It’s a little surreal

I’m here. I’m in Japan. And its Monday…but its not. But it really is. I pretty much lost all of Sunday to flying. I started out at 8am Saturday and didn’t get to Japan until 2pm Sunday afternoon and in the end I stayed up for over 24 hours and was a walking zombie before I was able to crash at 9pm Sunday night.

Leading up to leaving, it got chaotic real quick. Friday morning, on my last day of work, and of course the day before leaving for Japan, my friend texted me saying her water broke. This is great news, exciting, thrilling..all those things, but it had me panic for a moment because I was supposed to photograph her birth!

She was due on June 23rd…the day I returned from Japan. It was her first..she was supposed to be at least a week late…she was not supposed to go into labor until after I got back! We agreed! ..ok, she might not have agreed to waiting that long.

I took my camera to work with me in case I had to leave early and waited for updates all while mapping out everything I needed to do at home before the trip. I made it through my last day until 5pm, doing lots of work. More work than I thought I’d do, to be totally honest. I got treated out to lunch and was able to head home, with no major updates from my friend or her husband.

By 6pm, she was at a 6, so I started to get things ready for my trip before I went to the hospital around 8. It ended up being perfect since she was ready to push just 15 minutes after I arrived. That girl can push! She was such a trooper and it was nothing short of amazing getting to be in the room to witness her daughter’s birth. I’ve never actually been in the room before. Outside, peaking through a window, seeing it on tv, but inside? while it’s happening? witnessing the nitty gritty of it all.. amazing.

a sneak

The nurses and doctor all thought it scared me off to having babies, but is it weird that it just spurred me on more for them? It looks hard. It looks beyond painful but it just made me want to do it all the more.

I’ll go on and on about her birth in another post, but I finally made it home at 11:30pm and I knew I had a long night ahead of me with packing. By 2:15am, I was finally able to fall into bed so I could wake up at 5 to get ready. It was rough! I was finally able to get coffee in my system before flying out of San Francisco, and it was like heaven.

You know I must be bored if I’m willing to bring my big camera out at an airport and not care what people think of me snapping photos of my coffee.
      

It was the first time I’d ever been in a double decker plane and I thought it was the neatest thing. Even though I wasn’t taking advantage of the double decker amenities, I had an exit row, and to me, that was all I needed. I have to give it to United. Their service was really great and they fed us 3 meals plus 2 separate snack times plus ample water throughout the whole flight. I was never hungry once. All of the flight attendants were above and beyond nice too.

One caught on that I drink a lot of water and the moment I finished one cup, he took it and immediately placed another full cup in my hand without saying a word. I had conversations with a few of them on the flight, and it was so nice and a far cry from domestic flight attendants.

I met up with G-man at the airport and we indulged in a strawberry shake together before we boarded the bus to take us on the base where we’re staying. I was dead at this point, but over an hour later, we arrived and were immediately invited out to dinner by his boss and co worker.

You can say no to the co worker, but you can’t say no to the boss, so looking haggard and worse for wear, we hopped in a cab and made our way through town for dinner. It was such a nice night. The boss treated us out for Korean BBQ and we all were able to talk and get to know each other. I’ve never accompanied G-man on any work dinners so this was new to me and I was a little uncertain with how to be. Its one of those where I want to act normal yet don’t want to embarrass G-man in any way, so I was on high alert as best as I could be with being awake for nearly 24 hours straight. However meeting his boss and not realizing it was his BOSS until the dinner was almost over had me wondering where my brain was. If G-man hadn’t said “Sir” at one point, I’m not sure it ever would have occurred to me.

By 9pm, we were finally able to get some much needed sleep and sleep never felt so good. I’ll have the days to myself while G-man has to take care of things, so I’m hoping I’ll get the chance to explore this town a little bit.

How was your weekend?

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