Splits and Ends

We've been together for thirteen years, Mark and I. We've been through two marriages, one divorce, countless moves, and the birth of four children.

I nearly cheated on him, precisely two years ago this week, in London - because UBlend dared me to. But the stakes were too high, back then.

But now we've been in a long-distance relationship for a year and a half, me constantly juggling my schedule to connect with him when I'm in the States. We last saw each other in June. There's something perfectly comfortable about our relationship - he's seen me at my worst, and at my most polished. He always makes me feel good about myself, but ... you know, the long distance thing hardly ever works.

As much as I didn't want to accept it, life does move on. People change. Lives change. And I looked hard at myself in the mirror last week and realized that I just couldn't go on any longer like this. A girl has certain, ahem, needs.

And so, I braced myself for the misery of finding someone new. I've heard terrible horror stories. The awkwardness of it all. How now I would be in that uncomfortable position of having to explain things to someone, in a language I'm not fluent in, that Mark always just ... knew, without asking. We had our own comfortable rhythm, a predictable banter borne of years of shared experiences.

Sometimes, life surprises you. You brace yourself for the worst, and every now and again, something amazingly magical happens. You find exactly what you were looking for, precisely where you'd least expect it: your very own tiny hilltop town in Italy. And today, as much as I really, really do miss him, tonight I am seriously grooving on my new amazingly sassy haircut and color, courtesy of the New Girl. The one who I looked at in a panic, when I didn't know quite how to explain what I expected from my color/highlights experience, and I simply said ... "I have complete trust in you, I am in your hands."

Three hours later, walking across the piazza just before lunch today, I got THREE compliments on my new 'do. And one very suggestive look up-and-down. Oh! I had forgotten what it feels like to LOVE my hair, it's been ... months... a dry spell, of sorts. Oh, the sheer, unbridled JOY!


Considering how fragile I've been feeling lately, there are not words sufficient to describe my palpable relief. Because I honestly don't think I could have taken the deflated self-image that comes from a hair tragedy, or - worse - a bad string of rebound hairdresser relationships, chairhopping through the Tuscan countryside.

And Mark and me? Oh, I know it's a cliche, but we'll still be friends. I'm sure we'll get together every time I'm back in town, old habits die hard. And maybe I'm just justifying it, but I daresay he'd even LIKE her.



PS: Are you in DC? Hating your hair? Go see Mark, PR@Partners in Tenleytown on Wisconsin Ave. Tell him that his favorite Italian resident sent you, and she misses him but she's gonna make it after all. ;>

Reflections

We are all mirrors to each other. And here – without the buffer of a lifetime of relationships to rely on or perfect language smoothing over the harshness - this reality is more glaringly obvious.

Every time we interact with someone, we are holding up a mirror. It is how WE have chosen to see the other person. And the reflection we give back in turn becomes an almost indelible part of how she views herself.

It’s in our actions, in our eyes, in our words. Do we purposely speak too fast for her to follow? Are we dismissive and derisive? Do we smile genuinely, or avoid eye contact as we offer a backhanded compliment? Do we delight in their struggles, their imperfect moments (because we feel better by comparison), or are we encouraging, truly complimentary, kind… calling attention only to the other's best assets?

There are people in each of our lives – oxymoronic “nemesis friends” - who are those horrible contorted funhouse mirrors. While it seems like a joke, they reflect back at us, by their actions and attitudes, magnified versions of our weak spots. Shining unflattering, harsh lights on the less-polished parts of ourselves, things we might wish we could change. They delight in capturing and magnifying moments of imperfection.

And then there are those who, instead, show me a reflection of my very best self. The person I strive to be, the one I am in my very best moments. Those mirrors minimize the negative, with the angle and lighting ‘just so’ accentuating our positive qualities. Encouraging us to see the beauty that they see, glazing over the less-attractive parts. They are the people whose eyes see into our souls, and reflect goodness back at us in a hazy, soft light.

Yes, we are all mirrors.
And it is ours to choose which mirrors we surround ourselves with: which ones we place far out of reach and those in which we are able to catch reassuring daily glimpses of ourselves.

I am immeasurably thankful to have a handful of mirrors in my life who make me feel witty, brave, kind, vulnerable in only good ways, beautiful, generous, sexy, capable, charming. Who believe in the person that sometimes I am unable to see. It is those mirrors I look to when I am uncertain. They encourage me. Show me the possibilities. And when I look to them, I can believe.

“We don't see one another often, but it doesn't negate the fact that my heartbeat matches yours, and failing that, plays cymbal to your fierce and wonderful bass.”

“I just can’t imagine there’s much that would stop you for very long.”

I am awed by the power of those casual words, coming from distant friends. Even from far away, their reflections inspire me. And I stand straighter and stronger, able to confront the darkness. I am fiercer and more wonderful, because that it is how they reflect me to myself.

Choose your mirrors wisely. Your true reflection depends on it.

I don't even recognize myself.

On the agenda this morning: harvesting fennel seeds from the plants in my yard, to be dried and used this winter to season pork.

And tomorrow, if it stops raining:

I'll gather sage to make a large batch of sage/walnut pesto to freeze.

And collect the spent lavender blossoms to make into smelly sachets for linen closets and drawers.

I have totally been body snatched. Send help!! (Preferably someone who fits the aforementioned type who can chop firewood and help me eat a good fennel-encrusted pork tenderloin).

You didn't ask, but,

I'm the first to admit that my 'type' is usually* the clean-cut boy. (UBlend always teases me that he can spot my most-likely guy in a crowd when we're out together). It's the well-groomed, college-professor (usually bespectacled) type. It always has been. Without exception, all of my broken hearts have come from men who fit just that description. (*Well, except Johnny Depp, of course. But he's sort of enigmatic; simultaneously all types and none.)

But, especially here in Italy, I do have to concede that there's something, a certain je ne sais quoi about the slightly scruffy, brooding, motorcycle riding, longish and wild curly haired guy.

I just returned from the third trip to the vet this week (gravely sick farm cat). And he (the vet not the cat), coming in from the rain, shook off his wavy jet black hair and pulled it haphazardly back into a ponytail.

It does violate one of my major rules about men (he can't have prettier hair than me), but ... damn.

I'm just saying.

Totally Unsolicited Endorsements - IV

Funny what you miss, being so far away.

The last time I was back in the States, I realized I didn't know any of the new music being played on the radio in the rental cars (the music scene is completely different here, and mostly in Italian).

And I realized, in a moment of sheer horror, that I have already become (with my old Norah Jones and Mary Chapin Carpenter and Counting Crows and Andrea Bocelli and Neil Diamond (!?!) CDs) that thirtysomething woman who listens to 'oldies'. Those might as well be 8-tracks for as fast as the music world moves.

I've had an Ipod (her name is "With Envy" - she's a green mini) for a while, just hadn't been so good about using it. When I moved here, I went through the entire exercise of putting all my music into Itunes, but still carried my favorite CDs over with me. And they are what I played, for months.

My last two trips back to the states have changed me, completely. (I remember the moment, sitting in the car, when he handed me his Ipod headphones and said ... here, listen to this.) It was the first time I had heard a truly 'new' - okay, new TO ME - song in the longest time. And in that moment, I realized that my life had an entire soundtrack. That song had just been added. And I could carry it with me, wherever I went.

But how does your life's soundtrack evolve? If you don't have anything other than ... what's already in your music library? And no radio? And no friends handy to shove their Ipods into your hands, saying "listen to this". Wandering blindly through Itunes snippets on your own is a time-sucking recipe for disaster.

The answer?

www.pandora.com

It's completely free, from the Music Genome Project. You tell it what you already like, a song or an artist, and it makes recommendations for you. And plays them (did I say FREE?), like streaming radio. And you say "thumbs up" or not, and it keeps making more recommendations, playing more songs for you.

And you can add to your life's soundtrack, one song at a time. It's magical. It has, indeed, opened the Pandora's box of what I have budgeted to spend on music monthly (since of course I want to buy the songs I hear and like)! Finally, a brand that's honestly named.

It really is like having that conversation with a friend, over and over again, the one in the car that day: "here, listen to this song ... "




PS: I just, literally, laughed out loud and nearly snorted wine through my nose while typing this. A song just shuffled through reminding me of every crazy bit of my Southern roots, the lyric sang: "Don't tempt me, I'm where I wanna be. 'Cause on the 8th day, God made Sweet Tea."

Oh, Pandora. Bless your heart.

It must be random physical disfigurement month

I have always been a namer of things.

My car is Simon. My computer is Blu. Once upon a time, I had a grapefruit-sized tumor named Carl.

I am now reassuring myself that the THING that is rapidly buying up real estate on my left eyelid must be some sort of vicious, oddly-placed, stress-induced adult acne. Because it CAN'T be a bug bite, right? I mean, how unlucky can one person be in a month - after living here for more than a year with NONE?

Either way, he's large and red and angry. And hurty. And very, very un-pretty. (No, you do NOT get a photo. Geez. You'd have to a virgin Viaggiatore reader to not know that it's a RARE RARE occasion that I post pics of myself, so the odds that you're getting to see me looking like this are, um, ZERO, unless you're dropping by unexpectedly tonight.) I have christened him Arthur, and he needs to leave soon so I can go out of the house again without giant JackieO sunglasses on. Failing that, I just hope it's really, really sunny for the next few days.

Aaaah, life. Even in the comparative paradise of bella Toscana, it's still true: if it's not one damn thing, it's another.

Arthur's on notice: if he stays much longer, he'll have to register at the Questura and show his visa. The authorities are not amused.

Because there are no words.

Because I was in Washington DC, steps away from the US Capitol.

Because that day is woven, forever, into the fiber of my being.

Because living it once was enough; I do not need to watch it again.

Because it was simultaneously five years, five minutes, and five lifetimes ago.

Because there are no words, and yet ... not enough words:

Moments of silence are insufficient, but they are all I have.

I remember.

Shaking and stirred

This weekend was a veritable cacaphony of feelings, all smashed up together in something loud and impressive, but not even closely resembing harmony. I bet you can identify:

With that feeling like you just want to grab someone firmly by the shoulders and shake him vigorously? Because you're standing there, watching, while that person does something colossally, immeasurably stupid and it seems like everyone can see it but him? Situational blindness; we all have it - about something.

You can identify with that feeling - the combination of helpless and hopelessness, because you know you can't do it; reach out and shake him. Mostly because your arms don't reach that far. But even if they did, you would fight yourself to keep them still at your side. Because it wouldn't matter. Because we all have to own our situational blindness. Sometimes, that's all we have: pointless action; the flailing of arms frantically trying to stop a freefall through the narrow point in the hourglass. Falling is scary. But you must. Because the truth of the matter is that even if you succeed in stopping it temporarily, there's nowhere to go but down - in this case, forward - reversing back "up" the hourglass does not exist.

***

And aside from all that, I bet you can identify with the feeling of knowing that you really, really don't want to go OUT THERE and DO something; that you'd rather go back into your comfy, cozy shell and stay there. But (sigh) you know you must ... push yourself out there. OhGod, it's akin to coming out of the womb, every fucking time, and it doesn't get easier. But you put on your party shoes and lipstick, grab a bottle of wine, and march yourself out the door. And once you're there, you're glad you pushed. Because life is made up of moments like this.

Fleeting moments of laughter, of greasy fingers and the most amazing ribs on a grill, of a shy smile from a child, of a glance and a nod across the crowded piazza, sitting under the night sky eating homemade gelato. The moment when you realize that someone is a kindred spirit. Of peace amidst the chaos. Of the song beneath the song. The moment when you know that you know. Clarity. Shhhhhh.

Those moments are, ultimately, all we have.
Each is a card in the hand of the game of life.
The joy is (should be) in playing, not in the outcome.

***

You can identify, probably, with feeling like sometimes you just put one foot in front of the other, uncertain of where you're going, but that you think you'll know it when you get there. In the meantime, you know you must keep ... moving. Purposefully if you can, or just float with the current. Fight against the urge to flail. And you learn something new every day. And you savor the moments, adding cards to your hand, uncertain of how the game will end.

***

You can identify, I hope, with having a friend who loves you so much that it's almost as if he knows exactly what you need, when you need it. Yesterday, a little cranky after receiving the not-so-welcome-news that I have an unexpected trip back to the states in four weeks, I got this card in the mail:


"i was never meant to fly coach!"

And he's right, of course. About all of it: that running 'to' is much, much harder than running 'from'. That things will work out, the way they're supposed to. That it's about playing the game, even when it's hard. And that I was never meant to fly coach. (Though it seems neither my budget nor my boss has gotten that message?)

***



Sometimes life deals you a hand you don't quite know how to play.
But you can't fold.
You're in the moment.
Stay in the game, bluff your way through it, and pray you draw a window seat.

Baby's just a little bit tired of the city,

Billboards and bullshit got her down
Seems like you need a little hill country,
a little back roads driving, a little bit of that ole' top down.
Everybody's gotta get away sometime.
Forget about yourself for a while
Seems to be that all you need is a ragtop car and a ride with me ...

Those are the lyrics to one of my very favorite driving songs (Carry On, Pat Green).
And damn if life sometimes just gives ya what you need when you need it. Back in what now feels like the olden days (before BiteWeek 2006), there were The Roadtrips.

Yes, two of my very favorite friends, The Benders (Barky & Bimbo), have a new convertible. And they loved me enough to spend two consecutive weekends trying valiantly to pull me out of my funk. By putting me in the back of their car and driving until I could no longer feel my face nor my broken heart anymore. And of course, filling me with copious amounts of wine. And laughing while I sported the cancer-patient-evoking back-seat-of-the-convertible head scarf look (then again, some of my very best friends are cancer patients, so IMHO the look is VERY chic and stylish).


There were Tuscan hilltop towns and windy roads filled with vines and cypresses.

There was Opera. Because it's Italy. Because it was the Puccini Festival. Because it was Tosca, one of the most famous and tragic of all operas. (Spoiler Alert!): Everyone dies in the end, big-ly and tragically and dramatically. Go see it. Really, especially when you're depressed. Instant upper: how bad does your life NOT suck by comparison?!

There was a Sagra. Apparently the word "sagra" means, loosely, festival. Party. And this time of year, there's one in pretty much every town. Each generally revolves around a gastronomic specialty of the area: we've seen sagras for steak, sagras for pork, sagras for wild boar, sagras for bruschetta... you get the idea. This one, sporting what must be the world's largest frying pan, celebrated the local delicacy, the porcini mushroom. And, OMG, it was heavenly. Sitting at one of hundreds of red-checkered tableclothed tables, under the midsummernights'dream evoking canopy of trees in the public park in Cortona, listening to bad Italian deejays and the harmony of the fountain, making friends with the family at the next table.

There was a visit to one of our favorite wineries, Collosorbo, to restock our dwindling cellars.

There was Jack Johnson on the car stereo. There was the sunset. There were the lazy, devoid of purpose wanderings of a trio, traveling with the luxury of time to see and do nothing other than enjoy the windy roads and fresh air ... a sharp contrast to the agenda-laden travel of those here on holiday, cramming it all in. The benefits of living here: it'll be here, next weekend. And the one after, and the one after that, if we don't get there today.


There was attendance at a contrada (neighborhood) dinner in Montepulciano, in a giant circular brick room with gorgeous vaulted ceilings, where we sat at long, communal tables, ate amazing penne al fumo, and watched as the proud locals drank a heck of a lot of wine and then chanted what must be the equivalent of "fight songs" between tables. The contrade are a way of life here, the neighborhood in the town that you live in. A small town like Montepulciano has eight, I think.
Each has its own flag, a crest of sorts, and during town celebrations like this everyone sports their 'colors' proudly in scarves and shirts. Barky and Bimbo commented that they wanted to go back to a different contrada next time around until we've done them all, but I'm already feeling loyal to the red-and-black of Voltaia ... golly, I already have the scarf!

There was much sangria bianca e rossa. And outdoor dancing in a crowd under the stars, to a cheezy italian duo singing, among other things, bad Lionel Richie ("all night long": oh, MY.) and Gloria Gaynor. There was much embarrassment about what America exports to the world, as we listened to the crowd of Italians singing along.

Sometimes you've gotta grab the world with your own two hands,
set it spinning off on a course all your own.
Take yourself a big bag for your shoulder,
find yourself some good times, and bring 'em on back home.

Good times, fun people, and souvenir scarf to remember it all by: found.
And stuffed into the big bag on the traveler's shoulder.

You only get one life to live, and if you live it right, one should be enough.

Lessons

Maybe Unassuming Princess was right, that BiteWeek 2006 was supposed to teach me something.

It did, actually. A lot of things.

It taught me that people can surprise you. Turns out the slightly smarmy, slick-backed hair pharmacist at the top of the hill in town is actually incredibly kind, gentle, and patient. And more like a walk-in doctor's office. (CVS/Walgreens/RiteAid - eat your hearts out!) When I would take (yet another!) prescription in, he came out from behind the counter, "tsk-tsked" at how sloppy the guy at the emergency room had wrapped up my arm. So he re-cleaned, re-cortisone creamed, re-gauzed and re-netted my arm, THREE SEPARATE TIMES. And then wouldn't let me pay for the supplies that he had used; just filled my prescription. Full service, indeed!

It taught (okay, reminded!) me that Italians are brutally honest. When I stopped into the corner cafe, feverish and red and swollen, fresh from the emergency room, beautiful Federico the barman said to me, "what happened?" And when I explained, he said, "I thought so. You look horrible." And it made me laugh. Honesty is a good thing.

It taught me that sometimes by doing what we think is the right thing, we inadvertently hurt those who love us. My friends here are amazingly kind, giving people who were hurt I didn't call on them sooner (damn that independent, self-reliant streak); I should let people help.

It taught me that I've come a long way, baby. Last Saturday, (because they didn't want me to be home alone after my night at the emergency room,) I was invited for a family lunch nearby. By coincidence, it was the same family I had lunch with on the THIRD day living here, more than a year ago. And this time around, I understood it all. And felt really, truly a PART of it, not a voyeur. I don't know exactly what the definition of "making it" is, but that feeling should be bottled.

And sometimes, even when you're "making it," and damn proud of yourself for it, home seems really far away. They say "home is where the heart is". I've always said home is where my stuff is. Both are kind of true. Home is where you can feel, and behave, like your true self, and people love you anyway.

And, yes, as I sat alone in that emergency room, I knew with complete clarity who I really wanted to be there, squeezing my hand to reassure me when I felt panicky and not sure I could breathe. (And, for that matter, who I was quite relieved wasn't there.) Friends *are* the families we choose for ourselves. Panic begets absolute clarity of thought for some people, I am among them. All the stupid crap melts away. It becomes laughingly obvious - when you are threatened - how unimportant some things are, and how much others really do mean.

Today, I walk not just with a lighter arm, but with a clearer head.
I am reminded that the only guarantee I have is today.
Making different choices than I might have last week: not for the rest of my life, but to be happy RIGHT NOW.

Because life's too short: to drink cheap wine (as goes the cliche.)...to be dishonest (mostly with yourself)...to not tell someone you love them...to be unhappy... to flail against the current of the water.

God have mercy on the man who doubts what he's sure of*. Indeed.

And so tonight, I toss back the last handful of anti-everythings, washed down with a big ole' bourbon on the rocks. (Love you, The Mom: Screeh, Screeh.)
Lessons, summarily swallowed.
Mmmmmmm. Feels like home.

It's nice to be back.



*(hat tip for the Springsteen lyrics: cupcake!)

I'm positively swoony with feelings of love

... or maybe it's all the meds.

(I should not be blogging under the influence.)

But I've gotta say thanks. (Momma didn't raise a rude child.)

Between the comments and emails and calls that I've received, I really really can't thank you all enough for your good vibes and generally chipper thoughts during what I'm christening "BiteWeek 2006", and its' less-life-threatening, but perhaps-emotionally-more-draining prelude, The Funk.

When the going gets tough, you do find out who your friends are.
So, thanks - you. And you and you and you. You know who you are, and more importantly, so do I.

Love you. Mean it.

xoxo,
almost-feeling-like-me, V.

Can't talk, coming down!

There's a light at the end of the tunnel. Swelling actually receding!
For the first day in six, I feel like something other than death warmed over. My yelps of glee can be heard on surrounding hilltops, to be sure.

Can't chitchat, though, since I'm going out to partake in an American Holiday Weekend tradition: mowing the lawn. Because, sensibly, when you've been bitten and laid flat out by something small and vicious, the logical thing to do is go out and tempt fate with an afternoon in the great untamed outdoors. Oh, pshaw: you know what they say - that which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger.

(Have I learned nothing from Steve Irwin?)

I just keep repeating to myself, "no, that light is NOT an oncoming train."

Day Six: Isn't this over yet???

I know, you're tired of reading about my medical drama. (Not nearly as tired as I am of HAVING the drama, believe-you-me.)

And so, eight inches became twelve.
Fourth trip to the (very kind) pharmacist, who changed the dressings on the blister.
Fever spiked.
Second emergency room: in the "big city" this time.
Three doctors having spider vs. scorpion discussion.

Third set of injections.
Four: total number of prescriptions.
Seven saintly neighbors.
Zero euros spent on actual medical attention
Fifteen hours sleeping, waking only to add meds to the system.

Today, from the encouraging department:
Twelve inches and holding.
("not-getting-worse" gets filed in the good news category!)
Fever is down. Heat of swollen skin is down.
Blisters have stopped oozing.

I'm all hopped up on cortisone and antibiotics and painkillers, and I have a newfound awe and respect for small creatures.

My inner scientist is admittedly a bit fascinated.
My outer tough-girl is hanging in like a trooper.
My inner "exception to every medical rule" is baffled and just a little bit freaked out.

Six days?!?!?

Hey, would you just squeeze my hand really hard and tell me it will be okay? Thanks.
Because sitting here alone on this hilltop, I need to believe you.

8 inches of swollen, hot, throbbing flesh

(Oh, don't I wish that were nearly as exciting as it sounds.)

So since I know you're hanging on my every word (hah!), here's the latest:
Overnight, the "index card" of hot, inflated redness turned into the ENTIRE back side of my upper arm.

Shoulder to elbow.
(and of course, looking online it says "you should consult a doctor immediately if you have swelling 'across two major joints - for example, from your shoulder to your elbow'." Then again, type just about anything into WebMD and you can convince yourself you have cancer.) I'm no doctor, but I think this really isn't good.

Back to pronto soccorso (emergency room).

Big needle. Dizzy head. Draining my inner Tuscan.

Doctor: "che bel infezione c'e l'hai"
(what a beautiful infection you have!)

Me (gulping back tears): Beautiful?!? You want it? Take it!

So much for 'wait for the venom to be absorbed'approach. Now it's antibiotics.
And somehow, I'm not convinced we've heard the end of this. Just a crazy feeling.

Don't bats *eat* spiders? Maybe this is a demonstration from the bats' union to show me just how much I'd be sad without them. Okay, I give. Bring on the bats. Just make *this* go away.

Thank goodness I'm almost never sick, because I'm a really really crappy patient. In any language.