Day 15, 2.0: How Good it Can Get, May 14 still

Wellll. . . . . that was a bit intense. It's the same day as that last crazy entry. First off, Jo has made two very powerful observations in the past 48 hours. 1) That people should turn to God to get through hard times rather than away from him and 2) That God may make it rain all May, and that might suck for us, but He has placed incredible people in our path to help us, feed us, shelter us, and take care of us.

The 2nd half of this day (despite the torrential downpour) was great. We met a couple in their 60s from New Jersey in the Orvieto train station after my little meltdown. Marty and Nancy. They were witty and nice and treated us like we were 1) human beings and 2) their kids. I helped them with their bags (they were headed to Rome on the same train as us once we switched our ticket). We talked for hours, and it felt so good to feel like we had some friends. Once we arrived in Rome we bought ROMA passes and rode the very clean metro down to Laurentina.

It was raining when we got out of course, some of the heaviest rain we've seen yet. We arrived at Kris Oppenheim's early. She wasn't there, but her daughter Liz, and her mother and father-in-law, and her grandmother-in-law (her 13 year old son is having his confirmation this weekend). They let us in and they fed us tomato soup and leftovers. It was the best meal I've had the entire trip. It was warm. It feels so good to be around kind, military Americans. I'm not being close-minded or prejudice. It's just a fact that the nicest people we're met on our trip have been Americans. I wouldn't have guessed that before we left. And we've met some that have really, really sucked and given Americans a bad name. But it has been great to run into those who've been so hospitable.

Kris came home with her boys and we talked about everyone's lives in the military and travel. We did laundry - desperately needed. We felt wanted. We felt a strong sense of goodness and love. We felt like home.