Ok...I'll let a long story tried to be told in a short story.
My oldest DD Becky studied in Madrid in 2004. Dave and I decided that this was our chance to see Europe and visit Becky. I planned the whole thing myself following Rick Steves travel books. We were to be gone for 3 weeks, all over the place.
Our first week was to be in England. A few days into our trip, Dave had a heart attack while we were in London. Needless to say, it was a nightmare for him and I. I won't go into the details of it, but it was scary being so far away from home and the support of family. Changing hotels, being by myself, trying to get all of finances and health stuff together, making phone calls home with endless phone cards, being a total basket case.
He ended up getting angioplasty there, and the rest of our trip was changed dramatically. Becky was able to leave school a week early to make her spring break into 2 weeks. To see her at the airport in London ater he got out of the hospital, was the best medicine Dave could have had. We had an extended vacation in London. We did as much sight seeing as possible without tiring him out. When the doctor finally gave his blessing for us to leave, we headed out on the trains back to Madrid. I will say that it was a blessing that we were in a English speaking country for all of this to happen. The rest of the trip was not so fortunate.
Now keep in mind, that I no longer could use my original train schedule, and finding internet cafes was a challenge to find out when trains were leaving, making connections and so forth. Never got to see Pais, Venice, Florence or Rome as planned.
While on the train in Germany, we heard about the terrorist train bombings in Madrid. I was soooooooo thankful that Becky was with us. From then on the trains became HORRIBLE!! I just can not explain to you, how scary it was for me. Especially in France. I call them the Gestapo. Very rude, banging on bathrooms while I was in there, demanding Passports with machine guns strapped on their backs. I know that they were being cautious, but their attitude was so bad. I was also an emotional wreck from the heart attack experience yet.
It was weird, but Dave became very reliant on me for EVERYTHING, which is so not him. (I've heard this happens to heart attack patients) So I took care of everything money, schedules, phone calls home, food, finding lodging, making sure we didn't sleep through a train change. I didn't get much sleep at all.
Finally arriving in Madrid was just plain bad. We saw the bombed trains coming into the station, and our hotel reservation just happened to be by some government building with lots of red votives in honor of the victims. And now the Americans were the bad guys, with posters and all. Can I just say that I felt like Dorothy from the Wizard of OZ. "There's no place like home, there's no place like home."
Even though I tried to keep my story short, there is so much more that happened. It would take a book almost. I still cry when I talk about it. My best friend tried to get me to go to Holland with her and her Mom and Sister this month. It would have been the perfect opportunity to visit, cuz we all would have stayed with family there, and her Mom speaks Dutch. But I'm still not ready..............not ever sure if I will be.
So that is why, I won't be saving for a trip to Paris.
One good thing did come out of this experience. While at the internet cafes, Becky emailed all of friends about her Daddy asking for prayers. It was forwarded to an old friend from HS too. They became connected again, and now this old friend is her husband.
I have it as an iTouch wallpaper but decided to make a throw pillow out of it for my bedroom. Here's how it turned out: 
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