Words are flowing (back from Parma)

Just back from Parma, for a weekend with Chorus friend; the city was not as I expected, and I was very much disturbed by her neurotic housemate..However we had an enjoyable weekend, walking and walking and walking, and talking talking talking. We watched “Hero”, the first of the trilogy from Zhang Yimou (the second is “House of flying daggers”, beautiful, and the third one is just out, “The forbidden city”, and I can’t wait to watch it), and went to the opening night of the city poetry festival which featured a concert and some poems read by a great theatre actor and by an actress whom few people liked, I have to say: you could hear some annoyed low chatter every time she stood up to read. Anyway. The music was beautiful, and the cathedral was beautiful, and the night was very enjoyable, although we were very tired from all the walking.
Trophies of the weekend: two books (the new one from McEwan, how couldn’t I? and one from Joyce Carol Oates, since I was in the mood – I am re-reading her “Wonderland”); a good tan; a nice tiredness in my legs (but then again, I’m lying: we walked a lot and I was a bit tired, but I am used to walking a lot. In fact, I arrived at the station tonight and had to come home on foot, and it was no trouble, if only the air hadn’t been so hot and humid: welcome, summer); a lot of thoughts in my mind.
As a matter of fact, the trip from Parma to my county city, where I had to change for my hometown, was a complicated irresistible sequence of thoughts, visions, sudden epiphanies. Words are literally flooding over, and I feel them rushing out some unknown space in my mind, circling endlessly before my eyes, projected like the images of a movie.
I wanted to add a couple of trivial facts: one, I have received formal confirmation that I am accepted on the course in Brighton, therefore I will buy the ticket tomorrow, and start sorting things out before I leave (there is also a new job possibility which I would like to investigate, a one-year project organised by a university, and I may be the right person…cross your fingers, folks), in a list I have yet to prepare…Two, (ex) friend texted me last Saturday, to inform me that she had missed rehearsals again (as if I hadn’t noticed), asking me how things were going and all. It surprised me that she texted me so early in the morning (I saw that it was some time before 8), and that she texted at all. As if nothing happened. I wondered (and wonder now) if she understood, if she thought it normal, if. I don’t understand, and although I talked about it with Chorus friend for a real lot, I still don’t know how I should behave: if I live with her as if nothing happened, she may think that what she did was ok, and she will do it again; but if I behave and show the anger, which is not anger, really, it’s confusion, sudden lack of trust, disappointment, then she may not understand or underestimate my feelings, and how will she react then? Are we in some sort of competition for the attentions of Guy? Anyway. Three, Guy is wonderful, although I am still prone to pessimistic thoughts at times, especially after Saturday night when we never had a moment to be together and chat. The night went really well, I am glad about it: although the drive to the place was unbelievable (a steep slippery extra-narrow hill, right the size of my car, at the end of which my car was almost perpendicular and I couldn’t see what was going to come…I arrived and looked cool, and my friends, especially the male ones, congratulated on my smart guide, whereas the girls congratulated on my courage…I said it hadn’t been that bad, and it hadn’t, really, only the fact that the car in front of the car in front of me – we looked like some expedition in the jungle - had to stop because it was slipping down, and everybody on the other cars – including mine – had to jump out and go push it to help it start again, and then performed the same thing on the car in front, and then on mine, and the narrow road which made me feel somewhat uncomfortable, and the slippery hill…well, as I was talking casually at the beginning of the dinner I reached for some water and noticed my hands…shaking! Then on the way back, being one a.m., no lights whatsoever to show me the way…but at least then I knew what to expect!), I was saying, although the drive was amazing, the place was lovely, the food was fantastic, perfect, delicious, and we did have fun, took pictures, ended with going to the band to sing and play, and look at old pictures (my, have I changed! And luckily, I look a lot better now…), until I left them, being past two a.m., and I had planned to take a train at 10.30, and I wasn’t packed or anything, yet (in the end my parents drove me, having decided to spend the day somewhere different than the lake). But when I left, we had already said goodbye to Guy, who had excused himself at the end of the dinner, for the morning after he was leaving for a trekking trip as usual (lucky bastard, I want to go trekking too, and all my friends are too lazy to join me – it isn’t really safe to go trekking alone around here, in case you wonder why I don’t just go by myself). During the evening we were not sitting next to each other, being separated by Money friend, one I used to go out with (and the whole group of friends) two lives ago, in the famous summer of ’98; luckily Money friend is a heavy smoker and would go for a cigarette after each course, so Guy and I would find ourselves closer, and could chat, and laugh, with the other people. We were never alone, and the place was too small to allow anything of the kind. I texted him on Sunday night, I think, to ask him about his trip, and then again today, because I was in a bookshop yesterday, and I suddenly thought that he may like one of my favourite books, because he likes cinema like me, and this book is written in a cinematic style, so much that Cinema friend and I were playfully planning to adapt it into a screenplay: I am talking of the beautiful “The house of sleep” from Jonathan Coe. I told him about a book he may like, since he had told me that he’s stopped reading, now, and asked him what he liked reading. He replied saying that he likes Coe (!!!) and another one (Murakami), so I remembered that one evening on the bus, back from some concert with the band, we had talked about books, and probably also about Coe and the other one. I was so happy to read that, it was like our minds were connected (of all the people I know, there are only two who know and like Coe…).
It feels difficult at times; and then, I am going to leave in 11 days, and be away for a whole month or more, and then there would be summer holidays at the band, and if we don’t meet at the band I don’t know if I should ask him out sometime, during those three weeks off, provided that I am home and not still in England, that is. I don’t know. This Friday we have a concert, so I believe it will be almost impossible to have a minute with him, except while we carry and carry away all the chairs, stands, percussions and all. Then another week without contact, and then the night before I leave there’s the summer party, and we work all night waiting tables, although Friday is usually a quiet evening. I don’t know. Frankly, I don’t want to think about it. I am happy just lingering here, talking about him, thinking about everything.
Since I left my job I feel so well, and so full. I am never hungry, I feel I don’t need to eat, there are so many beautiful things to do instead, like writing all these words that are no longer clogging my mind senselessly, but waiting, queuing, just a little restless, a shy chattering noise, lining and waiting to be called out, to form rivers of meaning.
Plans of the days to come before I leave:
- book flight (haven’t yet..ops!) (Update: damn, ticket is so high up now! We'll wait and pray....)
- see Teacher friend (Wednesday night, can’t wait; she’s bought the new McEwan too, only hers is a signed copy…);
- register for the teaching list;
- apply for a couple of interesting projects (long story to be explained some other time);
- check packing list and do the necessary laundry to have everything, buy the rest (example: toothpaste for sensitive teeth, or I die);
- go see Gym friends (B&S guy is leaving for Dublin in a week, wish him good luck, he can barely say his name and I’m almost sure he will never understand a single word of what he will be told…);
- meet Gym friend (note to self: send her message for birthday…)
- top up phone (20 cents left…ops2!)
- tidy room properly and clean house;
- keep up with the running routine
- finish book (as I write, I think that this task could be accomplished tonight) (Update: liar! I'll finish it this afternoon, 50 pages left)
- beauty routine to complete (yes, I still am that vain…)
Last but not least, on the contrary, the most important thing to do, and I hope I’ll have enough time:
WRITE. All these words in my mind…I feel so well!