Ticket to heaven, please.

I bought my ticket to Vienna in September. A 3-day-trip all by myself. I was so excited I couldn’t sleep for days and so was my family. I received endless emails, concerning my flight, my plans, who was going to pick me up, what I wanted to do, what they wanted to do and so forth. This started Mid-September and lasted until a day before I left.

So when I left early (4.30!) Friday morning, I knew what to expect, I knew who to expect and I knew someone was expecting. I touched down in Vienna at about 9 am, stopped at the baggage claim (only to pity all the people that had to wait for their luggage – I was traveling only with my backpack) and then ran through the customs to be greeted by my family. The first face I saw was my mom’s, overjoyed and filled with happiness, my little brother, who – much to my dismay – is not that little anymore and my dad, who couldn’t wait to hear all the stories I had to tell.

That afternoon my bigger brother agreed to meet my family and me at the mall, to have some coffee together and talk about him being a progenitor. We talked about travels, arrangements, plans, happenings, ideas, dreams… I managed to squeeze in a frozen yogurt and buying some shoes as well (you can see, it was a highly productive afternoon).

Later that day we stopped by my grandma’s, who is doing much better by the way. I can’t tell you how much I missed her. Every time I see her, I can’t get over the fact how proud I am of her, how amazed I am by her strength – I can’t put it in words, how much I love her, she is simply incredibly awesome.

The next day was spend with my folks and my little brother, who – again – is not that little anymore. Also, he’s in his teens now and I am glad, I don’t have to deal with that, head’s up if he seems to be very moody and you don’t understand what the big deal is, from now on he doesn’t need a reason to be unreasonable anymore.

And then came Sunday, time to fly back home, but not before seeing my big brother again. We planned to have at least one meal together and since we were in Vienna, and it was Sunday my brother and I quickly agreed on Schnitzel-Sunday (yes, we made a tradition out of having Schnitzels on Sundays). We met at my brother’s place. I was greeted by my brother, his girlfriend, her 2year-old son and for the first time in the history of ever: my little niece – Nora.