Dear Wen,

You may not remember me, but I remember you.  Perhaps I can refresh your memory.  It was the summer of 2004 and you had been learning how to salsa dance.  I was out for an evening of dancing with my friend Andrea, who was visiting from out of town for the week.  You asked me to dance that night at Beso del Sol in Seattle.  We danced several dances and you taught me a little of what you had been learning.  You bought me a drink and we talked for a while.  You were handsome and funny and I enjoyed every moment.  That night you gave me your number after I did not give you mine.  I’m writing today to tell you I’m sorry I never called—you see, I had a boyfriend at the time and could not.  This particular boyfriend and I did not last all that long, but when I was available again enough time had passed that I did not bother to call you.  I sometimes considered going to Century Ballroom for their salsa lessons in the hope that I would run into you there.  I should have.  I should have called you.  You were great.

This last weekend I found the card you wrote your name and number on for me.  I’ve kept it all these years to remind myself to take a few more chances.  To live my life so that in later years I would never look back and regret missing out on an opportunity to live.

Thank you for our one evening of dancing.

Love,
Windy Dawn

P.S.  Years have passed and I do not know where your life has taken you, but if you are still single I would very much like to go dancing with you again.

Finally Done

I did it!  After 3 long years of part time school I finally graduated with my Master of Science in Applied Mathematics.  WAAHOOOO!

Would you believe no one brought a proper camera?  My mother (of all people) couldn't find her camera when we left early this morning.  My friends assumed my mom would have her camera so we only have cell phone photos.  Thank goodness for cell phones!  My dad managed to snag a short video of me receiving my diploma.

I did not attend the huge UW ceremony with 12,000 other graduates, instead it was a small department celebration with about 200 people.  As usual it was memorable.  While our Graduate Program Advisor was calling names mine was accidentally skipped.  After the last one I had to raise my hand and inform him he skipped me.  It was all pretty funny.  Turns out 2 others got skipped as well.  It made me laugh.

Here are a few pictures from my mom's iPhone of the festivities today.  Most of my family live far and could not attend, however my parents came along with my sister Sandie and her son.

My apologies for the silly looking pictures. I have this super awesome nephew, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named-Online, whose father has insisted no pictures should appear on the internet.

A few of my good friends came to celebrate with me.  Thanks for coming!

The faculty and masters students from the Applied Math department.

For those who may not have received an announcement from me (I had a limited number of them) you can see one below.  A big thanks to my friend Tasha for doing the pictures for me!  Well, she did all of them except for the one of my feet, I admit I did that one all by myself.  

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The Miracle of Sight

I rarely forget just how wonderful a thing it is to see.  I am reminded of it each evening when I take out my contacts and then wonder where I put my glasses.  I always do it in that order.  You'd think I would have learned to locate my glasses before removing my contacts, but no, I haven't.

Windy Dawn, age 3

I have a number of things wrong with my eyes and have had to wear glasses my whole life. When I was younger I would take them off and leave them in random places because I hated wearing them.  Hated having them on my face.  As you might have guessed, this drove my parents nuts as I could never remember were I left them.

Windy Dawn, age 31

I've learned to enjoy my glasses now as they allow me to see things that others see.  Although I still do not like having them on my face and typically wear contacts instead.  The above picture was taken an hour ago, just after I picked up my new glasses at Costco.  I still don't wear them in public all that often but I do get excited about my new glasses.  It's a new prescription and with them I can see.  Not only do I get to see, but I get to pick out cute frames.  That makes me happy.