Parlando

Speaking more Italian everyday, it's good to feel these words in my mouth, in my body. I feel different when I speak this language: my voice changes and my inflection is that of some one else. My lips wrap gently around the words and I try to hold them in my mouth just a little longer than I normally would. I'm trying to hold each one carefully and preserve some part of it in the memory of my lips, my tongue, my body. My voice grows just a little bit deeper as the pacing of my words begins to resemble that of a snail with vertigo. I speak slowly trying to think ahead and trying to wrap my body around the water drop of a word in my mouth. Learning this language involves the whole of my being, because I learn it through a life well lived. With each word I use I see a flashing memory of the moment I learned it: who was with me, where we were. Was it a night a PaPaGui, an afternoon on the lawn, was I sharing a cup of coffee with Sofia, was I fighting sleep with Giovanni, was I watching films with Francesca, was I in bed with J? All of these people float through my sentences, all of my time in this place is present in each conversation. My acquisition of this language is not like that of my first or second. Although I'm sure I learned English in this way the memories live in a place I can't recall. My Spanish came to me from a text book and I barely remember in what order I learned the language. But Italian...Italian is so intertwined with my life, with my memories of this place and these people. The language is becoming my memory. The language and the memory, the two are one, and the one is remembered in my body.

A little less lonely

Feeling a little better about the whole boy situation. Finally talk to Him for a little bit last night. It's ridiculous how speaking to him has put me in such a good mood. That doesn't mean I don't want to know why he hasn't answered e-mails and was so nasty when I called the other night, I just want to chalk it up to the election and him trying to finish several papers for conferences. I need to hear his voice once in a while, just to keep me sane.

These are the days that are difficult for me. Last night every one's significant other was at the house. Everyone is so sweet and cozy, and I'm alone. Those are the times I struggle with the thoughts of finding someone to keep me company. I suppose my prospects are quite limited in the village, perhaps a friend of Agape. This may be the most difficult part of the year. If I choose to have a relationship here how do I go into it knowing it'll only be for a year. I don't want to hurt myself or anyone else. I don't want to accidently fall in love. I have no intention of staying in Europe for a boy. My time here is purely for me. I have enough men back in the States, I don't need anyone trying to convince me to stay here.

For now I guess I just stay alone, count my blessings in my friends, and try to find some comfort about all of this in looking at the amazing life that I have in this place.

A couple things I just found written in my moleskin from London:

While looking at “The Snail” by Matisse

Thinking this is the favorite painter of a good friend – Haven’t seen him in a while, maybe years. He probably likes the idea of this painting as much as he likes the idea of me. In reality I don’t think he cares much for either.

On Francis Bacon paintings

“as if a human being has passed between them, like a snail, leaving a trail of the human presence and the memory trace of past events.”

Tangible

I’ve been too busy reading other people’s stories to remember to write my own. I’ve been trying to distance myself from the feelings I know will come pouring out when I put pen to paper. But I guess its inevitable, they’re rattling around in there whether or not they make it to the paper so I might as well put them down…here it is.
I sleep with the green shirt I stole from him years ago in hopes of pulling off the last bit of his scent – I know there isn’t any left. Some how the soft worn in cotton still feels good against my skin, it feels bitter-sweet. Reminding me of all the times I tried to sleep next to Him in it, but the gentle comfort of it on my skin was always replaced by the warmth of his rough hands – a welcome exchange, although I often put up a bit of a struggle, just for the sake of it. It’s the one piece of him I know I truly have with me. I don’t’ know if I can still occupy a corner of his heart or if he still thinks about me as he comes home to an empty apartment. But I do know that I have this one tangible piece of us, and I hold onto it for dear life. I no longer wear the ring He gave me, I don’t define myself in relation to Him, but I hold onto the old holey green shirt I stole from him when we were both at Denison, it seems like an eternity ago. I still hold tight. I think that if maybe I hold tight enough he’ll feel it, maybe if I wish these memories into him he’ll start to miss me…just a little.
It’s a last ditch effort to figure out how to have this love and this chosen exile. It’s hard and in all honesty I’m sure this winter will be harder. I’m a little afraid I’ll be living in some weird version of last year. I’d love to meet the woman who immerged directly after that but under no circumstances want to relive the events who brought her about. I don’t need another winter of sadness, another few months of not eating; another Christmas spent wishing he’d call. I don’t need any of that. I’m ready for the happiness that was the preceding 4 years. I’m in need of that rock. I want to come home to some one when I return. I want to be loved.

I woke up this morning and the fog was so thick I couldn’t make out even one mountain. It feels like the very thing that defines my existence here has silently stolen away in the night. And now this morning I feel like perhaps I’ve never left, that there are some things that may never change. Tried to call Him last night…too busy getting an article ready for the NY Times. 2 weeks of silence. There are moments when I fear my fierce independence will lead me to a fierce lonliness. But I suppose that there would be little different about the situation if I had stayed in the States. I wish I didn’t love so deeply, so fiercely, so wholly – if only for my own protection; to keep this vulnerability at bay. “Distance makes the heart grow fonder” maybe for us distance forces you to take back the pieces you’d once so happily given to some one else. Maybe this distance doesn’t allow such feelings to grow, maybe this distance is too much and forces you to withdrawal into yourself – just for sanity’s sake, to keep you from going crazy because you know it’ll be too long before your yearning will be satisfied. Maybe we aren’t meant to live in such anticipation. This is the moment to work on being responsible for my own happiness, even though there are moments when I miss Him so intensely that my body aches for Him, that I cling to my green scrap of him and try to drink in the faint perfume that is left of him.

What a face

I’ve been looking at some photos from a few months ago and realized I barely recognize myself. My face looks totally different. Not like there is some internal change that has decided to reflect itself on my face, although that may be true as well, but I physically look like a different person. I was told that time and time again when I went back to the States but thought perhaps it was because no one had seen me in a few months. But now I realize perhaps it was because I actually look different. It’s as if I’ve aged a few years, not in a way that simply makes me look older, but I look as if I’ve finally come into the whole of my being, like suddenly my body reflects the comfort I feel in my soul. A face that I know have to glance twice at in the mirror sometimes because I’m not sure I recognize myself. It’s a strange feeling not to anticipate the person who looks back at you. I’ve notice I’ve taken to generally only examining my body in the mirror as the face that looks back is some strange and beautiful being that I haven’t quite been able to comprehend, this person is now a part of myself. But this is me now and I think it’s a purer representation of me, somehow. My inside matches my outside for the first time in a long time, maybe ever.

“This forest eats itself and lives forever” – Barbara Kingsolver The Poisonwood Bible
I’m not quite sure what I think this means in the greater context yet but I think somehow I might like it to apply to my life.

Borrowed

Sleeping in a borrowed bed, in a borrowed room, in a house that will never belong to anyone. This is what it feels like to live on borrowed time, to know there is an end, a definitive end, one I can point to on a calendar and know that under all circumstances that is the end. Despite the knowledge of such impermanence I am completely possess by this place. Perhaps it is because of the recognition of the fleeting nature of Agape that I am so content and fulfilled with my simple work. Perhaps it is because of this temporality I am happy simply being in the presence of those around me. I suppose those who clearly see death within their sights tend to live more fully and deeply into their lives, but rather than death clearly in view I think of this as another birth. It isn’t often that life presents us with an absolutely clean slate and I’ve been given that gift. It’s a disservice to the Universe, to Yahweh, to the forces of life not to paint it beautifully, not to cover every square inch with color, to wash mistakes with tears and begin anew.
I’ll cover this new slate in the lace that hangs delicately around the mountains. A lace that is beautiful every moment but constantly reforming, reweaving itself. A gentle blow from the creator, the master artist, is always rearranging and creating a new pattern just outside my window. This dynamic lace floats lightly over a patchwork quilt of golds and reds, and the ever greens of my wolrd. This quilt wraps tightly around the children of the valley, holding us tightly, sheltering us from the outside world, the protection of a great mother; rising from every possible place to hold onto her children, to cradle them in the crook of her great arms, telling of her love for us despite our rebellion, despite our disinterest in her welfare.

casa dulce casa

Finally back “home”. If home is where the heart is I am most certainly here. Sitting in a warm soft bed, a gift from a friend I didn’t know I was missing from my life until this summer. My beautiful room lovingly prepared by my friends, perhaps my Italian family. Staring out of my window at a view that people pay thousands of dollars a night to see and I blessedly call it home. The trees bravely climbing the rocky cliffs have turned themselves into a sea of yellows and warm reds all swaying gently in a breeze as if to wave a welcome home to me. I feel content, easy, as if my whole existence is wrapped warmly in blankets and placed by a crackling fireplace.
I’m spending today getting settled in, putting together a puzzle with Jacob in the afternoon, trying to make some order of my room and getting mentally prepared for what lies ahead. I know the year ahead of me will be difficult and there very well maybe moments when I want to go back to my “real home” but I think the struggle will be worth it. I’ll be the better for it: better for having struggled and triumphed, better for the hard work, and better for the friendships. I’ll have crossed at least 2 things off my life list – living abroad for a year and visiting Whittington castle and hopefully working on becoming proficient in Spanish when the women from Uruguay arrive. If nothing else accomplishing 3 life goals in one year should make me feel good.