drinking and lake watching at the Terrace
- farmers markets on the square with spicy cheese bread
- drinking wine on the grass around the capital for concerts on the square
- biking to trader joe's and putting my groceries in my awesome basket
- Hook's melt with greens and wine tastings at Barrique's on Monroe St
- Babcock ice cream
- Ian's pizza
- Margaritas with the ladies at Pedro's
- Awesome friends
I think the moral of that list is that Madison is great for eating and drinking. Especially eating and drinking outside- I've obviously forgotten about all of the great winter activities. Since my last day of work last Friday, I've been happily unemployed and trying to enjoy all of the above listed things as much as humanly possible before I go. It's been brilliant and I know that I'll go through some kind of withdrawal.
I only regret that in order to survive here over the last 2.5 years, I've had to spend the majority of my time working and traveling for work. Why is it that we Americans have such trouble finding a good life balance? So many people have to choose between being well-rested, but bored because they have no money to spend or full of stress, but unhappy because there's no time to do anything fun with their money.
That is going to be one of my goals for my time in Morocco- to find a happy life balance. I hope to develop routines that divide my time each day among the following:
- Exercise (I just ordered some yoga/pilates videos to do in my apartment)
- Study (for the GRE and the Foreign Service Exam, Arabic, French, Spanish)
- Work (teaching English at AMIDEAST)
- Relaxation (catching up on reading, movies, hanging at Mohamed's store, chats with loved ones)
I'm not so naive as to think I'll get to each thing each and every day, but a girl's got to have goals! In PC I wasted a lot of my time on satellite television and I wince when thinking about all that could have been accomplished in that time.
The apartment is almost packed. Pictures are off the walls, books off of shelves, stacks of boxes in every corner- proof that it's really drawing to a close. Everything gets moved into storage a week from Sunday and then I'm off for some family time in Michigan. I'll post again once I get there...
