As Alex previously noted, there’s not a lot going on right now. She’s enjoying her time at Main State and I’m spending an inordinate amount of effort trying to figure out how in the world we are going to ship a dog to Africa during the middle of the summer (also, looking at baby cribs when time permits).

One thing I mentioned to Alex the other day is how much smaller the world seems now that she’s joined the Foreign Service. A year ago when a major international event happened, I would watch the news and learn what I could. I would feel empathy or outrage or whatever other emotion the situation called for. But it was usually in a general sense.

That has changed now.

Where there is an earthquake in Christchurch or violence in Cairo or important elections in Cote d’Iviore, I still watch the news, but now I also realize that I probably know somebody there. There’s somebody I know who is being evacuated or helping evacuate someone else. And usually it’s not just a friend of a friend from college, but somebody who I’ve spoken to or had dinner with in the last few months.

When I hear of breaking international news now, no matter the location, my first thought isn’t “What are the global implications?”, but it’s “Who do I know who lives there?”