in rob's own words

Happy New Year! Best holiday wishes from Madrid! It has been a very long time since I wrote a message to all of you. Sorry. But this message will prove that sometimes no news really is good news. 2006 was a great year, coming to a crescendo with the birth of my nephew Max on December 19 and then even better news on December 31.

This even better news is that my girlfriend Paloma has just agreed to marry me.

In case you think that the previous sentence may have been garbled by the satellite, I will repeat it, slowly: m y g i r l f r i e n d h a s j u s t a g r e e d t o m a r r y m e.

By way of details, here are the five W's.

WHO:
Paloma Gomez Perez de Zabalza is, indeed, the true love of my life. Some of you have never heard of her, some of you know a fair bit, and a lucky few have met her. She is a beautiful, elegant, intelligent, hilarious Spanish lawyer. A lifelong Madrileña, she is also an honorary American midwesterner by virtue of having spent a year as an exchange student at a high school outside Chicago. During the past nine months, we have visited three countries and all the corners of Spain. Traveling with her has been bliss. She is the only person I've ever met who can make me stop being mad just by smiling at me.

WHAT:
[editor's note: I can't think of anything to write for this category. I mean, getting married is a pretty big WHAT, but I already mentioned it.]

WHEN:
I proposed on December 31, just after we ran a 10k race through the streets of Madrid with 20,000 other idiots in neon yellow t-shirts. I intended to propose at the finish line, and ran the race with the ring in my pocket, but there was just too much chaos. So I waited till we had ridden the subway back to my apartment.

WHERE:
Home is a relative concept for me, whereas Paloma has always lived in Madrid. Her family is mostly in Madrid as well. With a grace that I can only gratefully accept, she has agreed to leave her home and join me on my world travels. If not before, you should get to meet her next summer. We'll be moving to Washington in time for me to start my next assignment (the Mexico desk at State Dept) in September or so. We hope to make a bit of a national tour before (temporarily) settling in DC, but there are a lot of things to figure out.

WHY:
Some people are meant to be together. In this case, fate (possibly having its arm twisted hard by my Grandmother, who died early in the year) took the following complex series of obscure steps to ensure that Paloma and I met:

• Sent me to Baghdad.
• Introduced me in Bdad to an American who had given up several previous careers to start an NGO creating jobs for Iraqis.
• Convinced that guy and his war reporter/new bride to move to Madrid to start their post-Bdad life.
• Sent them to an acquaintance's wedding in Italy.
• Sent Paloma to the same wedding in Italy.
• Introduced them at the wedding.
• Gave them the brilliant idea of inviting us to the same dinner party.
• Etc.

That's all the news that's fit to print. If anything else exciting happens, I'll be sure to let you know.

wish you were here,
Rob