I don't really know what to say about these last few days.

We partied with many people on the beach under the full moon. My camera broke. I lost my new hat. We were ready to leave.

We left.

One day later, I was suddenly very ill. By the end of the day, my vomit was green and I was walking like a hunchback. (sorry i know that's gross...but it was BAD)

The next day was my birthday. I awoke in a beautiful room that we had booked for the occasion, wrapped in an oriental silk blanket. There was a fuzzy orange stuffed alien and a card from Betsy at my feet. She made a dozen Sprite runs, brought me flowers wrapped in a pink bow, and watched Superstar, the movie, in bed with me. Explored while I slept. Thank goodness for best friends.

I thought about how my dad used say (and still often does): "Sky-B, I love you today!" How my momma would wrap me up in her best blankets in her bed and let me watch my favorite movies. I pulled out the note she sent me before I left:

Sky, you know I have always been such a visual person. Well, you know all the little boxes around the house and how I love to buy a little box when I travel. Here is why. I visualize lots of life as a collection of boxes. Some are big experiences, some small. Some are rigid or angular, some smooth and soft, some are fragile, others very fragile. Some have hinges that are easy to open, others are tight and difficult to open, and then there are those that won't open at all. Like life, some boxes crash and shatter, some crack and are more fragile. We can fix the cracks if we have patience and care. A shattered experience cannot be fixed and brought back to the original. Some breaks leave permanent scars-some bigger than others. But the collection all lives together, in harmony, in my home, in my memory, and in my heart....It is is just a silly way that a glance can evoke an emotion...

When I was little...I thought my parents knew everything. As a teenager, early-twenty-something, I was sure they knew nothing. Here, on my 27th birthday, in this note--is love, is wisdom...is more than everything.

I called them. Every time I call my mother when I'm ill, I hear that it's the end of the world in her voice. And even though it never is, sometimes being sick--especially--abroad, can certainly feel like it...thank goodness for mothers. They ask me again and again "Is there anything we can do?" "No." I say. "I love you." You've already done everything.

And then I opened Dan's birthday card--the one he sent with me. I read it. I read it again and again. We spoke ever so briefly, I could barely think. "Do you need to see a doctor?" "Are you hydrating with water and sugar and salt?" "I wish I could be there...to make everything ok." "...I love you."

When I hang up, I smile a little--these are all the things my parents would say.

Isn't it funny, how in a weird way our lovers or partners or boyfriends or girlfriends or whatever you want to call them, somehow fill in where our parents cannot anymore. They will rub our back when our tummies hurt. The ones who invite our sick selves into their beds. Who think we're pretty even when we're not. The ones who can--somehow--kiss us and make it all better.