Paola's Weblog

How sexy are we? :)

"Paola is from Barranquilla in Colombia (like Shakira). She's lost weight before her wedding to Christophe in July and is looking great. She's a little crazy and super funny. She works in Pricing."

This is our engagement portrait. You can see more at www.christophe-paola.com, our wedding website. It was a very cold day, yet free of rain and massive wind. Christophe’s hair is shorter now (thank goodness!) and my face a bit slimmer (thank goodness times 10000). We were quite happy with the result because it was a pretty shot and shows the real us and not some “Photoshoped” version of it. This was thanks to our photographer Aileen (visit her website at aileeninbelgium.smugmug.com)

This is a fairly recent picture. We are in a Colombian restaurant with out Latino friends. It seems the owners thought of Brussels as not enough of a cosmopolitan town to place their restaurant, so they chose Aarschot instead. I'm sure you can understand that choice!

That's all I have for now.

It seems sometimes like the rain will never stop. Whether it's hard or just a drizzle, it can feel like an eternity. When it stops, all that is left is peace and comfort of knowing you can now resume what you were doing before, or simply start what you've been meaning to do.

On Tuesday evening, I was cleaning after Fiona's little "leftovers" (some not so little), playing with her, waiting for Christophe to come back from the UK where he'd been giving a training. Some kilometers north east of where I was, his father passed away. Last time we saw him was Sunday. He was doing well, as usual. But I guess it was his time, though no one expected it.

He had good life. Full of joy, trials and tribulations, great moments that take your breath away, but most importantly, love. Lots of love. I think that was just enough that his body could take. I want to think he'd make his mark in this world for his loved ones to cherish him and the life he meant for them to have from now on. He did what he had to do. Now there is no more pain, no more sorrow.

As this happens, I understand why it's so painful. He is ok now, I don't feel sad for him. I know he is ok now. But the people he left behind are the ones you ache for. His wife, the love of his life. Seeing the two of them was like lovers after their honeymoon: exuding more happiness and love like you've never seen. His children, two of them still teenagers, have lost their hero, the man that made them everything they are now. Thoughts and comments of all the things he'd still have to give, all the things they were to live together all of a sudden lose their meaning. He would've seen his children graduate from school, getting married, having grandchildren, growing old with his wife. That is the life he could've had. The life we could've all shared.

But as the rain comes pouring, all of a sudden, sometimes announced, sometimes out of the blue, life hits us with the unexpected. But eventually, it stops. Yesterday as I grazed through the window of the family home, rain kept coming down, harder and harder. After a couple of minutes, it stopped. And while it still rains in all our hearts, it will soon stop to shine, like it did yesterday, a rainbow, what I feel symbolizes his soul looking down on us saying, it'll be all right. And the dream of a life he could've had, will come true for us all.

Got your attention there, uh? I did the same thing with my parents some 20 years ago when I titled my first ever story like this. Unfortunately, a title was as far as I went, but that wouldn’t be the last of many writings…it somehow stopped a couple of years ago.
Now I’m going through self-discovery phase, mainly to give my live a boost from the “dark age” that was last year.
My immune system took a sabbatical in 2006, and seems to be on holidays still. Career-wise, I’ve been more lost than ever. Stagnant is the best way to describe my professional and personal development this past year. I became, funny as it sounds, bored. I don’t remember anymore things I was passionate about. Then my mom reminded me of “Intrigue in the United States.” She said I always had quite an imagination; it seems she kept a notebook of mine with great stories. She has suggested I give it a shot. “You never know, you might end up writing scripts for T.V. and movies”
I don’t know whether I want to write movies, newspaper articles, or books. For now, I’ll stick to this space and let you know a bit of what I think about stuff. If you guys like it, it might mean I have a talent I should really profit from!
We’ll see…

After failing to post something before the end of 2006, one of my New Year resolutions was to start posting regularly on my blog, starting Jan 1st. I'm 26 years old, and I should know by now New Year resolutions are the first commitments forgotten (I still haven't accomplished "get good grades in school, might never will).
Anyways, it's the 2nd now, which should be good enough. 2007 will be a great year. I'll be married in 7 months time (if the wedding planning stress doesn't kill me) and I have a little one to take care of. No, it’s not a baby, but close.
This pretty little thing is Fiona, my 9 week old puppy. She's a Cavalier King Charles spaniel (what a mouthful!), quite a playful little lady, and really smart (except the peeing part...still doesn't get that "carpet" does not equal "toilet").
Anyways, I will be posting more stuff throughout the day. I’ve been holding back on a lot of stories and workload won’t be picking up this week, which is kinda cool, given how fond of it I am.

So behold, for I am back!

P.S./ Note how I wrote "it's the 2nd now." Well it's not. My Blogger account was kinda screwed up. But Dody fixed it. I like him a lot!