HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

Thank you to all the fathers, especially mine, for all their love, patience and support as we make our way through the world. I'm almost never home for Father's Day and this year is no exception, but I am certainly thinking about my dad and what he's done for me since I was born.

Yes, the above picture is of me and my dad, when I was a little girl. :-)

Mama mia, la lingua, part 2

I know it's been ages since I last posted something meaningful. My dissertation research is going well in that I have gotten access to several important sites in Calabria and I am rushing to try and work through the summer, my excavation director is here and I've got a friend popping in and out, so life has been chaotic. I changed my plane ticket and I'll be back home Aug 25; originally I would have left Rome on June 23, which is next Tuesday, so I'm feeling a little depressed right now about staying here. I'll try and post a big update about all my work soon, although my excavation director has been here for a while and he leaves Wednesday night, then a friend of mine is coming to stay; I'm not sure exactly when. How much free time I'm going to have, I don't know.

As for now, I wanted to relate my trip to the grocery store today, which was rushed because I thought they closed at 12:30, but apparently it was actually 13:00. Tired and not really paying attention, I was standing in line waiting while a large group of young boys bought some sandwich meat and 2 large bottles of gin. The cashier, whom I'm pretty sure is also the manager or owner of the store, suddenly addressed me and asked if I had any money. Um, yes, I replied, thinking who the f*ck would come to the grocery store, pile a ton of groceries on the conveyor belt and not have any money... "How much?" he asked, and while I was confusedly starting to paw through the bills in my change purse, he then asked if I had 5 euro, holding up a 5 euro bill. Now I was REALLY confused. If he had a 5 euro bill, why did he want one from me? Then he repeated himself and tapped the coin drawers and I realised he wanted CHANGE. It was of course a language thing; I was under the impression that coins were referred to as 'soldi' (soldo for the singular), not 'monete', but in fact moneta (monete) means coin, too. It's a 'false friend', which anyone learning a foreign language knows are one of the worst parts. That's what caused the confusion. Anyway, I had 5 euro in coins and was able to give him what he needed, as he was down to almost NO coins whatsoever. I was quite entertained, both by the store that has to resort to asking its customers to make change for it (although so few places are open on Sundays; when I worked in the dry cleaners we could always run to another store, but that wouldn't be possible here, so if you haven't stocked up enough rolls of coin to make change, you're screwed...), and by my complete confusion (and stupidity) at wondering why I would be asked if I had any money when I was obviously there to purchase items.

Ah well, I've worked out that little language nuance, I think, so even though I looked like an idiot, the trip was well worth it for the lesson (well, and the groceries, natch). Plus the usually grumpy manager/owner smiled at me and was more friendly, although I think part of it was 'poor little foreign girl who doesn't speak Italian,' which is true, but not as much as he might think. I hate feeling like an idiot, but when you're learning a foreign language in the way I've chosen, which is to not study it (probably hitting the books occasionally would help), but rather just wing it, that happens a lot. Although I suspect it happens a lot even when you study it and then immerse yourself among native speakers.

I decided to pay with my visa to save him from making change for me.

Not Fair

This song makes me laugh. I think the music video is cute, too, done as a 70s country music show.

Men take note!

;-)



EDIT: Paolo loves this song, too. He has declared it our 'official excavation song' for 2009, even though it was just a study season!

The Worst Day Since Yesterday

I know I've not posted recently. There's been a lot going on and not much of it good. Right now I've got a huge mess on my hands as I'm trying to sort out problems of access to materials, the likelihood that I'll have to stay longer, which I don't want to do and coming to grips with the fact that this dissertation topic needs some serious focusing. Meanwhile, there've been a number of personal issues that I don't really want to discuss, but all combined, I have been on the verge of tears for the last few days and I had a migraine last for 4 days. I finally took more medication and really whacked it last night. I read that if a migraine lasts for more than 72 hours you should go to a doctor or an ER to get it stopped as your risk of stroke is getting very high; I suspect as the migraine was jumping back and forth across my head and I did have at least a couple hours relief in there that I was ok and not in full 'status migrainosus', but still, I needed to try and stop it or go to the doctor here, which I didn't want to do. Now I just have an echo, so I should be ok. Anyway, I think the following song by my new favourite band nicely sums up the way things are going for me at the moment. Lyrics after the vid.



The Worst Day Since Yesterday
Flogging Molly

Well I know, I miss more than hit
With a face that was launched to sink
An' I seldom feel, the bright relief
It's been the Worst Day Since Yesterday

If there's one thing I have said
Is that the dreams I once had, now lay in bed
As the four winds blow, my wits through the door
It's been the Worst Day Since Yesterday

Fallin' down to you sweet ground
Where the flowers they bloom
It's there I'll be found
Hurry back to me, my wild calling
It's been the Worst Day Since Yesterday

Though these wounds have seen no wars
Except for the scars I have ignored
And this endless crutch, well it's never enough
It's been the Worst Day Since Yesterday

Hell says hello, well it's time to I should go
To pastures green, that I've yet to see
Hurry back to me, my wild calling
It's been the Worst Day Since Yesterday

Why we're feminists

Womens' Rights Manifesto

Because women's work is never done and is underpaid or unpaid or boring or repetitious and we're the first to get fired and what we look like is more important than what we do and if we get raped it's our fault and if we get beaten we must have provoked it and if we raise our voices we're nagging bitches and if we enjoy sex we're nymphos and if we don't we're frigid and if we love women it's because we can't get a "real" man and if we ask our doctor too many questions we're neurotic and/or pushy and if we expect childcare we're selfish and if we stand up for our rights we're aggressive and "unfeminine" and if we don't we're typical weak females and if we want to get married we're out to trap a man and if we don't we're unnatural and because we still can't get an adequate safe contraceptive but men can walk on the moon and if we can't cope or don't want a pregnancy we're made to feel guilty about abortion and...for lots of other reasons we are part of the women's liberation movement.

-Author unknown

Amor, ch'al cor gentil ratto s'apprende

The rain, it streams on stone and hillock,
The boot clings to the clay.
Since all is done that's due and right
Let's home; and now, my lad, good-night,
For I must turn away.

Good-night, my lad, for nought's eternal;
No league of ours, for sure.
To-morrow I shall miss you less,
And ache of heart and heaviness
Are things that time should cure.

A.E. Housman



Heart, we will forget him,
You and I, tonight!
You must forget the warmth he gave,
I will forget the light.

When you have done pray tell me,
Then I, my thoughts, will dim.
Haste! ‘lest while you’re lagging
I may remember him!

E. Dickensen

Amor, ch'a nullo amato amar perdona,
mi prese del costui piacer sì forte,
che, come vedi, ancor non m'abbandona.

Dante, Inferno

101 in 1001

I discovered this through Amanda and you can see her list here. I never make resolutions, but never say never! The list is a collection of 101 goals to achieve in 1001 days (click on the banner to go to the homepage for the project), giving you a more realistic time frame to make some real changes in your life. Of course, what you don't achieve will also tell you something about you. The list was incredibly difficult to finish, especially as I didn't want to cheat, add anything that wasn't important (but not necessarily not frivolous; it is important to have a little fun in life, no?) or split activities into two steps so as to take up 2 entries. I've actually been working on the list for several months off and on, and I've already done a couple of small things on it since I started, I'm counting them, even though I'm starting the count down to the end now. So I guess I'm cheating a little. But it's my list, my goals and there's a lot of serious stuff on there.

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed
by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do.
So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor.
Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore. Dream. Discover.

- Mark Twain

You are supposed to use very non-vague terminology and I cheated a little there, too. Some of my items are vague. What can I say? I know I'm not going to count the number of times I wear my mouthguard and I should be doing it every night. So I'm trying to establish it as a routine. I know some people are actually counting that shit. I am not going to. See above; it's MY LIST. For other parts of my life, I'd like to see a general improvement in some areas and I guess I'll know it when I see it. I hope. All I can do is try and if I do and feel I've made the effort, I can cross the item off the list and I'll feel better about the list, myself, and life in general. And that's worth a lot more than having a specific, yet meaningless (for me), goal like 'going water skiing' as some people do on their lists.

I've found out a reason for me
To change who I used to be
A reason to start over new
and the reason is You

-'The Reason', Hoostabank; coincidently playing when I posted the list.

The small details: Items struck out have been completed. Items in italics are undergoing completion. If you don't understand acronyms or I haven't explained something, well, that's because I don't want you to. There are a few private ones on there that I'm not sharing with most people. I may tell a few friends, if they ask, but no one else. So please, for the most part, don't ask and if you do, I may ignore your question. Don't be hurt, but this is a personal list about MY personal goals. It's not about other people. Some things I don't want to share.

Start Date: Tuesday, January 6th, 2009
End Date: Tuesday, October 5, 2011

So without further ado, here is my list, with some edits for privacy:

I put my heart and my soul into my work and have lost my mind in the process

1. Finish my dissertation
2. Graduate and obtain my PhD
3. Give a paper at the AIA annual meeting
4. Find a better rim chart.
5. Prepare and submit a solo article
6. Finish studying the Oppido pottery and analyze the data

Mama mia, la lingua!

7. Watch 10 films in Italian (with NO subtitles) (1/10)
8. Listen to Italian (talk) radio/watch Italian TV at least once a week
9. Become fluent in Italian

I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the community, and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can

10. Donate blood
11. Research the poss. of taking Calliope to a senior’s home; if not, volunteer myself
12. Participate in a Weekend to End Breast Cancer
13. Volunteer at a shelter or soup kitchen
14. Make a daily habit of smiling at two strangers on the street. Just because.
15. Maintain responsible recycling habits.

Only shallow people know themselves

16. Make a list of 10 people I admire and why (0/10)
17. Write a list of 101 things that make me happy (0/101)
18. Make a list of 20 things I love about my body (0/20)
19. Make a list of my 20 strongest personality traits (0/20)
20. Forgive the 6 people who have caused me the most pain in my life (0/6)
21. Take a self portrait every other month

Art is the imagination expressed through the senses

22. Get a poem published
23. Write a haiku
24. Write in my journal at least once per week
25. Write a sonnet
26. Master a very difficult new guitar piece
27. Memorize 5 guitar pieces I already know how to play (0/5)
28. Learn and memorize 5 new guitar pieces of any level (0/5)
29. See two live music performances, non-classical (0/2)
30. Go to the symphony or opera four times (0/4)
31. Go to the opera in Italy
32. Sing in public, for an audience, on two occasions (0/2)
33. Spend at least one day every month taking photos just for the sake of photography (1/34)
34. Learn to how to make pottery

‘Vanity’, thy name is woman

35. Maintain my hair in a cute and flattering style
36. Get contacts
37. Be no more than a size 10 and maintain it
38. Wear a skirt or dress at least two times per month to show off my legs! (0/68)
39. Get my second piercings re-done
40. Buy new underwear—that fits, is sexy and matches my bras

He who does not travel does not know the value of men

41. See the Capuchin Crypt in Palermo, Sicily
42. Go north of Rome: Milan, Venice, Florence, Tuscany…
43. Visit New York
44. Visit Turkey
45. Visit Paris
46. Visit Auschwitz/Birkenau
47. See the Vasa Ship
48. Go to Spain
49. Find 5 places in Vancouver I didn’t know existed and visit them (0/5)

A man too busy to take care of his health is like a mechanic too busy to take care of his tools

50. Start regularly seeing a massage therapist for migraine treatment
51. Go a month (consecutive) without soda (0/31)
52. Make flossing a part of my daily routine
53. Try acupuncture for migraine treatment
54. Maintain exercising at 5 days per week minimum
55. Do yoga/pilates at least once a week for flexibility/strength
56. Get my Hepatitis B booster (as the titre was low)
57. Get *private* re-test when return to Canada
58. Keep a migraine journal
59. Wear my mouth guard regularly
60. Complete the 100 push-ups challenge
61. Complete the couch-5k running plan
62. Talk to Dr. Falk about *private*
63. Establish a healthy sleep routine

Those who fail to learn from history…

64. Sit and talk with Nana about her life at least ten times and write it down (0/10)
65. Organize Gran’s photos
66. Learn the names of all my great-grandparents (0/8)
67. Identify at least 5 traits inherited from my grandparents or ‘greater’ (0/5)

The best part of life is when your family becomes your friends, and your friends become your family

68. Talk to my mother woman to woman once
69. Visit Marian in Grenoble
70. Take flowers to Gran three times and sit in the garden for 30 mins minimum
71. Write 20 handwritten letters (1/20)
72. Write 60 postcards (0/60)
73. Go painting with Nana (en plein air?)
74. Visit the Brideaus in New Brunswick
75. Finish Nana’s patio
76. Forge a good relationship with *private*
77. Have at least 2 friends visit me in Italy (1/2)
78. Send Christmas cards every year (including this year) (0/3)
79. Host a party in Italy

I took the road less travelled by…

80. Learn to tango
81. Spend 7 days outdoors from dawn to dusk (0/7)
82. Learn to drive
83. Buy a vibrator
84. Send BIE to 5 TFers (1/5)
85. Try absinthe once
86. Try pot once
87. Participate in TFSS and TFSV every year (2/6)
88. Care less about what others think of me
89. Spend 14 days without internet. Voluntarily and when access IS available. (0/14)
90. Read the Bible
91. Submit to Postsecret

Cooking is like making love, you do it well, or you do not do it at all

92. Learn to make good risotto
93. Learn to make Italian almond paste cookies (amaretti)
94. Cook another Christmas dinner, preferably with Lindsay
95. Cook a romantic dinner for a date.
96. Learn to make a palatable GF dessert (fruit salad doesn’t count)

And what makes my head go 'round and 'round
While my heart stands still?

97. Kiss in the rain
98. Learn to trust men again—or at least one
99. Have someone fall madly in love with me
100. Find a partner who makes me laugh uncontrollably
101. Realize and truly believe that I am like an expensive scotch and that any man would be lucky to have me

New Year, PhD student style

This pretty much sums how I feel about 2009. Well, I was hopeful for at least a few hours. Then a blinding migraine hit and I took it as a bad omen. We'll see...

I'll post soon about the holidays, Italian style!

To Coco

My Aunt and Uncle's family dog died yesterday. He was 14, but a small dog; recently he'd had some health problems and he went into congestive heart failure over Christmas. I must admit to not being a fan of small dogs, but Coco was special. He was extremely sweet, loving with his cats, well behaved and really just a wonderful dog. He loved my uncle especially and followed him around like, well, a puppy! He will be very much missed by their family and by ours. He was able to go to Christmas dinner with them and even managed to spend a little time sitting by my grandmother; happily my younger cousin made it home from Alberta for Christmas, so she got to see him, too, before he was gone.

It is both a sublime joy and a terrible pain to have animals in your life. Their time with us is so brief; it feels like forever and also the blinking of an eye. They enrich our lives, sparkle brightly, then burn out so quickly; they are like a shooting star you wish you could catch and hold close to your heart forever. But I think the joy outweighs the pain and in the end, you are a better person for having known them.

Coco, you will be missed, but never forgotten, nor never totally gone, for your presence lives on in all of us. All my love to you, baby, and to my family, with whom I wish I could be right now.

Do not stand at my grave and weep;
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.

Merry Christmas

This year I am spending Christmas in Italy with the crazies, I mean, Calabrese, away from home. It's bittersweet, I suppose, as there are positives (no stressful shopping, very little complaining from my mother about how much she hates Christmas, which often kills a lot of the pleasure I get from Christmas), but of course I do love Christmas and the magic that I often feel at this time of year is very much lacking for me here. It's strange, because even when I'm in Columbia right up until the last minute, I still feel very Christmas-y there; here, even with decorations and the same consumer orgy taking place, it doesn't feel the same.

Perhaps it's simply the knowledge that the day will be different, that I won't be having MY Christmas, has changed the entire season. And yet I'm very interested to see what happens in Italy. I am having Christmas dinner tonight, Christmas eve, with my landlady's family (the parents live downstairs, the brother upstairs and her sister is visiting from Milan; she is also visiting from Milan and is actually staying with me). There will be children and food and fun and laughter, although I will have to work very hard to think about my Italian all evening and everyone will be strange, so it won't be as comfortable an evening for me. I have bought spumante and a panettone to take with me for the parents, and some chocolate kinder santas for the children. It will be interesting and I'm sure I'll have a good time. But it won't entirely be Christmas for me.


And that's a part of life; as we get older, we can't always have presents and trees and lights and magic. This is reality. And the fact is, there's only so long I can rely on my parents to provide a Christmas for me. I'm grown up and if I'm alone in the world, then I'm alone. Christmas morning tomorrow will be very much like any other day and that is likely to be the way it will be for me for most of my life. There are a lot of people, most of the people in the world, in fact, who live life like that, not because they're alone, but because they have no money. In fact, I'm extremely lucky to have a dinner tonight and food to eat tomorrow!

I hope you enjoy and are grateful for the time you have with your families, your dinners, your presents, your trees and the general feeling of peace, warmth and happiness that seems to decend over everyone at this time of year.

Tanti auguri per un Buon Natale e un Felice Nuovo Anno a tutti!

Here are a few of my favourite Christmas songs/carols. Enjoy:

Wherein I (maybe) piss off an entire queue of Italians... intentionally.

Sometimes, when you're alone in a foreign country, you have to make your own entertainment. And sometimes, when this foreign country is irritating you because they can't organize things like reliable internet or you're tired of being stared at with the stony Calabrese stare that tells you they think you're the crazy one (an equally valid assumption), you just have to wade into the scrum and play ball.

I was standing in line today at the Quiiper, which is sort of like a Walmart, except half the stuff is expensive. Trips to the Quiiper happen only occasionally because it's like going to Ikea; you go for one thing and come out dazed an hour later with a cartload of crap you don't need. However, today's trip was necessary because I am apparently somewhat retarded. I have been keeping my clothespins in a plastic basket (made specifically for that purpose) that I found in my laundry room. I ceremoniously hung it up outside on a wire that seemed specially placed just for it, and therein placed all my pins. Every time I do laundry, they're right there, at hand, next to the four long lines that are strung out across the back of my kitchen balcony, and every time I bring my laundry in, I neatly put them away, tsking at the other people who leave theirs on their lines. This week I discovered just WHY they leave them on their lines. I live up on a hill, on a high part of Reggio. The house catches lovely breezes when it's warm, but in the winter Reggio itself can be windy and up here the shutters rattle with the sometimes very high speed winds. After a week of stormy weather, pelting rain, crazy winds, it finally cleared up and I washed my sheets, took them outside and stuck my hand into the basket to find... the number of clothespins drastically reduced. Apparently leaving an open basket of clothespins hanging on your porch in high speed winds leads to loss of said clothespins. Damn. Well, the Quiiper sells some of the cheapest clothespins I've seen (20 for 1.79 euro) and I like them best because they're a deep blue or yellow (plastic). The colour is vital. So it was an excuse to go, and I went.

I managed to pick up several other things, a couple of shirts (a bargain at 5 euro a pop), a notebook I didn't know I needed until I was standing in the stationary aisle, some more aluminum storage containers (what they use here in lieu of the cheap tupperware for food storage), and cruise the sweets section (cannolis, score!). Then I hit the line. Now, I don't know what it is about cashiers in Italy, but I swear they train them to be slow. I know it's a shitty job; I get it. But it's a shitty job elsewhere in the world, and they don't take forever at it. In Italy, the cashiers sit, you bag your own purchases and they ask you for as close to correct change as possible. Sometimes in N. America, when there's time, I'll offer correct change or something close to it, so I can get rid of some coins. But in a long line situation, theoretically, it should be faster for the cashier to produce change than for the customer to dig through his or her wallet for that 10 cent coin they 'know' is in there somewhere, all while trying to bag up a shopping cart worth of groceries. Because if you're slow at that, you can hold up the whole line, too. It's an interesting system, and it's unique and it's theirs. I'm down with it and most days, I'm more ready for the bagging/change producing/chaos than many Italians. But it slows everything right down.

Now, today, there are 4 lines open in this huge store, 2 of them for 10 items or fewer (meno di 10 pezzi), and the lines are LONG. I have maybe 14 things total, so I get in one of the lines with the people apparently shopping for families of 20 and wait. As I'm close to the front, the woman behind me starts to carefully line up her items (and she had a FULL grocery cart. I mean FULL) on the conveyer belt behind mine. And she isn't just careful, she's arranging them, like it's an art exhibit or something and she's taking her sweet time about it and taking up the whole conveyer. As she's doing this, the woman in front of me is paying, and a girl--well, a young woman--comes up and asks the woman behind me if she could pop into line as she only has one thing to buy. The woman pauses from her careful arrangment and looks this girl up and down, gives her the full Calabrese stare and shrugs. The girl backs off, but sort of hovers looking pathetic and a little frantic. I'm annoyed, so I tell the girl she can go in front of me, which pisses off the woman after me, but what can she do? I'm sure no one in that line was all that happy, but seeing as the woman behind me was STILL laying out her items on the conveyor, I figured it wasn't that big a deal.

I go through and get into the receiving end, preparing a bag for my items as the cashier will chuck them down to me. The girl pays, thanks me, and takes off, and both I and the cashier look up to see... a woman and her child there with 2 chocolate bars. My first thought is, you have GOT to be kidding me. She asked the cashier if she could quickly ring her through and the cashier looked at me and asked if she could do it. I looked at the long line of pissed off Italians, I thought about the woman who wouldn't let that one girl in and I thought about how many times Italians piss me off, and I smiled sweetly and said, of course. It's a rather passive aggressive attack on Calabria, all in the Christmas spirit. I was just being neighbourly, after all! And in my little grocery, quite often people with only an item or two will be let in front to whip through. One guy a few weeks ago let me and some other young girl cut in front of him, even though neither she nor I had particularly small baskets. I think he just wanted to stand and leer at us, though. Whatever. I wanted to get home. But today, I had nowhere to be, and the knowledge that I'd at least annoyed that one woman let me know I'd made the right decision in letting several people through. Besides, I was next in line. I got my stuff rung through and got to leave. Marian, when I called her to laugh minutes later, advised me to be careful on my walk home in case anyone followed me intent on revenge, but I suspect, given the size of that woman's cart and the speed of the cashier, I was halfway home before SHE even got out of there...

Please just call me red-headed and forgive me.

I'm a redhead and have the personality to match. I admit I have a short fuse, a fiery temper, and can be a ball of energy. I'm a little crazy, but without some crazy, how can life be fun? I have skin like alabaster (except where the Mediterranean sun is aging it), hair like liquid gold and have been kissed a thousand times over with honeyed freckles.

The Redhead is a rare breed in modern culture; in the UK, where the hair colour is more common than in any other nation, 'gingers' are cruelly taunted. But for the rest of the world, there is a sense of mysteriousness associated with what is essentially an assignation of melanoma by genetics. Certainly red hair is rare; on the whole, only 2% of the world population has it. At least, naturally. It's exotic and that in and of itself is appealing. There is, however, more to the idea of a redhead than just his or her hair colour. Common to most cultures is the idea that the fiery strands reflect the personality within:

"All throughout history, from Reuben to Robbins, redheads have been recognized as a rare breed. Blondes may have more fun, brunettes may be brainier, but when it comes down to raw energy, creativity, and personality ... you just can't beat a redhead well, you can, but beware ... she'll probably beat you back!"

Is this true? Do all redheads have such spirit? Maybe, maybe not. Did we create the mystique and mythology surrounding the fierce Redhead? Or do we, as such a small part of the population, try to make ourselves stand out and live up to the ancient tales of our Celtic ancestors or our Egyptian father, the god Set...

Some people believe that there are actual physiological differences between Redheads and the rest of the population. Certainly the lack of melanin in our skin makes us much more susceptible to UV radiation than others and the more time I spend in Italy, the more damage I can see being done to my sensitive skin. Freckles, either loathed or beloved by those who are covered in them, are the marks of skin damage; every one a warning of possible skin cancer to come. There are apparently other bodily quirks:

"Researchers at the University of Louisville discovered that, on average, people born with red hair require about 20 percent more anesthesia to obtain satisfactory sedation. University indeed. Anyone who's ever tried to seduce a redhead knows that."

Auburn, gold, strawberry blond, ginger, whatever you call it, it's RED. My hair (below), because I'm a Redhead, is a part of how I define myself. It gives me a certain liveliness of spirit and a saucy character, shared amongst Redheads, to live up to. I think I'm up to the challenge!

Gentlemen may prefer blondes, but it takes a real man to handle a redhead.
-Unknown

"You'd find it easier to be bad than good if you had red hair," said Anne reproachfully. "People who haven't red hair don't know what trouble is."- Anne in Anne of Green Gables

The attraction to redheads is a lot like being addicted to drugs.
-Unknown

While the rest of the species is descended from apes, redheads are descended from cats.
- Mark Twain

Ruadh gu brath!

Not bad at all

Cimitero

I live just a few minutes away from Reggio's cemetery. Above ground and walled, the cemetery is completely different to what most of us from North America (New Orleans excepted) or the UK are used to. Stemming from 2000 years of tradition, the Italians bury their dead in family crypts--small buildings above ground--or columbaria--structures for the storage of cinerary urns. When I walked through the gate I could have been standing in an ancient Roman cemetery with streets of tombs on all sides. Despite the noise and general chaos of Italian life, there was a stillness and quiet that seemed to preside within the walls; I was nervous even of speaking. It was a very peaceful and beautiful experience. Here are some of my photos:



2 types of Columbaria:







Family Crypts:











And my favourites:


"Avenging Angel"




"Emptiness"




"Sold"




"I walk a lonely road"




"Angioletto"



I am working on a poem appropriate to this post that I will share with you, but it is still in early stages, so don't be too harsh!

Cimitero

Candles of the dead
Surround me;
Glowing with the light
Of souls long gone.

Flickers of life
Reflect on cold marble,
Hard and smooth,
Unresponsive as those it entombs.

Water splashes against the stone,
Then pools in the dirt.
Gliding, undulating,
Seeking out new life to nourish.

I see myself
Looking at my reflection
In the wet stone.

Pelting rain
Echoes the rhythm of my breathing.
There is sanctuary with the dead;
I choose to stand in the open
Tasting life on my tongue.

The candles are snuffed;
I am alive.

Haunting & Beautiful

Rapture, Antony and the Johnsons

Evil

This speaks to me deeply; I feel very much in sympathy with this character, as if he is me, especially after recent events. I hope I don't seem too egotistical, but I really do think it's true.

"Of the wickedness of the world he was too forgetful. To discover evil in a new friend is to most people only an additional experience: to him it was ever a surprise."

Thomas Hardy, Desperate Measures

Fall Back, Spring Forward

It's that time of year again, when we change our clocks. I've probably just given half of you a bit of a scare as Europe has gone off daylight savings a week before North America, so take a deep breath! My computer is smarter than me, so it changed the clock by itself. I guess as I told it which time zone we're in, it knows when daylight savings ends for that zone. I was worried because it's a North American computer, so I thought it might think daylight savings was next week; now I think perhaps I'm looking a bit stupid!

I do love the fall changing of the clocks--really, who doesn't? There's a whole extra hour of time to play with! And for a whole week I'm an hour closer to North America in time!

Actually, I just love the fall, the autumn. I was thinking about that yesterday and how much I miss it here. It's not the same; it still feels like summer where I am, even though it's cooling off and it clouds over sometimes, it still looks and feels very much like the summer. There is something about the changing of the leaves, the reds, the golds and the yellows that surround you... the crunch of newly fallen leaves underfoot and the sudden gusts of wind that bring down a rush of new leaves, both swirling and floating... for some reason the sound of children in the fall is a happier sound, perhaps because apathy and over-familiarity with the school year hasn't yet set it; I still remember the excitement of the new school year, the new smells, the foreignness that was slowly shed. Or perhaps children sound happier because of the crispness of the air, which has a quality that is almost like the first bit into the perfect apple or the first sip of the finest wine. I will stand for a moment, eyes closed, and take a few deep breaths of that air and I feel more confident, more alive. In Vancouver, of course, the rain begins again, which soaks feet, makes the roads more dangerous and depresses everyone's mood. But I like curling up under the covers at night and listening to the gentle staccato outside, knowing that I'm warm and dry inside. I've never met a rainstorm I didn't love, the patterns of water on the ground, the beauty of the droplets, the sound, the sweetness of the air after the rain has passed.



Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves.
John Muir

Mama mia, la lingua...

So I've been living in Italy for a month or so now and my language skills still leave a bit to be desired. I'm fairly fluent at the grocery store (although today I was exhausted and managed to screw up ordering parmesan cheese; I got a kilo instead of a half kilo. Sigh. It'll keep, at least), restaurants, bars and in very basic conversation, but if we get more complicated, I'm in trouble. And the more tired I am, the more difficult it is for me to focus and I screw up. Some words are harder to pronounce because the sound and the rhythm is so different to my native tongue. I'm understanding more and more, but talking is slower. Most of the time I'm willing to make an ass out of myself and just try, because I won't learn otherwise; frankly I thought I'd feel like I did in language classes in school, but most of the discomfort is gone. I should spend more time on grammar, but of course after a day at work, with the lure of the internet, a chapter of language study seems... boring. So I skip it and regret it later!

Occasionally my somewhat limited language skills make for humorous situations. At times I simply cannot find the vocabulary or the correct conjugation (for a lot of my basic verbs, I can conjugate them, but I get flustered and frequently the wrong conjugation comes out). So I will be talking or answering a question and just stop mid sentence; I'm sure whomever I'm speaking with can literally SEE the wheels turning in my head as I stall not unlike a car. This causes no end of entertainment for the guards at the museum or my landlady's Papa and after laughing at me, they usually say, "piano, piano", which means something along the lines of 'gently, gently' basically, "take your time, don't get het up!"

While I may have vocabulary for grocery stores, bars (this is more like a coffee shop in North America), corner stores and restaurants (the range of things I need to ask and am asked is pretty limited--how much is this, do you have X, do you have a discount card etc...), I'm certainly not equipped for conversations about fixing apartment door locks or plumbing. As I've been here for some of the work done on the apartment, the workmen or more often the Papa (who I think gets elected to talk to the crazy foreigner as he knows me. He always oversees these things, thankfully!) ask me if I have a certain item or tool. While the plumbers the other day (or more accurately, I think they were gas men, but I don't know... they also replaced an electrical plug while hooking up hot water--which is apparently a gas issue--for the kitchen so I just... don't know who they were), they were more willing to ask me for things, accompanied by many hand gestures to indicate what they wanted. Usually I got the message. The locksmith however... He and the Papa would glance at each other, get this look on their faces that I translated as, "Oh, shit, how do we ask her for THAT" and then the Papa would have to ask. First he'd just ask if I had whatever he wanted, hoping I knew the vocab (they scored once with this technique as I do know the word for broom. The verb for sweep, scopare, is closely related, but apparently it's also vulgar and means, well.. I'm sure you can figure it out. Just FYI). When I obviously had no clue what they wanted, then they'd start acting it out. For one thing, the two of them bared their teeth and me and started pointing at them, making strange gestures with their fingers, stabbing at them and making sort of sawing motions. Something triggered in my brain and I went running into the bathroom and came out proudly holding my dental floss. As soon as I brought it to them, though, I knew I had screwed up, because honestly, what is a locksmith going to do with dental floss? Of course they wanted toothpicks, but I don't have those! The Papa had to go downstairs for several things that day; I do not keep a well stocked house it seems. What can I say? I don't use toothpicks!

I'm sure this will continue, although I hope to be much more fluent in the language by the time I leave. I don't have a natural gift for languages and of course my knowledge of French (at least, what's left of it) both helps and hinders. Definitely it screws with my pronunciation! I try to think more in Italian rather than thinking in English then translating, but it's not easy. At least I can swear somewhat well... I won't demonstrate for those of you with delicate constitutions.

And in the past few months I've come a long way; even if I don't know the meaning of all the words, they don't all run together in a jumble. Of course, I often miss a few vital words and thus the meaning of a conversation is lost somewhat, but it will come. I just need to practise, practise, practise...

Mama mia, non è sempre facile, ma è sempre interessante!

Men were deceivers ever...

Sigh No More, Ladies

Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more;
Men were deceivers ever;
One foot in sea and one on shore,
To one thing constant never;
Then sigh not so,
But let them go,
And be you blithe and bonny;
Converting all your sounds of woe
Into. Hey nonny, nonny.

Sing no more ditties, sing no mo,
Or dumps so dull and heavy;
The fraud of men was ever so,
Since summer first was leavy.
Then sigh not so,
But let them go,
And be you blithe and bonny,
Converting all your sounds of woe
Into. Hey, nonny, nonny.

-from Much Ado About Nothing, by William Shakespeare

And women, too. I found out yesterday that my former roommate was lying to me the whole time. There was something going on between them all along. And now they are openly flaunting a relationship, walking around Reggio as if in love. I'm not so upset about the relationship, although obviously that is/would have been painful, but I could not be angrier about being lied to. And being gotten rid of when I happened to be in the way, amidst indignant denials that nothing was going on. I was open and upfront at the very beginning that a relationship between them would be uncomfortable for me and I did NOT want to live there if something was going to happen. She assured me she had no interest. It seems she's a lying little tramp. I feel used once again, this time for the rent. Ah well, what can I do? I have little experience with people like this. They use others then discard them when they become inconvenient or no longer useful. They're totally deceitful, malicious, self-absorbed and inconsiderate of others. I suppose their shallow, immature natures appealed to one another--I'm totally different, hot tempered, sensitive (not necessarily easily insulted, but when I feel something, I feel it deeply. And I feel others' feelings, too), I like to think I have some intellectual depth and more interests than lying on the beach and going out to drink. I suppose ultimately they deserve each other. I can't decide which would be more unpleasant (and therefore, to my mind at the moment, the better scenario)-- one or both of them hurting the other (which is pretty likely) OR them marrying and her moving here (great for a year, but a lifetime?). Either way, it seems a pretty sad, pathetic existence. Their relationship bothers me a lot less than the way they treated me, but I think karma will get them. I've now got a much nicer place, with a much better situation and things are going pretty well professionally. I think most people who have seen this entire situation, even those who were friends with both myself and my roommate, are of the opinion that I got treated very poorly. And as my landlady (who is awesome, by the way) says, when a good person and a bad person enter into a relationship, the good person always gets hurt because they don't have as strong weapons--like dishonesty and cruelty. So I got hurt. What's new? People get hurt all the time and I get hurt all the time. Life goes on and I need to suck it up and move on. But because I'm a redhead with a fiery temper, I may hope just a little that they burn in hell.

Sunday Music Fun!

This brought a smile to my face for the first time all day! Say Hey (I Love You) by Michael Franti & Spearhead. Pretty awesome!

Strange what desire will make smart people do...

I wonder if HE ever thinks of me. It's been a depressing day, thinking of HIM. Dammit. I'm smart enough to know better, but... strange how the heart can overcome everything else, especially the brain.

Moira

Mrs Transome knew perfectly that Denner had divined her thoughts.

"I don't know how things will go on now; but it seems something too good to happen that they will go on well. I am afraid of ever expecting anything good again."

"That's weakness, madam. Things don't happen because they're bad or good, else all eggs would be addled, or none at all and at the most it is but six to the dozen. There's good chances and bad chances, and nobody's luck is pulled only by one string."

--from Felix Holt, by George Eliot

Appartamento

Finally some photos of the apartment! They've been up on facebook for a while, but I keep forgetting to put them up here. I also just spent a few days in Rome with my cousin Lindsay and her husband Robin, so I've not had much time to post since I took them. I'll post about that trip shortly. It was fun, exasperating, amazing and exhausting!

The apartment has 3 bedrooms, plus the diningroom/livingroom where I've set up, a bathroom, kitchen, laundry room and a storage room. I live at the top of a big hill, so I have a lot of walking, but there's a bus I'll probably have to take once it starts getting dark earlier or the weather turns. The view is breathtaking; I love waking up in the morning and rolling over to see Sicily. There is little better. The apartment is a little bare as I'm living in a space that a family could easily fill!


Welcome inside...



My bedroom/office (the dining room/living room). This is the largest room and has the best view and light. I think my landlady uses it as her room when she's here and I like it best myself.



The 'office' end of my main room, where I'm sitting right now!



The bedroom end, with the dressing table (a desk poached from one of the spare bedrooms), bed, and the balcony with a view to Sicily.



The bathroom.



The kitchen. Sorry for the laundry; I took the photos the day before I left for Rome and I needed the underwear etc. Also, that's tile, not wallpaper. The tablecloth is mine.



The laundry room.



The view off the balcony. I also have this view from the window over my desk and from the balcony in the 'guest room'.



More of the lovely view across to Sicily.



The view; Sicily and those little buildings in the left corner are part of Reggio's cemetery.



Night view of Sicily.

Don't prick your finger...

"The poets have told us of a dolorous enchanted forest in the under world. The thorn-bushes there, and the thick-barked stems, have human histories hidden in them; the power of unuttered cries dwells in the passionless-seeming branches, and the red warm blood is darkly feeding the quivering nerves of a sleepless memory that watches through all dreams. These things are a parable."

-George Eliot, Felix Holt

Viva l'Italia!

So I've been living in Italy now for about three weeks and it has been crazy, wonderful, terrible, exciting and, at times, boring. I have experienced some very entertaining, wonderful and interesting things living in Reggio Calabria; here are a few of them:

Waking up to the end of the sunrise over Sicily, delicate shell pinks tenderly cradling the island, while I lay in my bed, drowsy lids half closed, just watching.

Almost getting killed about 5 times every day on my walk to and from the Museo as there aren't sidewalks everywhere on my walk and even where there are, people are parked on them. I guess to keep their cars from getting scratched by the crazy drivers, so I get to be in danger of being killed instead. I crossed a very busy street just behind an elderly couple one day and I swear a police car sped up in an attempt to hit the couple.

Chatting with people in Italian. Every time I do it, it reminds me I need to study more grammar so I can improve, but I AM improving, just slowly. They will correct me, roll their eyes at me and encourage me. I am surprised to find the discomfort I always had in language classes of making an ass out of myself has fallen away and I am happy to screw up on a daily basis.

Old men blatently staring at me or slowing their cars down and honking. I should be flattered, I suppose, but it's kind of creepy. They will literally stop dead in their tracks, stare, and follow me with their eyes until I've passed. I give them my best Calabrese stare right back. It's mainly because to them, I am very different from the women here and therefore exciting and an adventure, not because I'm gorgeous. In North America I'm maybe a 3. But here, because my hair is ginger and my skin is pale and I'm so obviously a foreigner, I might just have velcro on my panties and be ready to rip them off for any sleezy bastardo. One never knows.

Walking along the Lungomare at night. It's a mixed pleasure. I love the sound of the water and watching the sea, watching Sicily, enjoying the walk... But it's a favourite walk of everyone in Reggio and I wanted to be alone a lot of the time when I went there. But it was almost impossible to find space to myself without young lovers also appreciating the beauty of the moment.

The little things that don't work and the fun ways to fix them. Tonight I went to the supermarket and while I was gone, the father of my landlady showed the apartment to a family interested in taking it after I leave. When they were through, the papa actually locked the deadbolts (I can't ever be bothered; I live in Reggio and I swear almost everyone in this building is a child of the parents downstairs. The door has a catch on it; it's not like you can't open it without a key). But apparently if you lock the deadbolts, you can't open the door from the outside. Which I discovered when I returned from the market. He and I spent a while trying to open it and finally he called the fire department (! I guess emergency locksmiths don't exist here). While we were waiting, a friend of his, who is also a fireman (vigile del fuoco) came in and opened the door. With the 4 deadbolts on. His tool? An xray loaned by the papa. So, yeah, they might change the lock, but to be honest, as long as no one puts those deadbolts on, I don't know why one would bother. And why put the deadbolts on? If a piece of paper can frickin' open the door... It's perfectly safe, I'm sure. My landlady and I were laughing, but I can imagine she's getting tired of things going wrong with the apartment. The evening water problem was fixed the other day, but I came home to find the washing machine no longer working. I discovered the problem was the plug was switched off, so I turned it on again and it started up some random machine that hadn't been working before and water shot out of a new hose that had been hooked up that day (and I'd not noticed before) and out of my laundry room and across the kitchen floor. I was laughing pretty hard, but I switched the power off pretty damn fast. Today I bought an extension cord for the washing machine (lavatrice) and just plug it in in the kitchen.

Once agan, Italian men. Today I've been told I'm very pretty and the papa of my landlady was wondering why I wasn't already affianced. Perhaps because my only proposals come from sketchy Italian men? He suggested I find a nice Italian man and I tried to tell him that hadn't worked out so well for me and finally resorted to telling him I wanted to live in Canada. Things were getting difficult (my grasp of the language isn't quite sophisticated enough to explain that I'm not interested in dating right now because my former lover used me, dropped me, then tried to screw my roommate and I've really just had enough of men and that kind of behaviour). My friend at the museum asked if I thought he was old (he's in his 50s) and I told him yes and no. Not in a sketchy way, but too old to sleep with. Oh, Italian men, have you nothing else on your minds? Is it the Catholic thing? Are you afraid of Madam Palm and her five sisters? I assure you, nothing bad will happen with them, but if you make a move on me it won't be pretty. Not that I'm against dating, but right now, after a certain man, I'm a little on edge, especially with Italian, specifically Calabrian, men. So, no.

The food. God, the food. I have fewer migraines here, I feel better, I sleep better... I don't know if it's the air or the food or what it is, but... Fresh fruit and veg for SO cheap. I bought a ton of tomatoes (ok, well, not a literal ton, maybe like 7 or 8 "on the vine"--pomodoro rosso), 5 bananas and 3 heads of garlic the other day at a store (a fruit and vegetable store, not the market, so a tad more expensive) and it cost me just under 4 euro. That's $6 Canadian. I couldn't even get the tomatoes for that in Vancouver. And the market sells this stuff for cheaper. Oh, the market. It's like stepping back in time, where the vendors yell their prices and try and out-shout each other, tons of cheap crap is laid out for sale and everyone looks for a bargain. I was walking through the market the other day and in front of a bunch of men who where just standing around bullshitting, I just fell. It was SO embarrassing. There was a policeman of some sort there who was going to help me, but I was fine--I told him it was fine--but everyone else just stood around and made comments sotto voce. I couldn't hear, but I'm sure it was something along the lines of, "look at the stupid foreigner who can't even walk". I brushed off my...ahem... dignity... and went off in search of fresh basil.

I think for now that's all I'm going to write, but there's a ton of stuff. This is not my first time in Italy, but it's really my first time so completely alone and it's scary and wonderful and not unfamiliar but not familiar either. There are some things you forget about (probably intentionally) as soon as you go home and others that just come back to you immediately. I can be quite high strung, but I can also accept some of the difficulties and problems with a laugh. Besides, after what I've been through this summer, getting locked out of my apartment seems like entertainment (I don't think it was for anyone else, though, as their evenings were all disturbed!). A lot of my colleagues have spent years abroad, staying as fellows at various schools in Rome, Athens and the Near East, but I think there is something to be said for picking up and just moving to south Italy. There is no safety net, no professors, few English speakers and no one takes care of me in a secure compound (not that I'm dissing those schools--that's a fabulous experience to spend a year at the American Academy in Rome or the American School in Athens or the British equivalents). I think it's better for my Italian as I have to struggle along all by myself. And I have a little more freedom and am a little more relaxed, even if I don't have a built in social network. I'm pleased with myself for managing to do this (sort of--the past two weeks have required a lot of support from friends, but that was due to extraneous craziness) and I AM managing. I hope to be much more fluent in Italian by the time I leave here--I don't think that's unlikely as I already speak some--enough for basic conversation, shopping etc (and I can cuss!). A lot of that was from my last time in Reggio by myself--this past summer. No one speaks English, or rather, few people do, so I have no choice. And I have to listen hard, but I'm doing better--my comprehension is ahead of my speaking, but I do comprehend what people say a lot of the time. That's a huge step, being able to pick out words and recognize them--it may seem minor, but when a language is very foreign, it can just sound like all the words run together and be hard to pull everything apart. I try and think a bit in Italian, too, as the more I do so the better it will be. I can't have the extra step of translating what I want to say into Italian. Things simply need Italian names and Italian phrases. And of course I'm studying grammar at night. I'm making progress!

Work is coming along in the museum and soon I'll be looking to talk with people about my dissertation. Right now I'm finishing up with the pottery from Oppido Mamertina; I'd hoped to be done by the end of Oct, but it may take me a little longer. We'll see. There've been a few 'lazy days' (the work ethic here is starting to rub off on me) and the chaos of my first few weeks here were not conducive to focus. But this year MUST be worth it, so I am working on centering myself so I can get what I need to done.

I'll post a few photos of the apartment soon, but I need to be home during the day to take the pics!

A presto...

Dressing your pets?

From PostSecret this week:

I laughed, but it's very, very true. A lot of secrets resonate with me and this is certainly one of them. I judge you if you dress your animal (although not only on that). There are essentially two types of animal people in this world--those who think it's SOOOOOOOO adorable to dress up their animal and those who are repulsed. I am one of the latter. Paris Hilton is one of the former...

It's a pretty sad commentary on our world that we will buy Hallowe'en costumes for our animals before helping out someone in need. I love my cat so much and she is my baby, but it's because I love her that I don't make her look so ridiculous.

However, I will admit that as long as the animal in question is not IN the room (they know if you're laughing at them and they don't like it), I've laughed pretty damn hard at animals in clothing. A friend of mine has a sister who for her cats has holiday sweaters, sailor costumes and even bee costumes. She and I have laughed until we cried over the photos of these cats in their Christmas sweaters. But if I ever put my cat in clothing for any reason other than warmth, I deserve to be struck by lightening.

Check out this site dedicated entirely to pictures of dogs in bee costumes. I'm just speechless. Have we really nothing better to do with our lives and our time and have we fallen to such vacuous levels of shallow consumerism that we need to buy pink dresses for our pets? FYI: Your pet looks ridiculous and s/he knows it. You also look ridiculous and you're blissfully unaware. Who's dumber, I wonder?

Revenge Fantasies

I think I'm classy enough and have enough control over my temper to not actually behave like this, but it's fun to think about.

Mia casa non è tua casa

I am in Reggio Calabria and have been for just over 2 weeks. It has been a rather crazy 2 weeks and the past week especially has been emotionally draining. I arrived thinking I had set up an apartment to be rented through the man I was seeing in the summer. I would like to say that was my first mistake, but I suppose ever getting in touch with him again was my first mistake. When I got to Italy, we spoke and he said he'd found something better--a shared accommodation with a Canadian girl for 250 euro a month, plus utilities. This was cheaper and the thought of living with someone who spoke English was attractive. We met later that evening and I had major reservations about the place. First, while the apartment was a decent size, the bedroom for me was roughly the size of a prison cell. Now, I've lived in lots of places, especially when I'm excavating, and I can handle space issues, so I figured that while it wasn't ideal, I could deal with it. There was enough room for a desk and a bed--what more did I really need? The less ideal aspects were twofold. First, this girl reminded me of a former roommate with whom I did not have a great rapport. The second, far more disturbing, was I sensed there was something going on, either between them or interest on his part, and for me that would have made the living situation extremely uncomfortable. I don't just sleep around, so I tend to have a few feelings for people I've been with. I'm not ok with living with their new partners, no matter how casual either relationship was/is for THEM. However, he was pushing me to take it, my mother suggested I try it out for a short while, and I went back to talk with her and was bluntly honest with her. I was clear that I could not handle any sort of relationship beyond friendship between the two of them and if that was in the cards or already going on, I did NOT want to live there for my own sanity. She assured me she had no interest in him (nor should she when he's really just looking to use women and there's about 20 years between them in age. Chronologically, at least. Their maturity levels may be about the same, maybe at about age 16?) and that NOTHING was ever going to happen between them. All she wanted from him was for him to show her parts of Calabria as part of excursions he often does with tourists. So, as I rarely lie, I sometimes find deception in others difficult to identify. She may well have been telling me the truth at that point as she knew it. I don't know. I'm usually an excellent judge of character, but as I misjudged him so poorly this summer, I put aside my reservations about her and my compatability thinking that it would be best to give things a try.

For the first week or so, everything was good. We seemed to get along ok--we talked a lot, we had dinner together, we went out together, we bought things for the apartment. But there was apparently undercurrents of resentment and/or a relationship brewing between them and everything exploded. First, I couldn't put aside being suspicious. I'm not proud of it. He was calling and texting her every day, so even if she wasn't interested, he was pursuing and it became very difficult for me. She finally told me she had told him she couldn't know him anymore and that he had accepted that and they were no longer communicating. I told her it wasn't necessary, but she said it was for my sanity and hers. What came next, was worse for my sanity than that--they continued to be in touch, him calling her and texting her and I don't know if she was replying, but I do know, for a fact, that she spoke with him after that and told me she had NOT. Once she started lying to me, whether she meant well by it to save my feelings, whether she felt it was none of my business (which it may well not have been, but better to say that than to lie), or whether there was something going on, I was furious and incredibly suspicious. I told her I thought I should move out and that she was stupid to get involved with this man (which she is and I certainly was). She told me she thought I was right and that while there was NOTHING going on, that she had certainly had no contact with him and she didn't like being suspected or accused (this was before I found out that she had in fact been in contact with him, so the huffy self righteousness made me want to smack her later) and that she didn't like that I wanted to know where she was going all the time, she didn't like that I'd moved furniture in the common rooms and a litany of stuff that told me I had been dead on about her character. When one shares a living space, no matter how close you are, you have to be willing to SHARE the space, not have everything the way you want it and impose that on the other person, then ask them to pay an equal amount of rent. I also just got into the habit of telling people I live with where I'm going and usually getting the same from them--for me it's a safety thing, especially in a strange place, but I suppose she took it as my being suspicious of her and she felt like I was her mother, which told me right there how immature she really is. I should have moved right then, but I was reluctant to pack up and I still ultimately believed her that nothing was going on and that she wasn't interested in this man. So I swallowed a great deal of my pride (which is certainly one of my biggest hurdles) and apologized to her for a lot. I moved all the furniture back to where she wanted, made sure none of my stuff was in the common areas as she wanted and retreated to my room. She told me I could stay for oct 'on trial', but that we would not be sharing our lives any more, she might be FRIENDS with him, but I would know nothing about it, we would not be telling each other where we were going or when and a few other minor things. I replied that I also had some conditions, thinking that if we were paying equal amounts of rent while I was basically contained in a tiny room of the apartment, I should be able to have a few things for myself to be relatively ok living there. At this point, he was away in London. She took my rent money and we basically didn't speak, coming and going like we barely knew each other. On Oct 2, he returned and as I was looking around for a place for Nov, worried that things might not work, I got a call from him that day asking if I were ready to move. I said I didn't think it had been settled that I was going right away, but he said he'd spoken to her that morning and that it was. So she took my rent money and let me find out from this man who had just broken my heart and was pursuing my roommate that I was kicked out immediately. She sent me a brief text message hours later suggesting I just get a room in another shared accomodation as there were some available. I wrote her back and told her I would go, esp. as I didn't appreciate being lied to (by this time I knew she'd been contacting him when she said she hadn't and I think more was going on or about to between them), but that she'd have to give me a few days to find a place. I left the morning of Oct 4, without even bothering to tell her--I'm sure he told her the minute I called him to say I had a place and to arrange for him to help me move as he'd offered, so why bother? Besides, she had taken my rent money and kicked me out, now I'm SURE to start seeing him. Which is not cool. She basically took 400 euro from me for my being there for 2 weeks. I am so furious about that, I am furious about all the lying and I am furious that they are seeing each other and I was kicked out I'm sure to relieve any guilt or discomfort on her part about that.

I have a beautiful apartment now to myself, of course I'm paying more than 250 euro, but it's 400, utilities included, and it's huge. I have a laundry room, a storage room, 3 bedrooms besides my own, a view straight across to Sicily and a huge bedroom with a double bed. The landlady is a very nice woman who lives in Milan, but her parents live just downstairs in the building, so if there are problems they can help immediately. I will learn more Italian this way and while I'm up a big hill from the museum, I've been missing my workouts at the gym, so this should help. It's quiet here (the other apartment was on the busy main thoroughfare of the town and it was noisy 24/7) and I have windows in my bedroom (I didn't even have any in the other, except into the living room) with the aforementioned view of Sicily. It's a perfect apartment and I love it. I just wish I hadn't had to go through the emotional stress those two put me through (nor the financial stress--I've sent her a message that she might want to give me back my money, but I doubt she will.) to get it. And while she kept saying the other apartment was HER apartment because she found it (this means, it got passed on to her from another girl--an American or a Canadian who lived in it before and she had help from her employer--an English school here), sort of suggesting like she had done something amazing and I couldn't--I found this apartment completely on my own, looking through Italian announcements, talking to people in Italian via email & telephone, using the web and other resources, NO help from anyone else. I negotiated by myself, I got the utilities thrown in and while the landlady does speak English, I could have done it in Italian if it had been necessary. I should have done this in the first place--I can do a much better job than others and rather than letting him rent me an apartment as I'd first planned, I should have just done it myself.

I think basically she is here to have fun, to go out every night, party until late, talk about makeup and boys and god only knows what other sorts of drivel and after talking to me for a week or so, it was all too serious for her. I can't be that shallow, I'm intense and serious (well, except when I watch crappy TV and discuss it. I do have a few vices!) most of the time and perhaps that's a little much to take. I don't think, ultimately, he could handle it either. They're the kind of people who want to have fun, not think too hard about much in life, use whomever they can to enjoy themselves (well, in that case, him more than her), and will probably sail through life, happy because they don't think too hard and they simply don't know any better. And yet, I'm not sure I'd like to live like that, because such shallowness of emotion, such shallowness of understanding life and the world we live in, spending all my time tramping it up around town, sleeping with many people, living always for the moment and never having a depth of connection with someone else, worrying about little more than whether I've bleached highlights for the month or what kind of mascara to use simply isn't enough for me. I can't do it. I may be wrong about her--maybe she's just having a fun year and isn't always like this. But I'm not wrong about him. He is a user, a player and has no respect for women. I really regret that he has a daughter because she will learn so much of how to relate to men and the world from him. If he has no respect for women, she won't either. And as for the two of them--my roommate and my former--well--lover, whatever--I think he will use her. She may use him. But I doubt they will find happiness together. He is certainly a sad, old man, preying on young women. It's pretty nasty.

Obviously I am now in a better situation than I was before, but I am also emotionally wrecked. My heart is broken, I feel like a bitch, I find moving and settling in to places very difficult and having to do it twice in 2 weeks is very stressful for me. This was not the best start to my dissertation research and I can only hope it gets better. I am feeling better about everything and I think distance from those people will help. There is no reason for me to see either of them ever again--she and I have a mutual friend at the museum to whom she can give my money if she's adult enough to do it. But I feel like my trust in people has been betrayed, over and over again in this situation--first in the summer, now again both with him and her. And I can't help but keep feeling like I just want to go home. I keep reminding myself I have been through much worse situations and made it through and so do several of my friends, who have been AMAZING, talking to me for hours and listening to me. I'm sure most of them are ready to stab this guy, if only for the long boring drivel they've had to listen to for so long!

Anyone reading this post is probably ALSO ready to stab me and/or him for having to read such a long boring whine. This will be the last time I write about either of these people, because I need to move on to a better place, where such vacuous, shallow people are not sucking my energy. And I will leave on a positive note, with a photo of the view off my balcony over to Sicily!

Handy! (no pun intended)

Keep this useful flowchart by your bed or posted on your ceiling, so you'll know just what to say at the right moment.



Click here to enlarge (again, no pun intended).

Glory in the Flower

What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

-excerpted from Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood, W. Wordsworth

Faking it.

In just about 10 days, I move to Italy. I will get on a plane with a few bags, fly to Rome, spend the night, then catch a train to Reggio di Calabria where hopefully I will have an apartment ready for me (see early post about the follies of renting through someone you've had any kind of intimate relationship with. But perhaps the irritations have more to do with the laid back, Southern Italian attitudes meeting my not so laid back, ADD, North American attitudes). I have been to Italy 4 times before and I should speak the language much better than I do, but I'm improving and can navigate my way around somewhat, order in a restaurant or bar, and carry on conversations with people, even if I only understand 1/3 of what's said. I know my numbers and can understand how much something is if someone tells me. So I'll be ok and hopefully, despite my language blockage, 9 months in the country will make a huge difference. I've lived in a different country before, too, albeit the United States, but I have picked up and moved from my hometown to a completely different country and part of the world (Columbia, MO is pretty different from Vancouver). And yet, I find myself apprehensive, even dreading this move. Everyone tells me how they envy me and how wonderful it will be to live in Italy for a year, and I respond dutifully, all the while wondering how I will make it through those 9 months. I suspect a large part of the problem is leaving Calliope behind. I depend on her and we are so tightly bonded that I can't imagine being apart from her for so long. 6 weeks feels like an eternity, so how can I bear 9 months? I will also be completely alone in the country, cut off on the whole from people who speak English and trying to communicate in a mixture of Italian and English to people I barely know why my dissertation is important and why they should let me look at their material. I'm not even sure I'm going to know what to do if I get access; the topic feels huge and unsurmountable and I cannot see how I can do this data gathering in the time I've allotted. Of course, that's assuming I can get access to these museums and find these people. Perhaps the dissertation will morph as I find out what I can get access to, but I cannot help feeling that I have set myself an extremely difficult task and I am not prepared at all to tackle it. We shall see. I doubt I am the first PhD student to feel this way and I'm sure I will not be the last, but I wish I could be more excited about this trip, rather than being so scared. However, I'll keep faking it, and maybe I'll start fooling myself.

The Panther Pounce

The National Post ran a front page spread this morning on whether or not Sarah Palin is striking a blow for feminism. I'll set aside the issue of why a Canadian newspaper is headlining with an American VP candidate rather than the imminent (and illegal) election that is about to be called by our own Prime Minister and address US politics myself (frankly, it's more interesting). It's true, Ms. Palin is the first female to be on the US presidential ticket and she is living the American dream, all while having a family of 5 children. Questions of whether she can juggle the vice presidency and her children quite frankly ARE ridiculous; no one would ask that of a male candidate and I would like to know what Mr. Sarah Palin will be doing? Perhaps he is a stay-at-home dad? Or could become one? Unless membership in the GOP prevents anyone with testicles and a penis from caring for the children they are equally responsible for. But I digress. So, we have established that her blow for femalehood is that there is a vagina running for VP. Fantastic. Pakistan has had a female Prime Minister, Germany has had a female Prime Minister, even we've had a female Prime Minister, albeit for a brief period and by default. So, while it is rare, it's not quite as amazing as the US would have us believe. Maybe for them, but for the rest of the world? Maggie Thatcher was running England when Palin was doing the beauty queen wave. So that glass ceiling has actually already been broken, many times over, just not in the US.

What concerns me far more is Palin's platform. Her policies are extremely anti-woman and anti-feminist. The GOP has practically put Anne Coulter on the ticket. So the idea is that Americans who want a pro-woman candidate are supposed to overlook her opinions and policies and simply see that she's a woman. That should be enough. Vote with your vagina! And that attitude is the most outrageous and anti-feminist thing I have heard in a long time. Sarah Palin's addition to the GOP ticket is not pro-feminist or pro-woman, but an insult to women and their intelligence throughout America.

Sunday Morning Funny

Roy Zimmerman & Billy Bob Neck take on the issue of attitudes toward Hillary Clinton and in general the issue of strong women who have ambition. In song. Brilliant!

Congratulations!

To Chris & Nate, who are getting married Sept 27 of this year. I would be there, but I'll be in Italy. I know Chris will make a beautiful bride & that they will have a very happy life together.
Love you guys!

Summer days...

I've been neglecting my blog, and I really haven't a great excuse. So bear with me as this update will likely be a little long. I'll try and post a little more frequently, but no promises. At the moment, though, I'll bring everyone up to speed on what's been happening since I got back from Italy.

As some of you know, I am spending the next year in Italy doing research for my dissertation. This is starting to weight quite heavily on my mind (as evidenced by the dream I had last night in which I was explaining my dissertation topic to a woman who was apparently coaching me in some reality singing competition. After hearing about how much I love grad school, I believe she was planning on going back to school for her PhD, but in music... ). So, I have bought a plane ticket, leaving Sept 16, arranged for an apartment in Reggio di Calabria (through the same guy I was seeing. He is going to manage the apartment, which in some ways will make life easier and in some ways will make life harder. And before you say anything, I wrote to him a quick question asking for advice about renting, I did NOT ask him to find me a place. He offered it up on his own.)



The apartment is near the museum, in which I will have to do a ton of work, a studio, and 350 euros a month, which to my mind is a little expensive for Reggio, but I certainly couldn't find anything cheaper. I'll arrange for WiFi, because there is really no way I can do dissertation research with no internet access. Plus I can get skype and I'm not sure I could do without email and facebook... I'll try and do some commuting to other parts of Calabria at least. The apartment will give me a central location to base myself from and I do think it's a necessity. Especially as I'll be applying for permission through the year to visit museums and collections; I won't have all that set before I leave.

I am in fact a little behind in organizing myself and the museums and contacts in south Italy, but I have an excuse. I managed to contract Mono a few weeks ago and have been a bit under the weather. It looks like I've managed to get rid of it and there shouldn't be too much lingering fatigue, but it was pretty nasty when I had it. I was so nauseated (probably because my liver was affected), my throat felt so sore, swallowing was like swallowing shards of glass, and I couldn't stand for more than about 5mins, if that. Having a shower would leave me white and shaking from the effort. I'm at the point now where I don't need to sleep during the day and I'm getting ready to go back to the gym (albeit armed with better disinfectants than they have to ensure I don't pass the virus on as apparently I'll be contagious for a while--mainly in saliva though. It's not THAT contagious and I have no idea where I got it. Perhaps one of the UK students from the summer, as they're the right age group, or perhaps I picked it up in the gym in the first place. I'll probably never know.). I was relieved to hear from the doctor that the trip in Sept is not going to be a problem.

Well, that's the long and the short of it for now. It's rather hot in Vancouver and the house seems to be exceptionally so. I still haven't ventured out to do much, so it's like a hot little cave that I can't escape. Monday the weather should turn and hopefully I'll be more ready to go out then, too. I need to get back to organizing the trip and working on my dissertation. Hopefully I'll post a little more, too!

Needs work...

I'm not posting the Canadian one. It's embarrassing, considering I'm Canadian and lived there most of my life, but can really only count 2 provinces... (although I have been in the Toronto airport... but I didn't count airports in the US map, either, or I could have added Texas and Colorado).

create your own personalized map of the USA
or check out ourCalifornia travel guide

Adopt a Rescue Animal!

Our second cat, Hawkeye, came to us at 8 months of age. He had been attacking his tail and finally the vets had to take it off. His previous family paid all the vet bills, but left him with the vet, saying they didn't want him anymore because he wasn't perfect. His name with them was "Wemsley", which tells me they wanted a decorative item, not a family member, albeit with fur.

Hawkeye, 8 Aug 1987--7 Nov 2007

I came across the following poem today and while it's not exactly a literary masterpiece, it is beautiful and disturbing. There are so many people who abandon animals at shelters because they become inconvenient. This, for me, is something I cannot understand. I was brought up with the understanding that once you adopt an animal, you take care of it. It is your responsibility to ensure that he or she is well looked after, with adequate medical care, food, shelter, safety etc, for the entirety of its life. If that is a responsibility you cannot handle, you do not adopt an animal. They are living, breathing, FEELING creatures. They are not toys. How would you feel if, after several years, your parents dropped you off at an orphanage and said, hope someone else comes along soon, or they'll euthanize you! As my friend Cassandra said, the really disturbing thing is, the people who can discard an animal like it's a possession often want children; what will they do when the children become inconvenient, messy or cramp their lifestyle? Oh, but those are humans, people argue. For me, humans aren't any better than dogs or cats or even gerbils. Animals are also alive. They also have feelings, maybe more basic than ours, but they are still there, and I will not accept that animals should be treated with any less respect than us. Anyone who has truly shared their life with an animal knows they are capable of love and joy, sadness and pain.

Perhaps it is a theological standpoint, the idea that animals have been put on the earth to serve us and are somehow lesser beings or not imbued with the divinity of god; well, that is one reason I reject religion. I hate that idea. We share the earth with other creatures, we should be living in harmony with them. It's natural for animals to eat other animals (although I find myself eating meat less and less), but it's the ultimate in egoism to believe that they have a lesser right to be treated with respect and humanity than we do.

The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.
--Ghandi

I suggest that Ghandi's statement can be applied to people as well. If you adopt an animal, that animal is your responsibility as much as any child you bring into the world or take responsibility for. It is a creature dependent on you for its care. You should treat it like a child and if you're unsure whether you should do something, think about whether you would do that for a child. If a child becomes inconvenient, would you hand it over to foster services? If a child requires expensive medical care, would you put it down? I don't understand how anyone can welcome an animal into their home, take care of it, then give it away like a sofa.

And one more quick point. Before you go out and BUY an expensive, pure-bred animal, consider going to a shelter and adopting one of the many, many animals who need loving homes. For that matter, before you start breeding, consider adopting one of the many, many children who need loving homes. There are strays, unwanted children of humans, cats and dogs alike and they ALL need love and care from responsible parents. But if you just want something fun or cute to play with, get a stuffed animal or a Wii. It won't mind when you tire of it or you don't want it anymore and discard it. Animals, human, feline, canine, etc, have feelings, and are hurt when you abuse* or abandon them. One can only hope the damage won't always be permanent.

I adopted your dog today

I adopted your dog today
The one you left at the pound
The one you had for seven years
and no longer wanted around.

I adopted your dog today
Do you know he's lost weight?
Do you know he's scared and depressed
and has lost all faith?

I adopted your dog today.
he had fleas and a cold,
but don't worry none.
You've unburdened your load.

I adopted your dog today.
Were you having a baby or moving away?
Did you suddenly develop allergies
or was there no reason he couldn't stay?

I adopted your dog today.
he doesn't play or eat much
He's very depressed, but
he will learn again to trust.

I adopted your dog today.
And here he will stay.
He's found his forever home
and a warm bed on which to lay.

I adopted your dog today.
And I will give him all that he could need.
Patience, love, security, and understanding.
Hopefully he will forget your selfish deed.

Author Unknown**

SPCA International - Donate or Adopt today!

*I did not address the issue of animal abuse because most people are pretty agreed that it's abhorrent behaviour and because I was inspired to write the post by this poem. People who abuse animals are sick individuals indeed and it is one of the few times I might be willing to support corporal punishment. Or life imprisonment in a mental ward.

I'm ashamed...

...but this is actually pretty true for me. Or at least, what I strive for until I break down and eat too much ice cream...

Sunday Morning Fun

Hell, by the Squirrel Nut Zippers. This song makes me smile every time I hear it.

The End of the Affair...

My...whatever it was...is over. I always intended to end it when I left for Canada, but things ended a few days sooner than that. I'm not sure what happened; I suspect he got scared that I, or both of us, were getting too close. I really should have known better than to get involved with someone who was just newly separated (in Italy, you have to have been separated before you can get a divorce). He has a lot of soul searching to do and is definitely not ready for anything remotely resembling a relationship. I hope he spends the next few months focusing on his daughter, who is moving to London with her mother in Sept, and on himself. I doubt he and I will ever resume anything, but perhaps we can be friends. I'm moving back to the south of Italy in Sept and I could use his help and advice. I think I was starting to fall for him, just a little, so the end was not easy, but I think it was perhaps for the best. Best for things to end before I got too attached. We had fun together and I did like him, but the timing was very off. I just need to avoid romantic movies & books for a little while and focus on getting organized for my dissertation and the move in the fall! I just wish that I were allowed a little happiness...

Nothing is more painful, then realizing he meant everything to you, and you meant nothing to him. (Unknown)

Italia 2008: Redux

I am almost through another season in Calabria and have lived to tell the tale. What with the excavation, Paolo, students, 'ndrangheta, locals, and various other events, it has been a long and busy season. I'm exhausted and feel completely drained. Luckily there was no 'ndrangheta activity to speak of, but of course there's always the possibility in this area. I doubt they'd be interested in us, but one never knows. The excavation was a success in that we accomplished more than we would have been able to without the students. I love working with students as they do what they're asked and they are younger. Certainly they were a step above the volunteers we've had in the past, most of whom seem intent on a working vacation, with the emphasis on vacation. I had a dedicated corps of pottery washers who may not have done the best job, but they certainly worked fast and efficiently and most with little complaint. The ceramic finds this year were unexceptional, much to my disappointment; there was much of the same and I didn't find anything particularly exciting. We did find a lovely bronze piece, but I won't say anything about that yet!

My other work here has been chugging along; I've been studying the pottery from Oppido Mamertina in the Museo Nazionale della Magna Grecia in Reggio Calabria and I even made overnight trips down to Reggio during the excavation until it simply became impossible to do so, for reasons I prefer not to elaborate on right now. Suffice it to say, there was a bit of chaos that had to be dealt with. It took me almost a week to get permission to work on the material but now that I have it, the guards all know me and I am able to enter and work during the day. I've returned to Reggio for a week now at the end of the season to finish up, although I still have quite a bit to do and I am so tired from Monte Palazzi that I'm not working at full speed. It's also hot like hell here and while the museum storeroom I work in is cooler than the rest of the museum, it's still warmish and it slows me down a bit. The heat makes me a little cranky, too. On the good side, I walk to and from the museum and that gives me just under 2miles of a walk every day I work. Of course, I walk slowly, now, as it's so hot, but still the exercise is good.

Anyways, it's been a long 5 weeks or so. I've been seeing a man I met here in Reggio on and off, in a very casual sort of way, but I suspect we'll end it when I leave in a couple days. It's very complicated as he's just separated from his wife, and it's a situation I don't really know if I want to be involved with. Plus I don't think either of us are that emotionally involved, although I do like him and I hope we'll stay friends. It's made things more chaotic, though! Ah, Calabria, it's a place to both love and hate.

Well, it's hot and my computer is making me hotter, so I'll end this post & will try to write another when I get back to Canada; probably soon after! I'm flying back to Vancouver on the 3rd of July but will be getting into gear to organize to return here in the fall for dissertation research. Still, I can't wait to see Calliope--I suddenly miss her SO much!

Ciao belli!

Italia 2008

I'm leaving for Italy tomorrow. I would write more, but I am currently hurrying to finish my dissertation proposal to turn in to my committee. I'm not happy with it, so I'm reluctant to let it go. However, I think the following comic sums up recent things very nicely. I'll try to blog at least once from Italy, but for now, ciao!