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Two weekends ago, a group of us, all core members of a non-profit volunteer organization, got together in Las Vegas for a retreat. By retreat we meant a whole day of meeting, and only head out for food and for some fun after all businesses are done. We stayed at John’s condo. It was so very nice of him to host the group.

It was quite a bittersweet weekend. As we talked about the future of the organization, and on our future involvement in it, we learned that …. none of us present core members can continue to stay involved. Everyone has a good reason — career, school, going back to school, business travel…etc.

On my end, although I enjoyed being involved very much and am passionate about the mission of the organization, I can’t commit to it beyond my present term because… well, I’ve got a wedding to plan. Along with the wedding are many, many significant, life-changing moves to make, and changes to adjust to.

Our term in the organization will end in September. After that, perhaps we won’t even be able to get the group together anymore as everyone will go on in their busy lives. All of a sudden, I realized how precious my remaining time in the organization is. Thinking about not seeing this group of fabulous people, and not working with them on events and projects anymore, makes me sad. The picture above might be our last group picture together. Who knows?

I guess at one point or another, we must all move on. As bittersweet as it is, we must all embark on our next journey.

I wish the best of luck to everyone.

Funny how happiness and uncertainties come hand in hand sometimes. Or am I thinking too much?

I spent the Memorial Day long weekend plus a Tuesday in Las Vegas with my soon-to-be-official finance, John. Yup! We’re getting engaged! The proposal actually happened in mid April, but we kept the news to ourselves for a while because we were still searching for a ring, plus there were much to talk about (and still are) as we live and work in two different states. For weeks since the proposal, we spent our weekends looking for an engagement ring. It took some work, as I was picky about the design (it has to be petite, simple, sweet, elegant, yet has a timeless look), and he was picky about the quality of the diamond. After weeks of searching we finally placed an order for a custom made ring and it should be ready for pick up in about two weeks. After that, we’ll have an engagement ceremony/party at my parents’ house on 6/22. We’ve also started looking for a venu for our wedding.

I’ve been on cloud 9 ever since the proposal. Everyday I feel happy in a different way. Every morning I wake up looking forward to be his wife. But over the long weekend, certain serious topics brought me face to face with loads of uncertainties. Being a urban planner by profession, I’d like to plan things out, I have to see a feasible, perfectly safe, well-laid out plan out there before I make a step. In other words, I hate uncertanties.

I tried to shut the planner in me off so I could enjoy private time with the marvelous man I am going to marry, but I have too many reasons to feel uncertain and unsecured. No matter how I tried to tell myself “just take it one thing at a time”, the planner in me comes screaming lots of different thoughts in all directions. At the end, I became very quiet.

But, I love him, and I want to spend the rest of my life with him. That part is certain.

I am still on cloud 9, but in a different dimension I guess.

2007 came and went way too fast. Before I am fully ready, here comes the horizon of 2008. Reflecting on the year passed, it sees as if I’ve lead two different lives — a horrible one for the first half, then a much happier one for the second half. There were too much unpleasant ups and downs in the first half of 2007. As a result, I didn’t accomplished anything major or half make the best use of myself besides going through the daily routine and hiding personal probolems from everyone else. I lacked inspiration to write because I didn’t want to think about the things I was going through for a good half of 2007. Hence, wakinghour was closed down, and all those old archives were deleted. Yes, my years of writing is gone. True, I did attend to my beauty pageant duties well and finished my term with good effort, but I got a good handle on pageant duties during the first half of my reign in 2006 already so there was no significant breakthrough in 2007. I did successfully host several big events, but then again the skill was developed in 2006 rather than in 2007. I did not read as much as I wanted to, nor did I take a professional exam that I had thought of taking, and let’s not even get into how I neglected healthy diet and exercising.

The second half of 2007 got better month by month. First of all, I met John in June. Now, I don’t want to gab endlessly about John this and John that to drive my remaining dear few readers who’s still out there after my long hiatus into insanity, but things just somehow calmed down after I met John, although he had no connection to the other problematic things at all. I went back to Taiwan to perform in a concert in my hometown in September. Although I got quite sick several days prior to the concert and gave a disappointing performance due to poor vocal condition, it still was a very good trip, hugely because of John’s companionship. I started to paint again in fall of 2007, which was also a big good news considering I haven’t painted for more than five years. And also, I made a few very pleasant trips, to San Jose, San Francisco, Solvang, San Louis Obispo, Morro Bay, Paso Robles, plus Las Vegas. On top of that, I ended the year by being on the 2008 American Red Cross calendar with my pageant friends — girls from the “now former” Miss Taiwan USA and Miss Teen Taiwan court. A nice little something to brag about, right? Read the rest of this entry »