s a t 01.28.05 | e a r l y m o r n
ciao, biiittcchhess.

waking up in rome is so beautiful. it doesn't seem real. i have started a small routine. i wake up alone. i turn on cnn. i eat breakfast. i shower and start walking to school.

i never walked this much before. i walk four miles every day. southern california was made for cars. rome was not. and i'm not sure which i prefer yet.

i don't know how to describe the feeling when i speak italian and an italian understands it and responds to me in italian and so on. it is the most beautiful thing.

i'm learning more than i ever have. i see more than i ever have. i am so happy here. i could never live far away from my family for an extended period of time but waiting until june to go home isn't that bad.

i'm going to london, dublin, and glasgow in two weeks. it all happened so fast but still i stop and think if this is really my life right now.

i know that in a few weeks the novelty will wear and this, like anything, will eventually be accepted as routine. but what a fucking awesome routine it will be.

w e d 01.26.05 | 9 a m
the phone rang.

today i'm going to see the pope. i wish mass wasn't so early in the morning but how can you argue with the pope? oggi vado al partito di calcio di roma e fiorentine. that means i'm going to a roma-fiorentine soccer game. it's called football here. which makes a lot more sense than calling football americano football because soccer does rely mostly on your feet.

i have been having a lot more alone time. all of my friends have morning class and i lucked out with afternoon class. but that just means that i know no one in my own class and half of my day is pretty lonely.
i get up when my roommates leave and turn on cnn. it's the only channel in english and i feel like i know more about the news now than i did in america. it's my one connection. the iraqi elections take place in a few days. yesterday someone was assassinated. johnny carson passed away. dubya asked for another blahbillion for iraq... you know, what's new.

valentine's day is approaching, not really a holiday that i particularly enjoy. every year it always seems to be cursed somehow and this year is probably no different in terms of boy girl love seeing how we're thousands of miles away from each other. i'm probably going to london to spend it with teera though. i heart her.

i'm starting to compose my thoughts in italian so i think that's a good sign. i bought my plane ticket home the other day... june 16th. although i'm nowhere near ready to go home yet, it just sounds like forever to wait.

i have to shower for the pope now.

s u n 01.22.05 | p a s t 3 a m
airports are cold and lonely.

my life has changed so much in the past few days and sometimes, well, honestly, right now i noticed that it's hard to take it all in. i have had nothing but an amazing time so far and i hadn't even thought of home until tonight.

i went to a bar tonight. i said "what is the strongest and cheapest drink you have?" and he gave me the universal look for *i know just the thing.* bars close at two here also for the most part. a few of them, the pubs, stay open until four but everyone rushes to them before two and they get too full. we took a cab home.

i went shopping today, most of the things i bought were presents.

since i hardly know any of these people that i spend time with day in and day out and am never, ever alone... i just feel like i can put up the best front.

god, it's so stupid. you see and talk to someone every day for half a year and then you switch to nothing. i have this huge void that rome doesn't fill. i thought it did but it doesn't.

i love it here... just not this minute.

f r i 01.20.05 | 2 a m
when in rome

waking up in rome for my first morning was the most disconcerting and then most beautiful thing ever. it is finally hitting me that i live here. i am living here for half a year of my life.

i live across the st. from the vatican. i go out of my courtyard, grass growing in between the stone on the ground, and it is 20 ft away. i walk down some steps and there is a bar where i can get cappuccinno for 1 euro and pastries that you would swear are so good they must have crack in them.

i can walk to school or take the bus. if i walk, i pass st. peter's and go over the tiber river, a bridge lined with grand statues on either side.

it's cold but not so cold as long as you keep moving and stay in the sun. the streets are windy and narrow with people on vespas passing by you every so often.

my sleeping patterns are still off and right now there is no hot water but it doesn't bother me. i already know that this is one of the best things i will ever do.

it just can't be any better for me right now.... except for the people i miss. but even that isn't as hard as i thought it would be. i just look around and think, they need to see this, they need to feel this some day.

t u e s 01.18.05 | 4:15 am
i am probably on an airplane.

i listened to classic rock on the way home. i did not know that they play the hits at three in the morning. i almost fell asleep a few times. there were no parking spaces in the street when i got home. it's never like that. i already feel gone.

they played "band on the run."

i have not slept much these days. i dearly hope i can sleep on the plane. i am packing a sleep aid for insurance. i spent most of the time packing and cleaning and finishing loose ends. and i spent the past couple hours saying goodbye.

and how i just wanted to fall asleep on that bed for a few more days. soft sheets. big arms. eskimo kisses. until i could give a proper goodbye.

the timing really is off. how is it that i met a boy that actually cares about me six months before i leave to go abroad for six months? i'll probably think about him the most.

my family and my friends will probably still be there when i come home and we will probably pick up where we left off. only i will be changed somehow, i think. but everything will become routine again.

i hope. quivering lips and watering eyes when saying he will miss me and to make the most out of it. how could i not want to hold those hands for as long as i could?

m o n 01.17.05 | 1:30 am
these are truly the last days

i depart on tuesday. i will arrive on wednesday. as predicted, i have left everything to the last minute. when i applied to study abroad, i didn't think i would get in.

i was in a rut. nothing made sense to me. i felt so alone. i walked by a poster that said applications were due the following day. i went in. i talked to counselors. i did all the paperwork. i wrote a personal statement. a few weeks later, i got good news in the mail.

this is something i have wanted to do for a long time but did i do it on a whim and did i do it to run away did i do it because i thought i had no reason to stay here?

and of course, as perfect as timing goes, i found more than a few reasons to want to stay in that short time from then to now. and i hope they'll be home waiting for me when i return.

in my final days in the united states, i went to the wild animal park.

i saw led zepagain (awesome.)

i was featured in my first art show.

i spent time with my friends and loved ones.

this life is beautiful and i assume i'll be seeing just how much in the next six months. arrivederla.

m o n 01.10.05 | 2:36 pm
ART SHOW

t h u r s 01.06.05 | 2:50 am
depingere

my sister got engaged last week.

my grandma passed away exactly a year ago yesterday.

i am in the undergrad art show at my school on january 13th. please come.

i got three hours of sleep last night because of that blank canvas.

and the paint on one section (goddamn oil paint) was still wet and someone... even though the painting was resting against a wall and i figured no one would touch it until we installed next week, decided to brush up on my painting and smear some paint... genius. thank you. thank you so much.

it's not a big deal but it miffs at my sense of accomplishment since i thought i was finally done.

i'm leaving for rome on the 18th.

things are moving along.

t h u r s 01.06.05 | 2:33 am
avery, the humpback whale

avery was a baby humpback whale. he was very close to his family. they travelled together in a pack. they swam a lot. he liked to do jumps. one day he got hurt from the blades on a motorboat. he couldn't keep up as well with his family but he was too proud to admit it.
they were swimming along and they lost each other. avery was all alone in the ocean. his family looked and looked but they could not find him.

avery was sad and lonely. one day he got picked up by a research group. they took him home and put him in the biggest tank they could afford but he was still depressed. no tank compares to the ocean.

he would lay on the bottom of the tank and never play, never respond. the research group did their work but they could never figure him out. they wanted to help him recover in the meantime.

over the years, avery was fully healed but he was still sad. the group had finished their research and figured the best they could do was return him to his natural habitat in hopes that he would live a normal life.

avery swam and swam searching for his family but the ocean was just too big for one small humpback. he befriended a group of dolphins. orcas eat dolphins but humpbacks prefer krill and plankton. he told the dolphins his story and they wanted to help him find his family and also keep him company. avery was a mess. the dolphins were also protected because dolphin predators were frightened at a distance by avery's sheer size: 30 feet. most humpbacks are 40-50 feet but avery was a little guy.

the tank life stunted his growth.

more years passed and the dolphins and avery became good friends. wherever they met people they would tell them avery's story and wherever avery's family met people, they would tell them as well. news slowly circulated and the two groups migrated in the same directions.

when they found each other, avery did not want to part with his dolphin friends and they could not part with him either. avery and his family and the dolphins swam together from that day on.

s u n 01.02.05 | 12:01 pm
so this is the new year

i was looking at an image gallery of photos from the aftermath of the tsunami across the pond. i can't even comprehend all that death. and all the bodies strewn on the ground, dug into the earth to be burned in groups. so many bodies that they don't know what to do with all them because they're rotting too quickly, the smell hanging in the air.

they say that it's better to be dead over there than to be a survivor because of the wave of disease that's coming.

and here i am in ethnocentric america, my entire intake yesterday since wake consisting of beers, a burger, beers, pizza, beers, one baby hit. i feel so far removed from tragedy.

happy new year.

i'm so partied out. i am not going to do anything for a few days. i'm going to lock myself in my room and start and finish the painting i had almost a month to complete. i know my system is a poor one but it has hardly failed me yet.

with a track record like that, who starts their work early anyway. this is not the first year that i have not had any real resolutions.

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