the cruise

My cruise was truly amazing! It was so nice to spend an extended period of time with Dad and Bubi. They were so great to me- listened whenever I needed to talk about Jon, let me have space if I just had to go be sad, didn't make comments about the sleeping pills that I needed to take the first few nights so I would just stop thinking what if and about what might have been... I couldn't have asked for better travel companions during such a hard time.
I missed the serivce - Mom, Kristen, Kara, Brian and Kendall went and I was so grateful about that. I think that Jon would have wanted me to be away on vacation with my family.
The ports that we stopped in were amazing - Costa Rica, Panama, Cartegea, Columbia and the DR. I hadn't been to any of them before- our first stop was Cozumel which I have been to but heart Mexico so it was cool to go back.
We ate very well and often. I sat out by the pool and read every chance that I got. I spent a lot of time in the steam room, had two massages, took a few stretching and aerobics classics.
I also met someone...this was very - unexpected. I noticed whenever I was in the dining room there was always this guy that stared at me. Wednesday night, he asked me to meet him in the disco. I didn't. The next night he told me that I didn't show up and asked me to meet him when he got off work. I did - he had a bottle of italian red wine and two wine glasses. We sat outside in the back of the ship and talked for hours. His name is Alessandro - he is from Naples, speaks 5 languages and just says whatever he is feeling which is so nice. Every night he told me about his day - always relating back to me and when he saw me, what he thought. He also tried very hard to teach me some Italian - I didn't retain as much of it as I would have liked but I loved how he sounded when he said it... more later