My one wish for our third year anniversary: to re-take our engagement photos. What a nightmare that was! We ordered one picture out of dozens of pictures that were cheesy cheesy cheesy. And it was pretty bad when I first got the one picture we ordered. I had told the photographer to get rid of the bags under Danny's eyes. But she got rid of part of Danny's eyes! And the amazing thing is, she didn't notice that it looked funny. She probably thought, "Oh, he's Asian. His eyes are supposed to look that chinky." I was horrified when I saw it, and demanded that she get it right. Anyways, long story short, the one picture that we got was not even a good one. My mom took one look at it, and said, "Throw it away. You look ugly." To this day, I have no idea where that one picture is. I must have listened to her and thrown it away.

So my dream is to have wonderful engagement photos. Perhaps we're walking casually along the beach. Perhaps we're in formal attire and gazing into each other's eyes. Perhaps we're standing side-by-side looking pensively into the distance. But the thing is, we won't have that fresh, naive "wow, I'm getting married!" look. Oh well. Can't have everything.

I see other friends' beautiful engagement photos, and I get so sad. I love pictures; they are very important to me. And although chronology is important (ask Danny about what happened when I was organizing my college photo albums, and I accidentally missed a photo from my sophomore year, while I was on my junior year), I'm willing to call these pictures our "engagement" pictures. It's just easier to explain than saying that they're my third-year-anniversary-re-take-photos-of-engagement-pictures-because-they-were-so-
ugly-pictures.

Today, as in most other days these days, I found myself wanting to have someone permanent to talk to while I drive home.

I pretty much call about five or six people on the way home from work, alternating days based on mood, their schedules, and availability. Sometimes it's Karen, who is a mother of a newborn, so her time is mostly determined by her child's needs. I have to catch her when he's napping, or when Seong is feeding him.

I call my mom when I want to discuss what I want to make for dinner or when I want to brag about something or when I want to receive endless support.

I call Danny just to say hello. Literally. Sometimes I'll say "hi" and then say "ok, bye." Mostly we discuss functional things, such as what we're doing for dinner, etc.

Then sometimes I'll call one of my brothers, just because they're my family. I want to know what's going on in their lives. Usually my little brother has much to say (about business, school, finance, Dodgers, etc.). We share some good laughs.

My older brother pretty much has nothing to say. I pretty much talk the whole time, and ask him a bunch of questions, just to receive one-word answers. "Are you at work?" "Yes." "Do you like your job?" "Yes." "What are you eating for dinner?" "Tacos." "Anything exciting happening?" "Nah." He downplays everything that happens in his life. So if he spends more than a sentence on one subject, I listen intently to try and gather the full experience of the words. "So have you met anyone?" "No. Just this girl. We emailed and talked on the phone a couple of times. It's nothing." Woa! Hm. What does that mean??? If it's really nothing, why would he spend FOUR sentences talking about it?? Who knows? He's a mystery wrapped in an enigma.

So I guess what I'm saying is that I wish I had some permanent figure in my car that would love to listen to all of the things I have to say, and talk back to me in an all-encompassing, deeply satisfying way.

Don't get me wrong. I have great friends, a great mom, a wonderful husband. I can't ask for anything else! But I guess I have a deeper need. Perhaps we all have a deeper need? One that can not be met by any one person. I need God. I want to communicate with God. He is my permanent conversation partner! Yes, basically that's what it boils down to. I want to pray more. I want to be heard. I want God to speak to me.