100 Day Dream

Tonight, we are on the brink of a new year. 2018. This coming year never seemed monumental to me until, slowly, I began to realize that 2018 would be a year of change. Funny, right? If anything, you might say that 2017 was that year, seeing as I went to Italy and did anthropological research, among other things. Perhaps this year of change really did start in 2017, with me. Rather, it began with the changes, still seemingly small and nearly imperceptible, that my time in Italy and Europe fostered in me. Now, going into 2018, these changes will no longer be silent. I'm being vague. And dramatic, probably more dramatic than need be. It's because I'm still not totally clear on what those changes will be, to be completely honest.  Coming home from Italy (actually, starting from my time in Paris in October), there was one question I kept turning over in my mind: what do I want to do? No, that's not quite it. It's more like, "What am I going to do?" or ...

I can't pack. I am sitting on my bed in a mess of a room, everything ready for me to place into my suitcases, and I just cannot do it. I have to. I won't have time to do it tomorrow because the next time I'll be home after I wake up, my host sister and I will be lugging the bags downstairs so I don't have to do it alone at 4 AM. So I know that the longer I sit here staring and listening to the most melancholy songs I own, the worse I'm making things for Future Zoë. I've been working on packing on and off for about ten hours now. I've got one packed and all of my clothes except the ones I'll be wearing tomorrow and to the airport are inside my big suitcase. But here I sit. I can't stop myself thumbing through old field notes or looking at random sentences I've written--little reminders, quotes I've heard in passing, or just thoughts I've had--reminding myself of how amazing my time here has been and how close I am to it all being ove...

I've been listening to Sufjan Stevens's "Mystery of Love" on repeat for the past two weeks, all because I've really come to understand it. I'm not in love with a person (proving my dad wrong and not getting married while I'm here), but rather with my city, with beautiful Firenze. You know this. Your cousin's brother's sister's mother knows this. The entire universe knows this because I have all but screamed it from every rooftop at this point. The thing is, I feel like I just cannot get my point across. How do you explain the color red to a blind person? That's how I feel trying to explain my love for this city to a group of people who mostly have not set foot in Florence or even Italy. But. I think I finally got it. Let me set the scene. It's about almost 6 PM on a Sunday night. I'm sick (I'll find out the next day that it's a lung infection because of course it is). It's pouring rain. It even snowed a little ea...

"Right now, all your dreams are waking up." Anyone who has spent more than two minutes with me knows of my obsession with music. I have a playlist for everything, I have a song for every mood and every moment, and I am always more than happy to give recommendations for new music (though you might just get a three page long list). When I want to process things, I go to my music and I search; once I find the right song, what I'm feeling suddenly becomes tangible. Lately, I've been searching for something to make what I'm feeling now real like that, but it's been difficult. The closest I've come, I think, is "Honey and the Moon" by Joseph Arthur. To me, this song expresses a sort of love that's all about the wrong place and the wrong time. It's all about this sort of temporary moment that sparks feelings that just won't go away, and I feel that about Florence right now. There's no eloquent way to say it: I don't want to lea...

This was a whirlwind of a month. I started the month running and didn't really get the chance to slow down until, well, now. First, I had to refocus my anthropology research due to some issues with participant observation, which meant that I had to collect a month's worth of research before my presentation deadline--three days from when I had to change my project. Once I finally finished with that (and the caffeine overdose I induced in myself), it was time to study for midterms and prepare for interviews. By the time I finished midterms and got my first interview done, it was time to get ready for my week of travels throughout Europe! I began in Amsterdam and spent about 3 days there. Initially, I had planned to travel with a group, but, when plans fell through, it ended up becoming solo travel in a completely new and different city. On the first day, I was wary of too much walking around on my own and stuck to pretty much the immediate vicinity to my hostel. Soon, however, ...