alors on danse (so we dance)

well i had quite the lovely valentine's day here in france :) i woke up, talked to the boy for a bit and said happy valentine's day, then went to class. and i knew he had planned something for me, i just didn't now what. but when i got to class, a guy from my school who used to live in the same house as ell handed me a huge bouquet of beauuuutiful roses!! white, yellow, red, orange, and yellow with red tips! so amazing :) i know he (and the kid who helped him) went through a lot to get me these roses while i'm away and it meant so much to me. and they look so good sitting on my desk for sure!

i had some time in between classes, so i just came home and enjoyed the beautiful sun. even though it was cold outside, just to see the sun is absolutely uplifting in any situation. :) even though i couldn't have been happier at the time. i'm starting to really enjoy my time here instead of being so homesick. yes, i miss home. i miss my friends. i miss my family. i miss chipotle, zen zero, five guys, olive garden... but after saturday (aka the day me and the three other girls were in nantes and went to that chateau) i've just been in awe of where i'm at. i'm basking in the beauty of this place. part of this may just be because i ate a dank sandwich yesterday, too...the best sandwich i've had so far while in france... but! i'm happy i feel this way. and i know other people are too. (ahem, grace.. mom.. y'all just needed to chill! i knew it would happen.) anyway, i wrote a poem about how i feel now:

     the trees look like godly arms
     thrusted up through the foreign ground
     they are reaching, stretching
     pointed towards the sun
     with little strands of electricity
     sprawling from each finger
     as if they have super powers

     and i simply stand in awe
     either this is truly from another place
     or this is the first time
     i have opened my eyes and looked around

     i suppose it may be both.

moving on... colette was cute yesterday, too. for dinner, she set the table with a special tablecloth and special napkins, and we had a glass of special wine before dinner. all this because "our boyfriends couldn't be here for valentine's day." haha =] she's adorable. we had a little appetizer of cheese crackers and walnuts, and instead of soup for our first course we had salad with vinaigrette. and i think i said this before, but i'm really picky about my salad. i only really like one kind of dressing, and that's dorothy lynch...which, as far as i know, can only be found in nebraska and kansas. and the salad was a cabbage salad, not lettuce. not a huge fan of cabbage either. but... i took a little bit of it. not too much to where i couldn't eat it all, but not too little to where i looked silly taking one bite and being done. i choked down the salad like a champ. my mother would be so proud. i'm being adventurous with my food, mom! and respectful! and karen and i are getting a lot better at talking to colette, or at least trying.

oh!! and something really funny... i think this happened the day before yesterday, but oh well. so i was skyping elliot and the connection was really bad, and so he would just get random frames of my frozen facial expressions. well, in one of them, i have my eyes reallllly wide, like bug eyes, and it looks like i have an extremely deformed hand, and other than that, it's just the funniest picture you will ever see. i don't know what was going on at the time that i made that face, but it's quite awful. he snapped a picture of it once he saw it and sent it to me so i could look at my ridiculousness. and so i pulled up the picture on my computer and went downstairs to show colette, and she laughed so hard. hahahaha she loved it. i explained to her what happened and she just thought it was awesome. =] great bonding moment over a terrible picture of me. oh well, ça marche! (that works!) here it is for your sick pleasure:

hahahahahahahahahahaha holy moses...

but... i'm going to be the best girlfriend ever and show you all a pic of my boyfriend trying to imitate my beautiful picture:

hahahahahahahahahaha i think they're pretty similar...

anyway... i'll write about today, too since it's almost over for me and i need to get on track with my posts. so today was lovely because i got to sleep in since i don't have a class until 2:30 =] jealousss? it was raining like crazy though, and i wasn't looking forward to walking in the pouring rain. but it finally cleared up before i had to go to class. yay! also, I GOT MAIL TODAY! i lovvve getting mail, even at home in the states, because it makes me feel important! but the mail i got was a birthday card from my dad... and (sorry dad!) i opened it because i was just so excited! and it was super cute. thank you daddy! and i also got mail from ell, but it was at the post office and i could only go get it after four o' clock, and i had class from 2:30 to 6. so i gotta go fetch it tomorrow. but i'm still really excited to get it!

i also just had a couple things i wanted to discuss:

1) i was talking about this with mah fraands... i think it's awesome that girls here aren't afraid to eat in public. not that girls in the u.s. won't go get food from a drive thru or go on a dinner date with someone, but girls here will just walk down the street eating this huge, long sandwich like it's nothing. and i love it. i will gladly stuff my mouth in public from now on.

2) i know i've talked about this a lot, but i just really love my classes and teachers. why can't teachers be this enthusiastic and awesome back home?! i mean, i suppose a lot of them are, but i think they allll should be. if you're not excited about what you're talking about (that sounded redundant...) and if you don't try to connect with your audience, your audience won't get excited about the information and they won't really want to pay attention. just a thought. oh, and uh, teachers should get paid more. but that's a different story.

3) i forgot what else i wanted to say. if i remember i will write it down and save it for tomorrow. :)

i hope this post is pretty entertaining. i mean... a poem, a picture, what more could you ask for?! 

happy late valentine's day everyone! and remember, even if you don't have someone to celebrate with, YOU ARE LOVED!! <3