round and round

i wrote an entire post about how i want to take a break from academia because i feel so trapped in this vicious cycle of self-congratulatory ego-coddling rhetoric and then i realized that the entire blog post i had just written was really freakin self-congratulatory.

ugh. i really need to figure out how to blog like a normal person. [ha!]

lefty loosey

i have trouble letting go of some things. case in point: i have 4 email accounts that i use regularly including (but not limited to) an antiquated hotmail account that is daily inundated by spam mailings and the various email lists i've signed up for over the years. i rarely get any personal correspondence and the format is terribly inefficient, especially compared to the genius of gmail [one of the 4 email services i employ] and yet -- i can't bear to let go.

other things, i let go of with shocking ease. my living arrangements, for example. in my four and a half years in nashville, i lived in 7 different places. in fact, since moving home 2 years ago, this has been the longest i've lived in one place since i first moved out of my parents house post-high school in 2001. though i hate packing more than anything and though moving is a universally despised ordeal, somehow i manage to pick up and change addresses with only minimal consideration.

which brings me to my current quandary: where next? this year marks my final year as an undergraduate at the University of Washington. as we all know by now, college round 2 transformed me from reluctant slacker student to über nerd and thus graduate school is the natural next step my nerdy progression. i plan on pursuing an MFA in creative writing and in my initial googlings, i've found that the programs that appeal to me the most are on the other side of the country. i guess i should be a little more honest here: i'm finding that the programs that appeal to me the most are appealing BECAUSE they're on the other side of the country.

don't get me wrong, i LOVE seattle. i love waking up to my glorious a view of the mountains over the puget sound. i will never find another roommate who does my dishes, cooks me fresh salmon lunches, and doesn't charge me rent (thanks, dad!). the thought of trying to find a faith community as spiritually, emotionally, and intellectually engaging as Quest feels near impossible. my brothers, aunts, uncles, and most of my cousins are within 40 minutes of me at any given time. and my friends! my amazing, beautiful, supportive, hilarious, wonderful friends!

i know there are plenty of fantastic schools here in the greater seattle area that would be able to offer me an incredible education and yet -- inexplicably -- i'm still feeling the itch to move. i don't know if it's fear of settling down or love of change -- maybe a little from column a and a little from column b. maybe it's a lot from column c: my amazing east coast visit last week. my time in new york and philadelphia was shockingly life giving. shocking because i was a bit reluctant to leave for the east coast in the first place after my long 2 month european excursion. so imagine my surprise when i felt sad to come home! again, this says nothing about my love for seattle or any ostensible lack thereof. there was just a newness and freshness about the east coast -- new and fresh to ME, mind you as both cities were plenty old and plenty dirty. those of you that know me know i'm far from peak physical shape and am in no way motivated to get there AND YET i walked MILES in each city without complaint and with a spring in my step! explain THAT whydoncha? i felt like both cities both brought out my truest self and made me strive to be a better version of me. i know that's a pretty strong statement to make after just a week and a half away but there you have it.

i suppose it would be unfair to say that the charm of the cities alone have injected my heart with this new jolt of wanderlust. truth be told, i was quite charmed by my friends, both new and old. i got to connect with friends i haven't seen in years, friends i haven't seen in months, and friends i met for the very first time. and though i've never been accused of shyness, don't let my gregarious exterior fool you: i've always found it difficult to open up and let myself relax with any real degree of depth. but in the short time i spent with them, i feel my friends in new york and philly split me open in the best way possible.

all aspirations aside, my fate is still more or less in the hands of the admissions officers at the schools i'll be applying to. i can daydream and whimsy all i want but if the schools don't accept me, there's not really much i can do. okay i take that back, i'm sure there's plenty i can do if i really want to move but i guess the impetus to move will be sort of deflated. but who knows? in the next few months, seattle just might re-woo me and i may end up staying on the left coast after all. que será, será...

self-fulfilling prophesy

on my crowded and disorganized bookshelf, i have about a dozen or so mostly empty journals. each was started with the best of intentions and each began more or less the same way -- with an entry apologizing to my future self for discarding yet another journal in the vain hope that this one just might be the one i finally get through, cover to cover. but without fail [or rather, with abundant fail] i leave each new journal behind with only a few months worth of entries a piece, some forgotten circumstantially and others forgotten forcibly, discarded because of the shameful Judy-Blume-ish confessions within. looking over my past few weeks worth of blog entries, i'm quite tempted to cyber-chuck this beast altogether. despite the difference in medium, i'm finding my paper journaling habits are being unwittingly duplicated for all the world wide web to see.

in my noble attempt to return to a regular rhythm of writing, i've turned to this blog for lack of inspiration to write anything else. as a result, the past several entries have been written in moments of weakness, times when my focus has been nominal and my sense of shame dulled down by too many hours of reality television. and though i know i shouldn't make excuses, dagnabit i want to make excuses and last i checked, this was my blog. so there. [reaaaal mature, jess.] i would love to get to the point in my journaling when i don't feel the need to constantly apologize for the last thing i wrote but sadly, i can't even accomplish that in my private journals much less this public one. i blame my constant and overwhelming desire to be perfectly understood, an unattainable desire if ever there was one.

i know i nagged y'all for comments and then apologized for nagging y'all for comments so please take the following explanation with a grain of kosher salt: when i get no feedback i.e., no comments, my mind goes BANANAS! i imagine all that's being thought of me and about me and though i've managed to keep it from defining my general self-worth, it continues to effect the way that i blog. as a result, i'm plagued by the need to beat my imaginary critics to the proverbial punch so that before anyone can think to themselves, "damn, homegirl is CONFUSED!" i'm able to acknowledge and articulate my confusion at length first, not to prove any of my hypothetical naysayers wrong per se, but rather to prove me more right. granted, as i already explained the last time, i know that my lack of response is most likely my own fault and yet STILL when i sit down to write, i feel panicky and can't bring myself to write about anything other than me and my own cuckoo craziness. it's sick, i tell you -- SICK! almost as sick as the stupidly long sentences that have overwhelmed this paragraph. nevertheless, i'm hoping that by exorcising these nagging abstractions via this [*fingers crossed*] final demonstration of neuro-vomit, maybe juuuuust maybe i can one day channel my neurosis into the discussion of something other than the innards of my buzzing brain. thank you for your patience in the meantime and please, don't feel overly obligated to respond. we've all got to work together to snap me out of this mess.

too late to 'pologize?

okay, so that last entry was probably kind of an a-hole move. the one before it kinda wasn't awesome either. how do i know this? not only were the two comments left apologies [you're forgiven, by the way] but several of my real-life blog reader friends have also made a point of apologizing to my face, not only for not commenting [you're also forgiven] but for the sad state of affairs reported in the entry before last.

i usually pride myself on limiting my public declarations of internet emo but i think i need to both humble myself in the sight of the Lord and of the computer screen. sure, i've still got the know-how to not post vaguely accusatory passive-aggressive one sentence bursts of emo all up on my FB and twitter statuses [statusii?] but let's face it: this blog is totes emo. it reeks of emo. it's all "wah-wah-WAHHHH" and "boo my feelings got hurt" and "daggumit i wish i had a boyfriend" and whatever what not. somebody really ought to wrangle up one of these dudes. it's intense.

so now it's my turn to apologize to y'all: sorry friends. i can't really blame you for not commenting when i write a veritable novella every time i sit down to has this junk out. i rarely have the patience to read anything more than 3 paragraphs long so i realize i'm asking a lot of the few readers i have as it is. it's hard enough to get through each entry, let alone muster up the brain juice to respond accordingly. and per the whole "boo-hoo i'm single" thing, if i'm honest about it, my desire for romantic companionship is mostly a desire for the convenience of having said companion. it would be really nice to have a man-friend just so that i could have one and people could get off my case. i don't know how it is for you fellas, but for us ladies any inquiries into our love life [or lack thereof] are usually followed up by recommendations for how to resolve the affliction of singleness. i would elaborate on this notion further were it not for my aforementioned resolution to be more concise with my blogging. i will just offer this closing lil nugget of comfort to those who were understandably concerned about my seemingly fragile emotional state: i'm really okay -- fantastic, in fact! i love my life, i love my friends, and not having a dude is about as tragic as not having a million dollars. both of those things would be nice to have but i'm doing more than fine without 'em.

so analytical

being the savvy techmological mind that mine is [mmhmm, you heard me] i utilize the most sophisticated modes of analyticalnessiocity to keep track of this here blizzery-blog. according to the great statistical minds over at google analytics, my blog traffic is down 18.6%. needless to say, i found this information to be both disturbing and not awesome. i happen to know that i have 3 blogger followers. not that impressive. so i hopped on over to my good friends at google reader to see how i was doing on the subscription front and they informed me that there are all of 23 of you out there subscribed to my humble cyborg-journal. this boosted my morale significantissimally. nevertheless, it's been days since my last post and i've yet to receive the satisfaction of the only currency worth cashing in here in the blogosphere -- that's right chil'ren -- the comment.

no comments! i poured out my heart [or at least my brain cells] and still nothing? i was having a bit of a carrie bradshaw moment [what with the mac laptop and all] and i couldn't help but wonder: is it me? did i say too much? did i get too emo? should i have followed my instincts and ommited all the whiny "waaaahhh i'm single" bulldookey???

and then i though -- no wayyyyy y'all! my whiny emo material is golden!!! BUT -- only after a little tweaking. and then it occurred to me -- maybe my subscribers are only getting the raw first draft! they're reading my writing in an embryonic state so maybe they just aren't reaping the spoils of the many rounds of painful whittling and adjusting that takes place in the minutes [*cough* hours *cough*] following the first publishing.

now you might be thinking to yourself -- why not just edit thoroughly BEFORE you publish? sure. i COULD do that. and in fact, i DO do that. ["do do". hee hee.] the fact of the matter is i'm a terrible proof reader of my own work and always have been. i can edit and tweak my writing within an inch of its life but even then, there will always be a typo or three that sneaks out. i know it's painful to be confronted with the reality that i am not, in fact, a flawless writer [breathe, my babies, just breathe] but it's time y'all knew the truth. and it's also time that you subscribers learned that you may be missing out on the best version of my work and it's worth checking back once or thrice for the director's cut.

and thus concludes my shameless plea for comments. feel free to indulge or deny me my sweet validation. know that i'm working on acquiring the techmology to track y'all down one by one so that soon enough, i'll be able to call you out in the STREETS! [don't think i wont, neither]

brain brain grow a way

i've been back in 'merica for exactly two weeks now [almost to the hour] and yet i still haven't been able to collect my thoughts enough to put together any kind of coherent european reflection together. this inability to articulate my travel experience includes but isn't limited to written, verbal and indeed even internal forms of expression. this is largely due to the fact that i managed [in typical 'me' form] to fill up my schedule with a flurry of activities and obligations. time not spent actually 'doing' things is subsequently filled up with purposefully mindless drivel [i.e., reality television, internet social networking, celeblogs, etc.]. i'll top off my long list of excuses with the obligatory jet-lag card and a surprise 48-hour weekend cold [replete with residual mucus that my body is still trying to exhume -- *cough*! *hack*!]. nevertheless, i'm pressing on in hopes that the simple act of putting fingertips to keys will awaken the creative beast within.

[*cricket* *cricket*]

hmm. well, i guess for lack of more innovative means, i'll just answer the line of questioning that gets asked more than any other: are you sad to be at home? do you wish you were back? in a word, my answer to both queries is no. then again, i never really got homesick during the whole two months away. i got a little churchsick [both in that i missed my church and that i got really sick of the gaudy churches there] but for the most part, i didn't ever really feel like i wanted to be anywhere other than i was. nor do i currently wish i was anywhere other than where i am. europe is beautiful or whatever, but when the puget sound is in your backyard, it's hard to complain.

[actual shot of my backyard. no big deal.]

i guess one of the grad students from my program put it best when he said "i take my body with me wherever i go" [or was it "everywhere i go, i take my body with me"?]. something to that effect. the point being, i am where i am wherever i happen to be. i avoid the senselessness of the greener grass syndrome whenever possible and try my best to be at peace regardless of my circumstances. the only area of my life in which this pursuit seems near impossible is [wait for it... you guessed it guys and doods!] in regards to relationships, or rather the persistent and glaring lack thereof.

in europe, it was the ubiquitous public displays of affection [public displays of pawing, more like]. in fact, i wrote a short poem in response to one such visual assault:

this is the millionth couple i've seen making out in public.
they are swaying.
i want to die.

now that i'm back at home, it seems that in my time away, just about all of my friends have wrangled themselves up a significant other or three. who knew it was MY presence that stood in between them and a relationship? perhaps my analysis is a bit too self-involved? hmm. irregardless, i'm back home and feeling very third/fifth/seventh/odd-numbered wheel-y. it certainly doesn't help that the second most common line of questioning since i've gotten back is "so are there any dudes? any euro hookups?" and i find it very difficult not to laugh in the faces of my well-intentioned friends. particularly my well-intentioned NON-single friends who seem to be rubbing their happiness in my face [jerks].

i hate feeling this way and as my longtime readers may know, i don't particularly enjoy waxing poetic about the perils of singlehood, though it may seem otherwise at times. [it's a little too livejournal, both in its lure and cliché grossness if you catch my drift.] nevertheless, i sat down to write and lo and behold, my fingertips took me here to this well worn place once again. i have no morsels of hope to offer, no particular epiphany to pass on... just to say that blah blah blah, whine whine whine, being single feels like disease, wah wah waaaaaah. gah. i better hurry up and publish this before my sense of shame catches up with me lest i delete it all and/or vom all over my pretty laptop. *sigh*...

reflections on rome, part 4

after two solid weeks of moving about through four different countries and attempting to navigate four different languages (only one of which i spoke more than three sentences of), i somehow find myself back in rome. this is the first time that i've spent more than three nights in any one place in over two weeks and truth be told, i'm only really beating my previous record by a night anyway. i had intended to spend two of these last nights in the famously beautiful cinque terre but i couldn't muster the energy (or justify the spending) to do so.

i guess i should backtrack a bit and at least give you a cursory review of my travels so far.

the day after my program ended, my best friend lydia and i took a train to florence. upon getting there, we found that it really wasn't that different from rome and by that point both of us were thoroughly museum-ed out so sad to say, we ran out of things to do rather early. i'm sure if either of us were more industrious travellers or if either of us were the sort of travellers who are awed by sightseeing we could've easily filled up our short weekend. however, us being us we didn't and so we switched out our train tickets so that we could spend a few extra hours back in rome with my beloved roommates before heading off to athens. i know it seems strange, switching up travel plans for just a measly couple hours with relatively new friends but that's just a testament to how incredible my friends are. though it meant lugging my ridiculously heavy backpack through nearly unbearable heat twice in that one short day, it was well worth it as far as i'm concerned. a few stolen hours, the procrastination of time apart, all for the price of an only slightly sweatier shirt that had already been soaked through anyhow. a bargain in my book.

after rome, we were off to athens to meet my other best friend, eunice. we arrived late in the night and only realized on our busride to our hostel that we didn't even know how to say 'hello' in greek, much less anything else. our kind hostel concierge gave us an abbreviated lesson in the language so that when we left to mykonos the next day, we knew how to say a proper 'thank you' for his kindness ('efharisto!'). the ferry ride to mykonos was long and really felt more like a turbulent flight than a boat trip. the payoff for our rocky travel was the sight of the beautiful island where the three of us spent our birthdays, my birthday was on july 20th and both lydia and eunice were born on the 21st. we spent a day at the beach and though i had braced myself for the topless women, i was not prepared for the trunk-less men. i was going to say the 'bottomless' men but as i found out first hand, they weren't lacking in bottoms or, umm... yeah. let's just skip on to san torini, shall we?

san torini was also quite gorgeous and unexpectedly sparce by our account. we were told that it was twice the population of mykonos but failed to take into account how easily mykonos is outdone (to give you an idea, there are only 31 taxi cabs on the entire island). the big event was our obligatory donkey ride down the poo-smattered steps. it was quite rocky, incredibly stinky, and i just about broke my hand from the death grip i kept on the saddle's metal handle. sadly none of us got to have a romantic sisterhood of the travelling pants encounter with any dashing greek men but c'est la vie i guess? but i'm getting ahead of myself. athens, london, THEN paris.

the three of us went back to athens where we made the arduous trek up the mountail to behold the famous acropolis. sadly, i think my month-long roman saturation of ruins may have tainted my experience and the slieu of sweaty tourists certainly didn't help either. the real athens highlight for me was the custom made greek sandals i got from the famous poet sandal maker on agias theklas. this little shop is world renown for it's simple designs that have been sought after by celebrity and royals alike. with the utmost care and attention, they measure the sandal to your feet, nail in the straps where they fit best, and all for the bargain price of 27 euro. the pair i got was named after john lennon, who some forty years ago got the design that became his namesake and had his feet fitted by the poet sandal maker himself, the father of the man who fitted mine.

in athens, eunice and i parted ways with lydia and headed off to london. of all the cities in my month of travelling, london was the city that i felt the most immediate affinty towards. perhaps it was the seattle-like gloomy weather, maybe it was the quaint boutiques and shops, or MAYBE it was the influx of delightfully gangly, nearly irredescent, deliciously nerdy english boys and their adorable accents. who knows? whatever it was, i felt at home.

after london, i left eunice to meet up with one of my roma roommates in paris! we did a whirlwind tour of the city in three days and hardly got to see everything there was to see. we got a good glimpse of monet, said 'waddup' to the mona lisa, and climbed up the ennumerable steps to the semi-top of the eiffel tower. we did a few other things (including but not limited to a devastating encounter with a maggot who we found AFTER we had finished two.thirds of our salad) but mostly it was just quality time spent together topped off by a tearfilled goodbye.

and now, finally, i'm back in rome. it's much lonelier here without all my program peeps to keep me company. i really think i fell in love with the group during our month together as they showed up in my dreams almost every night since i left them. it's only in the past few nights that they haven't been greeting me in my sleep and in a weird way, it only makes me miss them more. still, it's nice to be in a city i'm familiar with, free of a set agenda of things to do and see.

that's all i have the energy and time for i'm afraid. i've already kept a hostel mate waiting far too long for the computer. i'll try to muster up some more substantive reflections upon my arrival back at home in (and i can hardly believe this) just three more days.

i love you all. i miss you all. i'll see you so soon.

reflections on rome, pt. 3

i can hardly believe i've only got a week left in this creative writing program! would it be cliché to say that time flies? if so, i won't. :)

last weekend we had a three-day break from our program so me and a couple friends took the train to venice! as soon as we got out of the train station, we were confronted by water, water and then some more water! it was absolutely beautiful. the downside was the fact that the streets were absolutely overrun by tourists and indeed, mostly american tourists. walking through the busy streets my ears were flooded with loud, yippy, american english save for the occasional horrific (mis)appropriations of common italian phrases. though i love my country and i love the people of my country i'm not gonna lie, i was a teensy bit ashamed of my country folk that weekend.

while beautiful, the list of things-to-do in venice was rather short. we did a lot of shopping (read: WINDOW shopping) and a whole lot of walking but that was about it. and though i know i just talked down on my fellow americans for their shameless touristinessiocity, my friends and i knew that we couldn't justify leaving venice without the obligatory gondola ride. incidentally we wrangled up the most dashing gondoleer this side of the i-dunno-where so any tourist shame was quickly appeased by the sight of his tall, dark and handsome frame (the accent didn't hurt either). despite my signature cynicism, all in all it was a lovely weekend!

while flipping through my pictures from the trip on the train ride home, i accidentally deleted all the pictures in my camera. yes, you read that right: ALL the pictures in my camera. two weeks worth of roman documentation as well as countless other photos i was too lazy to upload were POOF! gone in an instant. the strange thing is, i was immediately at peace with my foolish faux pas. okay, so maybe not immediately since i spent a good two and a half minutes in utter disbelief BUT once that 150 seconds was up i sort of shrugged my shoulders and called that that. honestly, i've never been much of a picture taker anyway and it's actually quite exciting trying to recall the things i did from memory; it feels a bit like piecing together the random details from an extremely vivid dream. i'm hoping to sit down and do a sort of written photo album sometime this summer and i'll likely share the results here. i can't guarantee 1000 words worth but knowing me, there's a good shot i'll come close.

as i mentioned, my program here in rome will be wrapping up in a week (*single tear drop*) and i purposefully left the weeks that followed a little up in the air -- partly because i love the idea of flying by the seat of my genie-pants (they're all the rage here in italy) and partly because i really hate planning things. but in case you were curious, the weeks ahead of me may or may not include the following life-shaking adventures: a possible weekend romp in florence; a week-long 26th birthday extravaganza on the beaches of Greece; three days in London (give or take); three days in Paris (give or take); a possible few days in the Cinquetera; back to Rome for a night or two and then finally (come August 5th) home sweet home! i'm sure my plans have filled your hearts with the utmost pity for my wretched existence so please, do keep me in prayer. ;)

reflections on rome, pt. 2

so the day after i wrote my angsty last post, i got to go out to an authentic Italian dinner with my mom and roommates. being the experienced traveler that she is (she just filled up all the pages in her passport!), my mom had the know-how to look up this charming little restaurant, located random place in some back corner of some alley (of course). when we got there, there weren't any tables available so the owners literally made one, busting out a couple sawhorses and a big piece of plywood to accommodate our little posse. there were no menus and the only question our waiter asked us was 'bianco o rosso?' ['red or white' wine]. the consensus was rosso and within minutes, we had a generous bottle of their house red and the food came soon after. i'm sure you're wondering how we got food so fast since we didn't have menus; well at this particular place they do most of the deciding for you. even better, i got my last-post's wish and when we asked clarifying questions in english, the wait staff responded only in Italian, making the occasional accommodating hand-gesture or two [the non-profane kind of hand-gesture, of course]. after the main dishes were served, two large bottles of liquor came next: limoncello and grappa -- both potions strong enough to take the hair off your chest if you've got it and to put hair on your chest if you don't. we left full, happy, and a wee bit tipsy.

this past sunday, i got in a much-needed day of relaxation on the beach. my roommate ariana and i soaked in the sun and took turns taking dips in the ocean. i forgot how amazing it feels to flip make-shift fins through salt water! truly, truly fantastic. the unfortunate caveat is that i got horrendously sunburned and my skin is only now starting to feel like skin again. but i've been slathering aloe and creams in excess and i'm confident that the red landscape currently masquerading as my back will be a nice (semi)even brown in a few days time.

school continues to be quite rigorous and the pace has done anything but slow down. i've seen more tombs, sarcophagi, statues and frescos than i-don't-know-what [sorry dudes, my metaphor tank is tapped these days]. i'm starting to feel better and less debbie-downer about my time here and i'm actually even beginning to think i'll miss this place quite a bit! this is largely attributed to my aforementioned fabulous roommates about whom i'll need to expound upon at another time. the computer lab is actually being shut down right now so i'm going to have to cut this reflection relatively short [short for me, anyhow].

i love you all. i miss you all. ciao! :D

reflections on rome, pt. 1

i know i totally half-assed that last entry and haven't really offered any real updates on my time here in rome so i'm gonna give it an honest go while i have my brain cells about me (more or less).

i can't honestly say that i've fallen in love with rome, not yet anyhow. don't get me wrong, i love travelling! i love feeling immersed in culture, overwhelmed by the unknown and surrounded by natives doing their thing, living their life. i love getting to travel around the world! and though i haven't done a lot of global gallivanting, with just about every other country i've been to (china, brazil, the motherland), i've fallen in love with almost instantly. rome, on the other hand, is proving to be a harder sell.

for one thing, rome is absolutely inundated by tourists and i feel like this city in particular has over-accommodated for its guests. in every other country i've visited, i've been forced to learn the language. though the word 'forced' carries a sort of negative connotation, for me it's a joy! my ears love to be flooded by the beautiful cadences of other languages and i love the challenge of manipulating my american tongue to follow suit. here though, i've only mastered "gratzie", "bon giuorno", "buona sera" and "prego" (which means 'please', not 'spaghetti sauce'). granted, i could've taken more initiative to learn the language before i got here but even my fellow students who studied italian have commented on how they've barely used any of it as just about every vendor and waiter immediately interjects with english. it certainly doesn't help that i'm currently enrolled in an english creative writing program in which i must think in english in order to effectively write in english. mind you, i love that i'm in this program and i appreciate the opportunity to exercise my long neglected and subsequently atrophied creative muscles. but language is a beautiful thing i really feel like this program and our writing would be well-served by some lessons in the native tongue. i think the practice of putting words to an experience, regardless of which dialect those words belong to, always ends up better serving the written art form as a whole. by not taking time to learn the language here, i really feel like we're missing out on something huge.

now i know a huge part of the appeal of rome is the access to such a depth of history. within walking distance of my apartment are the remnants of the roman forum, the infamous coliseum, the vatican... and on and on and on. and though certainly the architecture is breathtaking and it's incredible to imagine life two thousand years ago, what remains today seems tainted. raphael's tomb in the pantheon lit up by fluorescent bulbs, electrical outlets carved into ancient etruscan walls, a public restroom steps away from where caesar's ashes were scattered... it just seems strange. and i know that these modern interjections are meant to highlight and (quite literally) illuminate these incredible sites, i can't seem to get away from the stench of money and the stain of greed in the midst of it all. even the thousands year old etruscan tombs with their intricate carvings haunted me in its vanity: the rich memorializing the rich so that a couple thousand years later more rich people could come and admire it. note: i'm fully aware that i sound like a whiny, spoiled, cynical american sharting all over the incredible opportunity i've been given but i've gotta keep it real, kids. being here makes me feel like i'm being duped into buying into the eurocentrism that's at the heart of the american curriculum and me and all my cultural studies, american ethnic studies, social justice training just can't seem to buy in without pushing back, just a little. and by a little, of course i mean a lot.

with all that said, i'm hoping to let go of my angst (or at least some of it) before this trip is over so that i can really embrace rome for all that it is -- good, bad and ugly. i know that a lot of that depends on my willingness to embrace this experience so i'm working on chipping away at the gigantic chip on my weary shoulder, bit by bit. i know my whining makes it harder to believe what i'm about to say but i really am so grateful that i get to be here and that i get to travel around for the next month and a half. i don't plan on debbie-downering my trip to death and i truly am looking for the silver lining wherever i go. the good news is, even though i haven't yet fallen in love with rome, i am already deeply in love with life. i'm also falling in love with my incredible roommates who have already filled this week (and my heart) with incredible conversation and beautiful company. the other good news is i've still got three weeks left here in rome and that's plenty of time to get over myself and fall in love with this beautiful city. i hope.