The Bad .. The Ugly .. and The Boss

Recently I have talked about earthquakes and the fact that Rick and I are going through a bit of a rough patch and have put certain aspects of our dynamic on hold while we work though these issues.

Sorry but this post isn't much different.  If you've had enough of hearing about all of that (I'm actually bored with it myself!) please feel free to skip this post.  Oh, there is some good news if you can bear with me :)

We are working through things and are slowly regaining both confidence in our roles and trust.  It feels as though we are moving forward and putting the incident behind us.  A number of people commented on my previous post that it seems we have not actually put our dynamic on hold.  I hadn't really thought about it that way but I guess that is true.  A lot of the structure remains in place and many of our rules are being loosely observed.

Most of the rules are in place for a good reason and are things that matter to us. They are things I do out of love and respect and therefore I am continuing to observe them.  Others, however are in place more to reinforce our roles, such as asking permission for certain things.  These rules have been taken off the table for now along with role affirmation and consequences.

Putting some aspects of the dynamic on the back burner has been good for us.  It has allowed us to just focus on us and on reconnecting.  We are taking things slowly and I hope that we will come out of this even stronger.

It's fair to say that last week was the week from hell, which has also meant little time to just focus on us.  We had some serious external issues to deal with as well as work issues.

Did I mention earthquakes earlier?  I did?  Our week from hell culminated in another 6.6 earthquake Friday afternoon, a month after the earlier big quake.  Its epicentre was in the same place and we had been having constant aftershocks during the month from the previous quake, although we weren't feeling many of them.

This one was even more scary as, unlike the first one, it was during the week so we were in the city at work.  Fortunately Rick and I were together when it hit.  We were out on the street at the time making our way back to work which made it even more scary.  All cars on the roads around us at the time immediately hit the brakes and stopped.  It was Erie.

There was no major damage or injury, although there has been substantial damage in the towns closer to the epicentre, but the scene was pretty chaotic.  Traffic immediately jammed with people trying to get ot of the city and we were evacuated from buildings etc.  There were people everywhere and emergency sirens blaring and vehicle's galore.  The rest of Friday night also saw a number of fairly large aftershocks, some not much smaller than the original quake.

Now we go through another round of aftershocks from this quake although again, we haven't felt that many of them.  I probably made it sound more dramatic than it was.  Still, it was a scary experience and I am unnerved and on high alert praying that this swarm of activity would just stop.

Ok ... now I have gotten the doom and gloom off my chest, onto the good part :)

Although Friday was an extremely difficult day it did have a silver lining.  Those of you who have read here for a while may recall that Rick is a huge Bruce Springsteen fan.  The Boss is his absolute idol.  You may also recall that Bruce is currently in the middle of a massive world tour.  We expected that he would play some concerts 'down under' sometime early this year.  Australia was a certainty, but little ole NZ not so much.  We waited with baited breath when the Australian tour dates were announced last year to see if NZ was on the schedule.  It was a possibility given the scale of the tour.

Our hopes were dashed.  Tour dates for Australia were announced but no NZ concerts.  Rick was so disappointed, as was I as thanks to Rick, I have become a fan also.  I also wanted this so badly for him.  Travelling to Australia for a show there just wasn't an option for us.  The Australian dates occurred during March this year.

In the early hours of Friday morning an announcement was made that Bruce would again be touring down under in March 2014 and guess what .... this time a date in NZ has been confirmed!  We had no clue before the announcement that he would be returning to Australia, let alone NZ!  I think we are both still in shock!

Rick and I are both so excited.  I am so thrilled that he will get to see his idol.  It truly is a dream come true for him.  Rick has seen Bruce a number of years ago on a previous tour here.  However, he says his dream was to get to see him again and with me at his side this time.  How sweet is that!

Rick will be going to see some some of this

I will too but if you ask me he also hasn't got a bad body, especially for his age :)