When I went to the Great Wall before it was packed with people so I wanted to do something different with Alyssa. My friend Lauren who was here in November on a business trip had gone on a private tour and highly recommended it, so we used the same tour guide. It was so worth it. The wall was practically empty and rather than see a reconstructed area we got to see an original part of the wall. My only complaint was having to climb the wall with Alyssa. She is a talented athlete (and anyone who knows me knows I am not) so she bounded up the wall like a mountain goat. I huffed and puffed, which was expected. What was unexpected was the stream of commentary from my sunny friend. "This is INCREDIBLE! How cool! Sarah, look at this! Isn't it amazing! You're doing great! What do you think of this? Look around! The world is beautiful!" and so on. I'm giving death glares through my labored breaths but could only manage one or two snarky comments rather than my usual volley rate. We made it to the top of the highest tower in our area and it was beautiful. But only one of us got there smiling and skipping all the way.
We did a pub crawl for New Years arranged by my other very bubbly and social friend, and as you might guess she and Alyssa got on like a house on fire. Sitting between the two of them with their joyous laughter made me wonder how I keep convincing naturally jubilant people to be my friends. It was a fun night but the ringing in of 2015 made me remember spending last New Years on a plane on the way to China. I sound like a grandparent (so I sound like myself) when I say time flies.