the Italian Job

 

 

 

Always captured by Italian creativity (and beauty).

100 años de (non) soledad

A century ago my grandmother was born. Today, one hundred years later, she still welcomes every visitor with a big smile of excitement, unfailingly pointing at them with her crooked finger. Her hands bare the memory of the icy cold water of the village fountain where Grandmother used to do the washing.

Her heart, instead, has absorbed the steadiness and nobility of the mountains she grew up surrounded with and as a gracious majestic mountain, this tiny old lady radiantly looks at us with her pure blue eyes. I am so grateful for having you.

happy birthday, Nonna.

words of the water

Sometimes - too often probably - I go around saying that I am lazy. But I have to really stop doing this because lazy I am not. I went to the swimming pool today; the last time I was there, it must have been three years ago. I just abandoned myself into the fresh water and the first lengths were quite hard, I was out of breath. Then I thought I would just count, giving myself time. I wanted to count until 50. One, two, breathe breathe, three, four, breathe breathe. So the fiftieth length came actually more quickly than expected and I decided I would be really proud of myself if I reached seventy. Which I did. 

So I am not lazy. 

And beneath the water, while glancing at the shape of my body reflected by the metal bottom of the pool, repeating the same movements slowly and regularly, I tried to give shape to my thoughts; I decided to trust myself and send that letter with an unspoken apology that I should have sent long time ago, which now has an added, more profound meaning. I decided that it could have been a good thing or a bad one, but that I woke up thinking about it and that, if the thought had not abandoned me for half a day, maybe it should not be ignored. That maybe I should just be brave and click on that send button. Which I did.

In the water, bubbling out the air from my lungs, I told myself that I am the one who should decide whether or not to think, feel, or do something. Which most of us probably learn when they are 10 or 12, I know, it is actually a quite banal thought. But only if you did not grow up with the unconscious mission of making people smile before thinking if you smiled too. With this desire to make others happy so that they´d give you happiness too, in the end. That´s how it works, right? Well, not really, not just.

In the water, stroke after stroke, things cleared, became liquid, and solid again. I am doing my lenghts and I have to realize that I endure more than I think.

medianera´s sweet treat

ecoute moi

29.10.2010 it was all there

There are things that one would think need not be said, not because they are useless, but because they are – or should – be known, be felt.

There are many things that I don’t bother saying, because I think I’d be misunderstood, pleonastic, pathetic. Pitied.

There are things that cannot be said, because they necessarily shatter against the surface of reality and the collision’s fragments are thrown back at your face and you have to be quick to shun them.

Fact is that communication is a state of art, a daily and underestimated challenge. The most fascinating one, for me.

Fact is that adults lose their ability to speak out the truth of their thoughts, they stop talking, understanding, they hide themselves behind habits and they become grey.

Fact is that I might be misunderstood, pleonastic, pathetic and that I am in fact afraid of being pitied by you, but when I feel, I have to share. And I am thankful I still have the courage to do it, after all.

reaching the Shore

Stephen Shore. I went to see an exhibition with some of his works last year. It was a great escape back then. It is, quite unexpectedly, today too. How consoling that there are people so eager and capable to express, capture, share.

confetti

It´s like in the movies.
There´s this wedding, my brother´s wedding.
I came back to what I still call home, even though I have been living in another country for over 10 years now. Home is my harbour, emotionally speaking. But it can also be the gloomiest and strangest place to be. It is where I long to be when I am not feeling well, but it is also where I can feel worse within a few hours after leaving the airport.
  
So it´s like the movies, where you should be all excited and it´s all about hairdo and outfits and high-heels and so on. But excited I am not. I am happy for my sibling, he is crowning his love story with a very fine and good woman and there´s nothing more moving to witness. Yet the idea of having to smile the hell out of myself with people that I haven´t seen in ages and I have never seen all-together-all-at-once terrifies me. It was actually a pleasant thought until two weeks ago but then something changed and everything else changed too.

I will try not to look like the strange, irritable, maladjusted expat sister, though right now it´s what I am and I really have a hard time feeling a connection with most of the people around me.
Except for a psychiatrist friend and an expat one. Just a coincidence?