Frozen Socks and All

November 24, 2005-
Last night, I went up to the attic to check on the status of my "drying" clothes and I found that all my socks were completely frozen. Frozen I tell you, frozen stiff. I brought a few pairs down to my room to defrost, but I don't know what I'm going to do. I have a lot of clothes hanging in the attic "drying" and I can only defrost a few things at a time in my little room. At this rate, it might be some weeks before a large portion of my wardrobe is wearable again.

It's cold here. Not as cold as it's going to get, but cold. It snowed all day. When I was walking the mile or so to my language class, my face was pelted with frozen raindrops. It was mildly miserable, but what can you do? In response to the unbearable cold (and my frozen socks), I have purchased a faux fur coat. I got it from the bazaar today. Truthfully, I feel slightly ridiculous in it because it's long -- down to my mid-calf, and well, quite the coat. It's brown and huge, and I feel slightly like a lioness when I have the hood on; but it's warm, and that's what I needed so...

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. My clustermates and I had a Thanksgiving feast with our host parents at the one cafe in town. We ate strictly Ukrainian dishes, though we came close to American tradition with our sides of mashed patatoes. At first, I felt a bit melancholy about it being Thanksgiving, mostly because I've always managed to get back to San Jose to spend the day with my family. I thought a lot about everyone gathering at my grandparents, enjoying the punch, laughing, drinking wine, perhaps shooting some hoops. I snapped out of it though, when our own Thanksgiving feast began.

It was very special to share the American holiday with our Ukrainian families. Many toasts were made and lovely words spoken. More than a few times, our families broke into song, singing many traditional Ukrainian numbers. They kept asking us Americans to sing our traditional national songs, but we couldn't even compete with them. Americans don't have national songs that everyone sings and knows from a young age. We have some songs, but it's not the same at all. "Doe-a-Deer" and "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" hardly compete.

I have a lot to be thankful for here. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed, it's true; and sometimes I feel far from home, but for the most part, I feel an acute sense of how much there is to be thankful for, frozen socks and all.