About Prague (and more)

Ok, now a short account of my Czech weekend..and something more.

We leave for Prague on Thursday evening, worried because the forecast announced three days of rain and clouds, with the final day accompanied by a storm, nothing less! So my previous packing list is thrown away, and the new one sees me leave wearing long trousers and a shirt plus sweater, while in the luggage I have my jeans, one more shirt and a sweater; mum takes THREE sweaters, a pair of warm trousers, autumn shoes, and she wears a long-sleeve shirt with warm trousers.
We arrive some time after 10 pm, go straight to the hotel, and to bed; me, I am very nervous because I don’t know where we are exactly, and I hate being in a country where English is not the main language, so that I know that I will convert my real English to some sort of badly spoken English and I'll spend my time worrying that people will not understand me. Anyway.
The morning after we wake up and I open the window…to the sunniest day I have ever seen! We go out after breakfast and we get the tube to the Old Town, where we walk up and down the streets, on Charles’ bridge, in the Jewish districts, and we walk, we walk, we walk.
I should mention that at 10 we have booked a river cruise with complimentary drink, so the first walk of the morning after booking it is only to kill some time before we meet with our guide and go for the cruise. At 9.40 we rush to H&M in Na Prikope where I buy a pair of shorts to avoid death by suffocation…I spend the next three days wearing those same shorts, and although they are thigh-short, sometimes I even pull them upper…
So the first day passes without incidents, we walk a real lot and see most of what has to be seen, excluding the synagogues, which I would have liked to visit, but mum couldn’t be bothered. Never mind. At 9 pm we have reserved a whole hour at the hotel’s fitness centre, which is actually a small room with a treadmill and a stretching area, a sauna and..the Jacuzzi. While we walk back to the hotel, I see something on the sidewalk, which looks like the corner of a 100-crown note, so I pick it up. Mum starts saying “what are you doing, put it down!” (doesn't this sound like she's talking to a baby rather than to her 30-year old daughter...), but I say “it’s money!”, and she shuts up at once, and hides the bunch of notes in her bag. In the hotel we count them, a fountain of notes springing from the envelope: 4.300 crowns, about 200 euros! When we tell dad, once at home, he links this lucky incident to the fact that in the morning, like all the tourists on Charles’ Bridge, we touched and took a picture of the statue of Saint John, which must be touched to have good luck…and we did have good luck! Blimey, if I had thought of that I would have touched it every day for the rest of our weekend! And maybe wished for…
Anyway, the evening is spent in the Jacuzzi, to rest our poor tired feet and marvel at my luck. We don’t go out, we never do, because we are evening persons, we like to wake up early and make the most of the day.
So the morning after, while half the tourists in Prague are still sleeping, we are crossing Charles’ bridge heading for the Little Town, where we catch the bus for the Castle. And there we spend the next four and a half hours; I remembered it was a beautiful place, but not this beautiful. Must be because ten years ago it was cold and snowy and I was very tired because my classmates had partied all night in the hotel’s corridors... (I have always been a morning person, unfortunately for my teenage..).
In the afternoon we go shopping, or at least we try, because mum is craving for a pair of light summer shoes…but shoes in Prague are as expensive as in Italy, so we decide not to get any..after walking into five different shops!
We are back in the Jacuzzi at 5 pm, and after that we go back to the Old Town because we have the tickets for a puppet show, Mozart’s "Don Giovanni". I’d better not comment on that, but put it this way: Mozart was a fun man, so he would have liked it; and the show has been on for more than ten years, and the puppeteers were actually good.
On Sunday we have booked a trip to Karlstejn Castle, so off we go, and we spend about four hours altogether there, visiting the castle I had already visited ten years ago, which is actually beautiful. When we are back in town we go back to the Little Town, catch the funicular and go above the castle, to a tower made by the same Eiffel guy of the Paris tower, only a smaller version. We climb it, admire the marvellous landscape of Prague, we get down, we go to the mirror maze, which is something that has always fascinated me, and then back in town, where we walk and walk and walk.
Our night is concluded by yet another round of Jacuzzi, and the packing of luggage, and the planning of the last day, which is taken up by a trip to Hutna Kora, some 70 km east from Prague. We see the ossuary (unbelievable! I’ll try to put some pictures next time, the whole “chapel” is decorated by bones of more than 40.000 corpses! Macabre but ingenious, I’ll admit), walk around the lovely town, stop for a traditional lunch (soup, goulash, dessert, a pint and the final liqueur), and then we end with a visit to the cathedral. We are brought back in town, and we rush to the tube, then to the bus, then to our terminal, then to our check-in, and then we relax and spend the last crowns on a shirt for Brother Genius (who left for Valencia this morning, where a friend of his is getting married on Saturday), a horrible sandwich for me, and then coffee and muffin on the plane.

We get home and the temperature is..low! 17 degrees, and rain! And I am wearing my shorts and shirt, thinking that I would be back to another hot place like it was in Prague…

Today I spent the day in the most normal way, giving lessons, being tortured for two hours by the S&S guy, and looking at things to do for the summer, because I’ve been thinking that spending a couple of months working in the UK wouldn’t be a bad idea; so I found a few interesting posts where I’ll apply tomorrow, and at the same time I thought about getting the certification of TESOL, for teaching English to non-english speakers. And that is what I plan to do for the next hour, reading the files I’ve saved and think practically about this idea; I’ve got some money saved, so I can use it for something useful, right? And while I’m there to study I can find some part-time job, just to pay for the accommodation, nothing much.

I sent a message to the guy I’ve talked of in one of my last posts, saying that I was looking for a job in England for the summer, and he replied instantly saying that it was a good thing, so that then “they” could come and see me. I can’t wait to see him on Friday, and mostly on Saturday, when we have a concert and then a dinner with the band and our hosting band, and..well, these are the best occasions to start things, I believe. We’ll see what happens, ok?
Ok, now I have to work a little, then, so that tomorrow I’ll have clearer ideas on what to do.
Updates to come soon.

Pictures of Trieste (I made it at last)

Trieste on our last day seen from the "beach" - if by "beach" you accept a large stretch of sidewalk full of bodies lying in the sun, and hidden from the road by a thick set of bushes...

Baby friend and an evil cat (yes, I know it looks like a nice sweet cat right now...but after the picture was taken, the mask of kitty-kitty fell and...EVIL CAT appeared!)

Chorus friend and me on our last day in the White City: now, aren't we beautiful???

Nice, aren't they?

I'm back

Just a few lines to update.

Adjectives for Prague: beautiful,sunny, extremely hot (had to run and buy shorts on the first day, seen as the forecast was for rain and cold and I only had long trousers), white, crowded, noisy, easy, big.

Things not to do again: think that my Visa electron is accepted everywhere, because, matter of fact, in Prague IT IS NOT.

Things to do today: prepare for the afternoon lesson; think about a summer job (right now); try to upload the Trieste pixies one more time; go to gym; pick cherries from our tree; write full account of our journey to Prague so next time I am on Blogger I can post it; finish book; tidy mess in room; bring films to photo shop; take back photos once developed; buy album for photos; start tidying photos.

My, there are still so many things I need and want to do. Come on, let's go!

Happy chaos

Well, so…while listening to some music that will later be uploaded on my brand new mp3 player (!!!), I need to recap a bit of what’s happened lately. I guess it will come by instalments, because there are thoughts and facts and feelings, and all together is definitely too much, all at once. Plus, I will use it as an excuse for my laziness, it’s late and I’ve got lots of things to do tomorrow…we are leaving for Prague in three days, and I don’t even know how much money we should put on my credit card before we leave…

It’s been an incredible time, and yet it has all been so ordinary…I have been teaching and teaching, working out, going by bike, as said before I’ve been to the White City (for nothing, really…), and I have received my final payslip with an enormous amount of money for the end of my work there…I’ve never seen all those money together, and probably will not see it again for a long time..but I intend to make good use of what I have now, and sort my life properly.
So, first of all about the meeting with my shrink today: a very positive time. I am living this good period, this sunlight, this days filled of lessons and home, and bike and errands, and concrete plans, and peaceful thoughts on where to lead my life. And the shrink got it all. The Transformation Game did nothing but take out of me things I already had, already knew, Socrates-like. It gave me more consciousness on my resources and my possibilities, it filled me with hope and practical advice on myself, on my life. And as I said today, I am a warrior. I have always been. In the past months I have lost myself so bad that I had changed inside, forgetting what it was like to be me. Of course I have changed a lot during the years, but my me, the one that is now writing these lines, is closer to what I used to be: optimistic, loud, energetic, messy. My light is back.
Practical thoughts that have accompanied me along this short yet long way: most of my friends (my same age or slightly younger) have taken ages to graduate, some of them finished three or even four years after me. While they virtually wasted their time by just living in their uni cities, studying and doing little more, I graduated and travelled, I taught in Wales, I worked in England, I did some four jobs before landing here, I read and thought, I studied and learnt more about the world, and myself, and who I want to be, and what I like and what I would like to know more, and the people around me.
I am now back to reading, the Pleasure of pleasures, I am back to singing (I had almost forgotten how to sing, folks, how sad to think), I am nearly back to writing (my personal therapy to maintain sanity, and another Pleasure of pleasures) when time will allow (i.e., after Prague), and I am back to loving.
So, fact number two which shrink wanted to see was if on that side I had made any step forward, seen as on the other sides there have been improvements: I have a clearer idea of what I want to do (teach), a half idea of how to do it (teaching courses, plus I can apply to public schools and evening schools), and moving, leaving home is not a problem anymore, actually I’m finally back to that feeling of “must-go-and-get-free”, which I was feeling before getting trapped into the car-debt and what followed. Before becoming someone that was not me. Now, as I mentioned before, I may be on the way to look for someone to love, and may have found him already: we are exchanging texts, and we have nearly “risked” to spend a whole day together at the BookFair, last Sunday. He is kind and sweet, and I have thought of him often, these days. When I am back from Prague I will see that we meet more often. One thing I have promised to myself (and to the shrink) is that I am not going to hide anymore.
The theme of hiding was recurrent during all my life, and it doesn’t need a specialist that I hide to protect myself from the fear of being refused or hurt. That it depends on bad experiences of my past or what, it is of no importance, now. It must not be of any importance anymore. I have a couple of mantra that I should repeat over and over, to convince myself of something that deep inside I already know.
But this is material for instalment number two. And I must really post all this mess before I leave!!!


…so, to continue…
Apparently I cannot really apply to teach for state schools because I only have half exam when a whole one is needed…which makes me wonder…how did Mama friend get into the list, sees as she has the same exams I have???
Anyway…the solution is already here, though: part one, we (Unions’ guy and I) apply all the same by presenting only the list of exams, and the schools will be in charge of investigating to see if it’s a one-semester or one year-exam…Part two, I enrol for a single course at uni and get the missing semester (or missing exam, I have a few options) while waiting, and then I register and try to pass the exam for the teaching school.
Pragmatically, I will find the missing info on the teaching school (I already have some, it’s just slightly confusing..but that’s just the way Italy is, sadly..), then I will print the list of my uni exams, and find the info on single courses at uni, finally I will present my application in the schools.
In the meantime, I already have a long list of public schools that can do what they like and that is where I will start from, by sending my cv, as soon as I am back from Prague. Tomorrow I will find more schools (the list so far includes schools from five counties, I need a couple more to enlarge the field of possibilities). Also, when I am back from Prague I will see teacher friend to give her my cv, because maybe she can help me somehow in a public school of our valley.
Little by little, folks, but things are moving!

On the gym side, because it’s awfully hot outside, but we keep working out, I am sweating on the matt three evenings a week, and tonight I got my personal plan updated with lots of stuff for tummy and core stability: a whole hour spent crunching and pulling the fitball and moving back and forth while trying not to fall…keep your abs contracted, baby, they told me, you’re doing great!
Yeah. I am.

Tomorrow (or should I say today, as tomorrow IS today while I’m posting this) I am not teaching and so the plans are to finish here, have a nice run, maybe do the chores in the afternoon, prepare the clothes and stuff to pack, and read some more. Also, watch C.S.I., take a look at tomorrow’s lessons, do my nails (a-hem…), and maybe write a letter. I am thinking a lot about David, these days, and I really need to tell him all about my life at the moment. Sharing my pieces of mind with him is a refreshing action; there are some more people who should receive news from me, and I have promised I will do it soon. So, all I’m saying is, as always: keep the faith!
I am in the best possible mood now, and I would love to share my thoughts, my light, my happiness with all my beloved. Reach my hands out to you all, and hold you.
As I’m writing this it’s nearly 10.30 pm, and I have a book waiting for me, 200 pages to the end.
It feels so good.

Images from the White City

Ok...the idea WAS actually to post four pixies from our trip to Trieste...but blogger is slow, and the internet connection at home is even slower...so nevermind, maybe when I really feel like spending two hours waiting for an upload of images, ok?

Somebody to love?

End of the week: a week made of work, training, work, training, reading. One thing I had noticed during my depressive months was the absence of books. And of movies. I am back to reading a lot, and oh, I am back to dreaming, did I say that? Yes I did. But it does feel so good, and I want it to last.
The idea is that teaching is my path: and by coincidence, apparently the next four or five years will see a huge increase in the need of teachers, because the government is basically saying “retire now or work forever”, so most teachers are going to leave their places vacant for my generation. Good. So this is my first plan, to be acted little by little this coming week and the next. The other good thing is that now Spanish is being taught in high schools too, so I have more chances. Cool. Let’s start, then.
The other fact of the day is actually a sort of daydream I am acting out, and I don’t know if I should go on or not, but you know what? I am gaining a little confidence back, and I feel like I could give it a try.
So this is the story, no details: there’s a guy I have always liked. We chat, and we laugh, and he has become more and more close to me, to the point that, shy as he is, he comes over to say hello, to ask me about things I have done, and it’s nice. I have found him looking at me more than once, and..well, that’s it. I am shy and paralysed when it comes to this sort of things, and I don’t know about him…But on Friday I was walking to the car with shop-a-holic friend and we said goodbye to him, while talking of the huge book-fair of Turin where I would love to go, and where she is going with her boyfriend.
Yesterday I was watching Poirot and I thought I texted he guy, just to see his reaction: so I said that I wanted to invite him to go to Turin, but had forgotten the date and now it was too late and I hadn’t got anything organised, but if he felt crazy enough we could…He replied saying that oh no, he had plans to go trekking…And I replied saying not to worry, keep free for another time, ok? An hour later he texts me saying that since the forecast say it may rain tomorrow, would he be in time to leave with me? I think carefully about it, and I say that if he decides to go to Turin he can text me first thing in the morning, and we will meet and go; otherwise I will go back to bed, no problem. (a-hem: it takes a lot more messages than these three of four lines, and it is sweet, I think, because he is really interested in going, and in spending the whole day WITH ME!).
In the end I watch tv all evening (must stop watching Cold Case, it’s getting boring, and I can always guess who did it after ten minutes, and not because I am Sherlock Holmes, but because there is some sort of “secret” formula I found out), I go to bed and set two alarms, one on my radio and ten minutes later one on my mobile, which is on the discreet profile so I won’t get a hear attack when any message or call arrives. I wake up at 6, the first time…and again when the alarm clocks go off. It’s some time past 7, so I understand the weather’s good and we are not going to Turin, and back to sleep I fall. When I wake up again, and this time it’s almost 9 o’clock, I find his text saying that the sky is clear and he is going to the mountain, feeling so sleepy…
All I can do is smile and think about another occasion to meet, and I also think that any weekend is ok even for a simple walk and an ice-cream. I don’t tell him that, we don’t want to exaggerate, right? But something is on my mind…and it makes me smile.

A happy Sunday to you all, and a welcome to Philip for finding my blog and being so kind as to add it on his favourites: I have read some of yours too, so I am glad I can include you on my list of faves.
Love and sunshine***

The Transformation Game

Yesterday afternoon was all taken up by “The Transformation Game”, some sort of New Age game that my shrink thought would be useful in my therapy. I confess that I wasn’t thrilled at the thought of spending a whole afternoon there, with all the things I should have done. But I was also intrigued. And this is how it went.
(A-hem…Mind you, it’s quite difficult to explain all the rules).
I was playing with this other guy, who should have been some sort of mirror (and I for him), and first of all we were given our unconsciousness in an envelope, which contained a certain number of obstacles, of resources, and of angels, characteristics we own but (of course) we are not aware of.
The first angel drawn became a sort of guiding quality along the way. Mine is faith, as in Trust.
But first we must say what our intention is for the game, as in, what we aim to: me, I have this ambitious goal, to find again the joy of living. It takes a while to understand that it is what I want, hidden behind the need to find a job that I like, or a boyfriend, or a better body, or or or. But this is what I must and want to find: my vanished joy of living.
So, we position our little stones (mine blue, his green) in the main source from where we have to be born when we are ready. I am first with the dice and I am born straight away: so I am given this large card which represents my physical and material me; everything I do and everything is gain now (obstacles and all) must be considered in the light of my material me. I gain a lot of consciousness, by means of more little cards I draw along the game: what I gain is the idea of me that I already have, but which I have to make clear to myself, and these are my new consciousnesses:
- liveliness
- dance (dance? Me? Then I think about the summer party at the band, when I used to dance with friends, even though we cannot dance, and then I think about country dance and group dances, like the Macarena, which I used to dance too for fun during the Great Event of the Year)
- hug (because I love hugging people, and I restrain so often now)
- abundance (of feelings, I thought, and of things, on the material side, because I have lots of things. Shrink makes me focus on the fact that I always say “I have” rather than “I am”. This will come out later too)
- adventure (because I used to be ad adventurous girl, didn’t I? Pack and go!)
- style (because, no matter what, I have my style, and I had lost that when I was feeling so bad at work, when even my hair, of which I am so proud of, would be neglected in favour of a “barely brushed” look.
- Beauty. Now, would you believe it? But I knew. Deep under, I know I am beautiful, and it is not a matter of boasting, it is somehow like a song (unfortunately it’s Christina Aguilera): I am beautiful, in my own way, and I know it. Only, I suppose that by pretending to think that I am not, I can find a reason for not proposing myself, for not trying to be with people, for not saying that I love people. Because I am so sure that I will hear a “no” in reply, I don’t even start and I blame it on my not being beautiful. Let’s proceed.

Obstacles along the way: my ego is so fragile that a single wrong word makes me close and hide to the world. I put the card on the column of the problems to solve: if I don’t solve this, I won’t pass to the next level of myself. But I have a resource in my unconscious, and the resource is: to change my credo and accelerate the change; and the, to forgive. This is when I get a bit emotional, as we perform a sort of stand-up session (much like a club of anonymous alcoholics), and I have to read my card which goes like this:
I forgive the others; I forgive myself; I forgive my past experiences. I am free.

And I win more consciousnesses, which I don’t remember now. All in all, I have gained 10, when I needed only 6, but I am still on my physical level. And this is when I win what I needed, card of “help” for the other player(s), so I help the others and I help myself through it. The other guy can so get rid of his tears (obstacles) and I can pass to my emotional level.
It is the quickest level I play, because first of all I exchange two of my material consciousnesses for an emotional one, which is, guess what, happiness. I knew I had it. It’s deep down, you know. There is pain and bad memories and chains I have put myself around my wrists and legs, not to move, to feel always this bad and brood over more pain and nostalgia, to look back. But it’s there, here it is on my big card.

The next move is the transformation: we both perform it, and we pass to the mental level. I gain three consciousnesses, my exuberance, the power to visualize (see? All my daydreaming means something!) and…telepathy. I’m sorry, I want to believe and yet I find it hard. But still, it’s interesting.
Now, I have finished all my angels in the physical level (simplicity and peace), I have solved all my obstacles (in the physical level too), and I have one resource left. This resource is interesting, because it says that my personality irradiates trust. So, I am back to the beginning. And my unconscious is empty, I finish the game.
The other guy is not done yet, and I am allowed to play one more round to help him finish too. And guess what, I end on the “help” card, that lets him complete his game by extracting the last angel from his unconscious, and we can draw the last conclusions on the game and what we have found out of ourselves.

For me, it all revolves around the idea I have of myself, built around the fear of being rejected, which paralyses me. The key words are “I don’t have enough”, and the key idea to work on in order to solve it is “trust”. For of all, trust of myself, because I thought that I should gain more confidence and open myself to the world, but apparently first of all I have to open myself to…myself. Because I have to accept myself before being accepted. Or believing that people accept me, for what matters, because people already accept me, only I don’t realise it.
And oh, one more thing: I have to hug people more often. And tell them that I like them, if I do.

A very interesting game, and it showed things I knew already, while it cleared some ideas I had before, and again, I had forgotten or hidden.
So now it’s time to work.

Monday, Monday...little to say

It’s funny how I feel so well when I’m around, and then as soon as I hit home I am in deep darkness and spend the evening crying or feeling generally bad, full of regrets, or remorse, or just simple pain.
Last night I sent a couple of cv’s for translating jobs, and I so want to keep my hopes high…Then I found this beautiful offer for a library in a lovely region (where my brother also works), and saw that to apply I need to have a degree (check) and a since mine is the “old” degree, I also need a certificate of course as a librarian of at least 200 hours (crap).
And so I thought about September 2006, when I got all those info on courses, and a second degree in library science, and since that was too long and expensive I found the possibility to follow single courses at university, then thought better of it, because I had three more instalments to pay for the car and the insurance too, and and and. So I didn’t register and didn’t do the course and didn’t get the certificate that I would need so badly now to have a single, small, tiny chance for that beautiful job. What can I say apart from a gigantic DAMN? I’m a failure all over.
I am hyperactive, on the other side: I wake up early, I clean, prepare my lessons, jump around the house with extreme energy, and when I go to the gym after a lesson I work out with such enthusiasm and strength I didn’t think it possible. Like last night, when I worked out so much I couldn’t lift my arms to wash my hair, later in the shower; and after dinner I nearly fell asleep on the couch..and it was only 8 o’clock.

Ok, never mind

No, things are not going too well after all..
It all started with Friday night, when I went to the band in a slightly bad mood, because it was raining and I had had a long week made of lessons and errands, so without any time to think or act for my future, as in no time to think about it seriously and researching, and at the same time with mum’s look of “I’d like to ask you but am afraid of it”, because I am still trying to make sense of it all, and the sense is simply not there. Also, no time for writing: I am running from place to place, with the house to clean and the lessons to prepare, and I am still a fit-a-holic, so thanks, I would like to have my daily run or work-out session, if you don’t mind. Just because I am back to having a kind of dinner it doesn’t mean that I am giving up on training. Anyway.
Now, it’s been two weeks since I left my job, and still no time to investigate or think about any way to improve this situation: and this week I have got a full afternoon busy with that stupid game at the shink’s, and I am not happy about wasting a whole afternoon when I have lessons and I need time to think. Peace.
It annoys me that mum said that this would be my time off to find myself, but still she presses me over what I would like to do, over what I have thought or am thinking, over all this. I don’t seem to be getting any real time off my oppressing thoughts.
So Friday nights saw me at the band, where I arrived and first of all was told off by the conductor for not being there during a gig on Sunday afternoon; for god’s sake, I replied, I told you I was going to Trieste on Saturday, and it takes 5 hours to get there, did you want me to arrive at the station, say hello to my friend and jump on the first train to be back on the very same day? Just for playing a lousy hour?
So then I am told about the bassoon, because a teacher has been found and the cost of his lessons will be divided in two between the other band and us. Our conductor starts saying that maybe the day after (Saturday) I could…And that’s when I say that now, I would not be there on Saturday either, because I had forgotten about the small gig we are to do in the morning and therefore had set an appointment.
You will not be there tomorrow?
No, I am busy.
What is it that you have to do?, asks me sax partner, also member of the board. And this annoys me sooo much. Mind your own, hu?
I have to go away, I reply.
Conductor’s mad at me, and says that then what’s the point, let’s not even begin.
I go and put down my case which so far had weighted on me and my tense shoulder.
I go sit down and I am not happy at all. I think about going home, about telling conductor that ok, let’s not even begin, because by the way, I’ve quit my job and am seriously considering to move somewhere else, which could be an hour away if I am lucky, or 5 if I am even more lucky and get that job in Trieste. At the moment I am not happy at all. No.
Baby sax partner arrives and I ask for a hug, because she’s my hugging friend, and that is when the tears are back and I break again. I spend the next ten minutes in the bathroom, crying and saying that nothing is going to be fixed, nothing. I really feel that. I still do.
I go back, take my sax and play for a whole hour.
Drummer friend, my sweet, comes over after playing and we chat for a while, sexy shoulders joins in and I feel strange but slightly well.
Then conductor comes and gives me the bassoon, shows me the five pieces that make it a whole, makes me play a couple of notes and gives the book so I can start practising this week, because the first lesson will be on the 19th.
Then another guy of the board comes to me while I am chatting with shop-a-holic friend, and asks me if I am set with the bassoon, and if this is going to be the right time, the time when our band will have a bassoon at last. I think this is done purely out of courtesy, then I realize that it’s some sort of moral threat, as in “we are going to invest money and time on you, don’t you dare…”.
When I leave the band I feel heavy and trapped again.
I’ve been feeling this bad since, going over the possibility to tell them that we should just give up, before it’s too late. I think maybe I will.
This week I am going to look for..things. Just to see if I find some option for the months to come, some job, SOMETHING. One thing is sure, I am going to move. That. Is. For. Sure.
Because I feel even more trapped here at home, with parents asking me things every minute, commenting, suggesting. I cannot breath. I feel guilty if I sleep too much even when it’s a non-teaching morning, if I spend some time at home even if I spend it cleaning and tidying and ironing, I feel so bad when mum says goodbye before going to work and adds how tired she feels, I feel bad because I am taking this time to find a way that makes me happy, serene, calm, somehow, and even if I have no debts to pay, and I am half working after all (these lessons give me about 100 euros a week, which is like a part-time job), I feel as if I had thousands of euros to pay back, and I found myself opening a job magazine looking for jobs, the same kind of jobs I swore I would never do again for the sake of my mind. You understand that this is not good.
At the same time I don’t want to run and make the wrong decision, like I was thinking last night, when I thought about moving to a city where there is the most important university of psychology, and enrol, and work and study. I don’t know. Jesus, I am so confused.
I am not writing, except for these confused, depressed, schizophrenic posts. The thought of spending a couple of hours writing for fun, for the stories that are clogging my brain, the thought of taking some time off for myself without working makes me feel guilty too; the same thing happens when I go to the gym, or I take my run. Ok, my mind switches off and concentrates on the training, then, but as soon as I am in the shower, or getting changed, it’s crazy, and I think about mum saying “well, if you really have to run then run”, as if my only duty in life were to help her in the house and think about finding a job, after being so crazy to leave a “job for life” that was giving me money and confidence for the future, etc. etc.
On Friday night I was reading a letter from a friend of the band who now lives in Peru and works to build schools and improve life there. The guy says that there is the need for more hands to help, and more enthusiasm to put together the new children of the town, and as I was reading I thought “maybe this is what I should do”. It’s the first time I think such a thing, and I was almost shocked when I realised it. But again, I don’t want to take decisions in a hurry.
Now I will post all this, and work a bit more. Lessons are prepared, because I am quick, and maybe I could write a bit more for my own fun. It’s Sunday, after all, I am allowed. I think.

Still feeling well (fingers crossed)

Boy, I feel so well! Ok, I should not use any exclamation mark, I know, lest I regret it in the future, and scold myself for being so enthusiastic over the recent news and good feelings I am feeling. But even though outside a storm is breaking, like last night (weird season), I see good times ahead.
I woke up early this morning, and at 8 o’clock I had my first lesson of the week with Blondie from the gym, where for an hour and a half we read and translated an article, which tomorrow we will finish, analyse for grammatical stuff, and discuss for the sake of oral work. When he left I got changed and left for the morning errands, which included the photo shop for an id picture of my smiling face to be put in the large envelope I then sent from the post office, and which contains my cv, double printed, for a tricky idea I had (see later); a photocopy of my id, because you never know they may want it; and a letter for my friend in Trieste who is going to receive it and bring it to the bookshop, and say that I’ve gone back to my hometown for a couple of days, which is why she is delivering my cv and I am not; the cv will see my current address as…hers, so that they will think that I actually live in Trieste, and will not restrain from calling me for an interview if they think I am ok for them, which they would (not call me, I mean) if they saw my address as being here, five hours away from them. This thing bothers me: I remember applying or calling for jobs half an hour away from my home town, and hearing people say “well, don’t you think it’s quite far from where you live?”…PEOPLE!!!! I’VE MOVED TO WALES TO WORK AND I COULD DEFINITELY NOT COMMUTE EVERY DAY OR WEEKEND, YOU KNOW??? What do you think half an hour is to me, who’s spent a whole year abroad, and coming back home only three times? Boy…the Italian way of thinking…they want you to be flexible but are not flexible themselves…
Anyway, this will be my little trick to get the job I want. I feel well and hopeful even though something in the back of my mind tells me I shouldn’t waste my time hoping.
The afternoon activities include: tidying up the huge mess I have upstairs; teach from 4.30 to 6 (B&S guy); work out right after, for a couple of hours; once home, finish the book I started on the train to Trieste on Saturday (and continued on the way back, when I did nothing but read for four hours…). Lesson for tomorrow morning is ready, and before that I will have time to prepare the one for the afternoon too, just a couple of notes. And there will be plenty of time to run, do a little cleaning around the house, and read again. Not bad, hu?

A weekend in the white city and more

I am back. And I feel good. I have projects and light shoulders, a clearer view on what I can do and on what I want to do, I have even got hopes. Things seem to be less bleak and more sunny, like the sun that has embraced me for the past four days in beautiful Trieste, the White City on the sea, Joyce’s second home town after Dublin.
I arrived on a sunny Saturday afternoon, and walked for hours, admiring its old and fascinating buildings, up to the main square, golden and breathless, an open door to the port and the sea, where ships were arriving and leaving, and the sea was shiny and wonderful, and the smell of salty water filled my mind entirely and it was like I was back in Swansea. I walked and walked for three entire days, taking pictures, chatting, looking around; we stopped for fantastic ice-creams, and for drinks before having dinner in fancy restaurants (the first night in an Indian restaurant and the second in a Japanese one, for my very favourite food – after Italian, that is). We went to a walk by the sea where people simply laid down large towels and lied in the sun, the sea being too cold to dive in, although we did immerse our feet, just to feel the water. More pictures were taken, more walks in the city followed, and a final homey dinner was eaten before watching two very interesting movies, “Equilibrium” first, with Christian Bale (wonderful movie indeed, folks. Highly recommended by yours truly), and then “Harold and Maude”, straight from 1971, sweet in a bizarre kind of way, however very enjoyable. A movie night with friends, on the couch sharing a blanket at the end of a relaxing weekend, after being away from this suffocating valley and this bleak clouds hanging over it…that’s exactly what I needed.
So as I said, things have sort of cleared in my mind, although I am taking this week off serious acting in order to think a bit more: I am giving my lessons to my boys (of the six trainers at the gym I am teaching 4…not bad!), and tomorrow I am going to send a cv to a bookshop of Trieste where they are looking for personnel…and my fingers are going to be crossed for the next weeks until I get a reply…It would be too wonderful and perfect if I could get that job, exactly one of the things I’ve most loved doing, and leave my hometown for a while, change air, literally.
Anyway…this is only one of the dreams I am cultivating at the moment, and it feels great to have dreams again. To be able to dream again, and think with a peaceful mind about the actions to take, about the calls to make, the letters to write. I seriously did not think I would ever get back to this feeling.
I am a lot calmer and more lucid, so much that I also think that I can quit with the shrink, after next session, which I am doing because we are going to play this “transformation game”, for a whole afternoon, and I am curious about it, but then I think that I will quit. The fact is, I have acted in a hurry after resigning from my job, and called her on the spur of the moment with no real intention, only to make mum happy; I guess we were both looking for a miracle and she seemed the quickest way to get there. I don’t much like going there anyway, to be honest: she only makes me talk, and brings in ideas for more reflections that put me into more depression than I can –or want to – bear. And thank you, I don’t need to pay 35 Euros per hour to be told that I must free my mind from the obsession of being accepted by other people by first accepting myself. As if nobody told me before, as if I didn’t already know. It is something I have always worked on by myself, so I guess there is no need to be helped through this process by somebody who so far has only told me that the beauty is in the eyes if the beholder, and that I should invest more on my femininity (or something of the kind), only to contradict herself by remarking that she didn’t even know if she had brushed her hair that day. I mean, are you saying that I should work more on what I have and feel better by using the simple feminine tricks of “hair-make up –clothes”, or are you telling me that beauty is in me no matter how I dress and make up? Oh, bother..
But what I understand now, is that there is no way I can have a miracle, as long as I brood over the past and my mistakes; ok, the past 10 years have been an embarrassing sequence of mistakes and bad actions, taken in a hurry, almost desperately. But not all of it was negative: I chose to go to that university for the wrong reasons, ok, but if I had not gone there I would have never:
- studied the subjects that fascinate me so much now, meaning gender and the likes;
- won the scholarship for Hull, which resulted in my meeting the most fabulous people of my life (yes, David, Lisette, Charlotte, Rigmor..I am talking of you); not to mention the fact hat the Hull year allowed me to get a good view on the English student way of life; and then I studied one of the most interesting subjects of my life, film adaptation, which is still one of the things I love reading of and studying.
- Lived in the beautiful Bergamo and discovered its streets, its cinemas, the lights at Christmas and the sky in summer.
- Worked in the university bookshop, which has always been on of my dreams (working with books, in general), where I made friends with some more great people and learnt and read and talked so much of every single thing one can think of.

What I mean is: it hasn’t been all that bad. Of course I could have done things better, like getting a better mark with my thesis, and studying more for that exam of linguistics and the one of philosophy of language; sure, I could have chosen another university too, and lived an entirely different life, and maybe now I would be a media scholar with a Phd running in cinema studies, who can tell? Maybe I would have found a boyfriend and be married by now, how do you know?
But I cannot turn back time; I can only try and accept what was, nothing else. Remember the good things, and try and learn from the bad things, even if thinking of them makes me sad and regretful.
Now it’s time to work on a better future, and I am going to take my time: keep your fingers crossed too, please. Good will is ok, but a little luck is always useful.