So this is what’s it’s like to be completely alone. Cazzatore moved out yesterday with a wave of the hand. Everybody in this house changed rooms, and I got a new one. After moving things in and arranging them, it was dark, as everybody had gone out, and I was alone. It hit me hard- I am alone. I looked in the bank of phone numbers in my little telefonino and realized that I have about four or five friends, but none that will come over in the night so that I will feel less lonely. That takes time.
My family tells me to give up and come home. But they don’t seem to realize that that is not my home anymore. I left home and I am making a new home (though until it’s finished I am emotionally homeless). I’m trying to build my new place in myself so that I can take it with me wherever I go.
I can’t give up, no matter how hard it is. No matter how lonely I feel or how few people will come to keep me company in the middle of the night, I won’t give up because I don’t want to make a habit of it. So I keep at it, hoping that one morning I will wake up and be content, that I won’t automatically dwell on loneliness or pain and that I will smile again. At this moment there is only the faint glimmer of hope, but I am grateful that it’s there at all.
2 Comments
I think I understand when you say that “home” isn’t home anymore. Home is something that you have to make for yourself. I am now at a point in my life that “home” either my parents or my sister’s place, is not home. Home is here, on this rock, and for you, home will be that city, with its wonderful history, beauty, and amazement concealed behind every stone facade. Keep having faith in yourself, you are an inspiration, and your stories still make me smile.
January 12, 2009 at 2:48 pmI love you mucho.
The reality never, in any way, lives up to the fantasy. I lived in Florence over 10 years and it never gets easier, the bureaucracy will always be a nightmare. You need form A before you get form B and vice versa. Please take care of yourself. Dissolusioned Americans in Florence have been a reality for hundreds of years.
January 15, 2009 at 5:32 pm