Parallel Worlds

Really can’t tell you what a lifesaver writing here can be. Even when it’s just blah blah it seems to help me make sense of things and aways lifts my mood. Blog I have missed you!

Today I’ve been thinking a lot about parallel worlds. Most of us have faced some kind of personal tragedy or challenge in our lives which has forced us out of our coccoon – and there is a sense of surreality, a haze over everything we do, as though we’re outside in the cold, rubbing a misted up window, looking in. You can no longer remember what it feels like to be inside, where the log fire burns bright, and everything is cosy.

But disastrous events past, present and future, ALWAYS co-exist underneath and alongside any happiness.  I’m thinking of a friend’s adopted son who was brought up in Africa with loving parents until he was two, when his whole village was massacred. Somehow he was saved. Even if he didn’t witness the atrocities, he knows his own history. He has to live with that, no matter how happy he might be now.

As I walk up Via Coroneo in Trieste, I sometimes remember to look up to the high walls of the prison there. I try to imagine what is going on inside. I think it must be unbearable, and I wonder why I have the right to this life of walking along the road, and asking these kinds of questions. I think it wouldn’t take much for the coin to flip. I could go over and join them anytime. And not because I would have committed any crime. Just because I might find myself in there.

Hospitals are like that too. Other worlds of suffering that we wander in and out of.

I have never quite known how to work with this other world in times of happiness. It seems odd to ignore it.

 

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Fragments for the beginning of the year

Preparing for my class this evening I came across the poem  Fragments for the End of the Year by Jennifer K Sweeney.

I’ve written my own response ( a work in progress but posted all the same). 

Fragments for the beginning of the year

Though I have changed countries

and accents to get here,

and been through my items one by one,

I have left little behind:

my suitcases are so full the zips are bent,

the buckles are popping at the strap.

The shelves meant to be

left bare for tasteful objects,

are lined with the same books,

the same bills –

And still there are repairs,

bricks to be lain,

friends to ease into like slippers till they fit.

 *    *    *

The garden is bare and frosted now

though I can see a spring

when there will be herbs,

and stalks twisted around twigs, 

and soggy paper aeroplanes.

I watch the children building

their memories on purpose.

*   *   *

I still can’t kick my habit of longing,

though really there is not much that I want,

only sometimes to stop the blackness that might come,

unexpectedly, like an earthquake in Haiti

with its own tree houses, and memories,

not built by anyone, and not on purpose,

but there, indelible, all the same.

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the voices in my head

I need a place to write by a window where

I can concentrate and not be disturbed by

the whistling wind

the whining telephone

my heartbeat

all the chores I haven’t done and never will.

I need a place to call my own

that is not my mother’s

or my brother’s

or the place I think my husband would wish it to be.

I need a time to start writing that feels right.

And writing that feels right.

Not this stuff here,

churned out of wedlock,

pausing for effect,

stumbling from one sound to another.

I need Annie Proulx and The Shipping News,

a new world of ships to explore,

a character that comes to life on his own

and I just have to write him in.  

I need space, a place, a face to start with.

Let’s start there.

A face. An old face? Yeah!

And a young one too. Young and old.

Cliché, here we go, say the voices in my head,

but I  don’t care, I won’t go there.

I #am writing.

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Christmas: a longing for belongings

Christmas (as in the non-religious celebration of consumption) is designed to compound all fledgling symptoms of nostalgia, homesickness, uprootedness. It’s designed to make you wish for things you didn’t even know you wanted, and more powerfully to wish for things you don’t have, without even knowing what they are!

It’s a holiday designed to make you stressed, a family gathering designed to make you fall out, a present designed to miss the mark. Christmas can never ever live up to its name (so redolent of sparkles and twinkles and snow prints and crackers and …fill in your own foibles here). It can only disappoint. So let’s get ready…

For me, this insidious spirit of Christmas is most easily caught by the ‘Christmas Wish list‘. My kids complain, “I don’t know what I want…I only know when Christmas is over and then I remember all the things I wanted and didn’t get!”  Some things on their lists make me smile (7 year old: a packet of liquorice swirls); 11 year old’s list includes (of course) a Nintendo game and the new Lilly Allen DVD. Alongside certain items (a case for my laptop; a remote control aeroplane) she has put NOT NESESARY (yeah, spell check programmes have made her lazy).

[It’s reassuring to  think that Lilly Allen is nesesary. Sometimes, listening to her with the kids in the car for the nth time, I have to agree – her lyrics are hilarious and wonderful – and indeed, as a way to understand this modern life from a different generation’s perspective – nesesary. A separate post on Lilly Allen might follow… ] 

Anyway, this distinction is the point isn’t it? Necessary. Our kids have had so much in the last few months, more than ever, as we adjust to this new life and home and try and smooth the path for them a little. Summer camps, scuba diving, After School clubs – roller skating, piano, tennis, basketball, video and script writing (these have certainly enriched their lives) weekend activities (skiing, eating pizzas and ice creams…). Then the Necessary New clothes for the harsh winters (quilted coats, roll neck jumpers, thermal gloves, waterproof boots, etc etc); the ‘optional’  extras  – pocket money for the Bake Sale at school every Thursday; and the essential items (quaderni, quaderni…hundreds of school notebooks, pens and pencils, calculators…).

Certainly we are all spoilt (I’m talking specifically about my family here, the four of us). We have way more than our fair share. Yet, by definition, it is not enough. 

What do you want for Christmas?

Just before I went back to London in November to run some writing workshops, I was doing some last minute shopping in Opicina (the small town on the Carso in northern Italy where we live). As I approached the baker’s, I took a deep breath. I was stressed. I knew I would have to pass, yet again, the old man sitting on the pavement in front of the shop, with his few symbolic goods laid out on a cloth by the tree where the dogs might pee.  Incense, lighters, a candle or two. The only black face in Opicina. He always smiles warmly, the gaps between his teeth glimmering with saliva. He always gently, unobtrusively holds out his hand. He does not seem to see so well out of one eye.

But this time he does not even look up. 

I walk on by. I do not know what to do. I feel bad. I go in to buy bread. The smell inside of yeast and dough is such a nostalgia trigger, such a warmth-inducing, family-round-the-table essence of love and sharing. I am disturbed. 

When I come out he is till there of course, sitting on the cold tarmac, staring at his feet.

I continue down the street. I go in and out of various shops, buying things we need for tea, things we need in the house, things we need. Then, realising I have forgotten something essential, I retrace my steps. I know I will walk by him again. Now I have had time to reflect,  I decide that this time I will give him some money. I select some coins from my purse. I am starting to feel better.

But he is no longer there. 

                                                                               *   *    *

In London, up in my friend’s attic in Acton, I dream and wonder and worry about the old man outside the baker’s in Opicina. Until that last time, he had always engaged with me, always looked straight at me, always hoped. I wondered what I should do. I pass him every day.

Then  I had a Eureka moment.

It has been a habit of mine for some years now, to go to a cafe on the way home from walking the kids to school – and have my nesesary coffee. I don’t know if it’s a habit, or an addiction, I don’t know if it does me good – or harm. Certainly, it delays the beginning of my day, it puts off the return to a house that needs cleaning, but it allows me to consider my strategy for the day’s chores, to put a space between me and the kids so I can put my wordplay hat on..and sometimes, it’s a place to network: to meet mums and exchange useful knowledge about kids, swine flu and the next PTA dinner. 

So what has this to do with Eureka? I was asking myself: would it be okay to give that old man money every time I pass? How would that be? Can I afford it? Is this a good way to help him? 

I realised that the 2€ or so I spent most mornings on my latte and croissant could go direct to him. That way too, I could return home subito and get on with things – I could clean the house in the time I would normally take for my coffee! A win-win situation – and a life-changing decision.

But now I am back in Opicina, and the old man is not there. I have not seen him again since the day he did not even look up.

He lost hope in me. And that was what made me think again. 

He was right to lose hope. His well-being should not depend on my fickle sense of virtue. 

I am not sure what to do now. But I would like to do something, about Christmas, about wanting and longing for things, about creating desires that don’t exist, and ignoring the nesesary  longings that do (for food, for shelter, for love, for peace, for health). 

I will be thinking about this over Christmas and New Year. Your comments welcome. 

In the meantime, I did not stop off for my coffee this morning, I wrote this instead.

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Now we see through a glass darkly…

Indeed. Today I started wearing glasses. Full time. This is really unexpected and a bit of a drag. I used to have the best long sight. My kids boasted about my prowess. “My mum can see – like – miles away – she can read signs when we’re driving we didn’t even know were there.”  Yeah…well that’s gone.  I won’t be winning (or starting) any more family “I spy” competitions. 

It’s not that I can’t see – or even that anything’s blurred. Stuff is just not as clear as it was – my right eye is stronger for distances, my left stronger for reading, both eyes are apparently ‘rigid’ and I don’t see things in 3-D. All this means that my two poor eyes are working very hard to compensate and the muscles surrounding them are very tired. Mostly (apart from a lousy dumbness numbing my senses)  I’ve noticed my eyes not doing what they should when I’m talking to people. I find I have to concentrate very hard to get them to move at all! This is not what they mean by ‘good eye contact’ – so important in today’s society, and a chapter heading in many self-help books. 

Anyway, I need glasses for ‘driving’ and glasses for ‘reading’. I’ve had both of these for a while, though I’ve always thought they were an optional extra.  I remember much more often to wear my reading glasses (though I hate wearing glasses in bed. That is uncomfortable). I  can never find my driving glasses which is only a problem really when I’m driving at night (but who can see anyway in the dark?). But today the Italian optician (who Stef discovered 20 years ago when we lived here last) told me I should wear the driving glasses all the time.  Contact lenses are not an option. Oh God. The secretary look does not suit me.  

Now I’ve started noticing people wearing glasses (just like when you’re pregnant, suddenly so is everyone else). They all look designer-trendy. But how do they manage?  When do glasses become a mere appendage? I feel as self-conscious in glasses as I do in make-up. Do you need a different haircut if you wear glasses? Do you need to choose your glasses (rose-tinted) at the same time as your hair dye? 

I know this is irritable trivia for those of you who are reading this in braille, and even more annoying for those of you with a terminable disease of one kind or another, but these small annoyances still have to be tackled head-on. I feel as though today, for me, is quite a momentous day if I really must start wearing glasses always. That is a big change. Psychologically, physically, emotionally, practically.  

I will try and grin and bear it.

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Journey From Hell

READER WARNING

Only read this if you’re:-

a) a train spotter

b) a plane spotter

c) any kind of timetable nerd

d) hate Ryan Air

e) hate the Stansted Express

f) hate Stansted airport

g) hate the whole public transport system in London

h) are just bored

h) and i) you live within a 1 mile radius of Acton Central station

I have been unable to write this in any kind of interesting way. I apologise. This piece is full of facts. I wanted to get them down on paper. It’s important to me. Cathartic. You’ll have to go with it. 

It could certainly have gone a whole lot better. Most of it wasn’t my fault, in the sense that if the public transport system had been working in any way whatsoever then I’d have got to the airport on time and wouldn’t be sitting at Stansted,  4 hours later, writing this and waiting for an evening flight that would get me in to Venice/ Treviso @ 10pm (still 2 hours from home), instead of the leisurely lunchtime jet set into Trieste, in time to pick the kids up from school, I had been anticipating.

Now I’m £17 poorer for the last-ditch attempt to get here in time by taking the Stansted Express (that, excuse me, is really taking the piss); £100 poorer for the flight transfer charge; £108 poorer for the kids’ clothes I bought at Monsoon to while away the time; £20 spent on books; £20 roughly on coffees, breakfast and lunch; £1.60 for the two bottles of water I have to buy since they cost 10p more than buying one; and £2.50 and counting for the 50ps I’ve fed into the weighing machine to check that all my extra purchases haven’t put me over the Ryan Air weight limit (but with a 1.9k Chrismas pud in there and 2 tubs of Marmite it’s been a challenge). 

Here’s how the journey went. I leave my lovely friends’ house in Goldsmith Avenue, Acton (London) at 7.30 this morning. Plenty of time to get to Stansted for my flight which leaves at 11.20 (gates close 10.50). Approx journey time 2 hours. One hour margin of error.

I have worked out that this time the best route will be:

Acton Central to Finchley Road and Frognal (London Overground).

Alight at Finchley Rd, spring over lightly to bus stop, catch National Express direct to Stansted. No problemo.

Flawless plan, and much better than my usual schlep Acton Main Line, Bakerloo to Baker St, schlep to Bus stop, coach to Stansted route, and preferable I think to the option of catching the bus from Acton High Street all the way to Golders Green (an hour on a double decker – no thank you!) – or to schlepping the hour over to Liverpool Street on the central line and getting the Stansted Express (totally resent paying £17 for a train that travels approx 30 miles (?) and can not in any sense of the world/word be called an express).

P.S. I am not Jewish (nor was meant to be) but I love the word schlep.

So, I dutifully set alarm for 6.30. Leave house at 7.30 as planned. Feeling pleased as punch with my punctuality even though never-ending rain puts a dampener on things.

(From now on I will highlight what I will call Public Transport Errors – or PTEs – as opposed to MPEs – My Personal Errors; that way we can all work out who is to blame for my missing the plane, and then I can plan my revenge…) 

I walk the 3 minutes to Acton Central Station. First Public Transport Failure (PTE No. 1). The train is delayed. There is no train until 8 – and then only to Willesden Junction. I could take the next train at 8.15 which goes direct to Finchley Road (but there’s no guarantee it will arrive even then).

What would you do at this point?

Reconsider one of the many options cited above?

Walk 15 mins to the High Street and catch the 260 double decker direct to Golders Green?

Walk 20 mins to East Acton and get the central line to Liverpool St?

Oh, there are so many options I could have/ should have taken. But even though I am clearly versed in all the alternative ways of getting to Stansted none of them present themselves to me. My mind is a blank. I cannot contemplate not keeping to this route now that I’ve planned it. And anyway, I have an hour’s margin. And there’s a train coming in 15 mins. I decide to wait for it.  (MPE No. 1)

I try to get advice from the very quietly spoken station attendant. I cannot understand – or indeed hear – a word he says. (PTE No. 2) I decide he is a lost cause. Several people do the same. A tall yet stocky man with an East European nose walks boldly up to said put-upon attendant and demands some answers.

“Are you sure the 8.15 will come?” he says, and then when the attendant whispers something indecipherable, persists,  

“Do you in fact know anything? Why are you standing here doing nothing when it is your job to know the answers?!”

East European looking man (who does indeed speak with a slight accent though his grammar is perfect and his vocabulary advanced) – wanders off to get some answers through his mobile phone. I decide that whatever he does, I will follow. Here is  a man who means business! (MPE No. 2) 

He (and thus I) opts for the 8.00 to Willesden. Reassuringly, masses of people are doing the same. 3 minutes later we arrive at Willesden, though none of us are sure where to go next. Here the station attendant calls confidently into his megaphone, “Everybody down to Platform 2” . That is all he says. (PTE No. 3)

“Why you all looking at me like that, why you not moving? I said down to Platform 2”, he bellows.  We bregrudgingly shuffle along, hoping we are all moving in the right direction. Then my East European guru pipes up in clear sardonic tones,

 “We are not cattle. We need to know where we are going.”

I feel he is my spokesman, I watch him closely and consider that whatever decision he makes next will be a wise one, and I will follow him (MPE No. 3).

Down to platform 2 we go.  Down the stairs, over the bridge, down more stairs. I am the only one struggling with 2 suitcases (space for all those stocking fillers I intended to buy at the Pound Shop in Acton and to assuage guilty feelings for leaving kids for a week). But at platform two we are still in the dark. It is raining miserably. I am very cold and miserable. There is no place more miserable on this earth at this moment than this miserable platform at Willesden Junction (deliberately built by sadistic train operators in a wind tunnel).

I wait here a long time, not knowing what is coming next. I find myself, like everybody else, staring down the track in seach of the train as though that will make it come. If I stop looking, it will stop coming. Nobody says anything, we just all stare down the track in the miserable rain. There are hundreds of us.

Finally an announcement. “The train to Sratford is waiting at Platform 4.” (PTE No. 4).

Platform 4?!  I’ve just come from Platform bloody 4. Up the stairs we schlep, over the bridge, up more stairs, stumbling onto the train just in time. The clock is ticking furiously. The train is packed with people coughing up phlegm and swine flu all over each other. A lady sticks her backpack into my stomach. She doesn’t feel a thing. 

(In retrospect, this was a serious MPE – since I could have simply walked over to platform 1, got the train to Euston, from there the tube to Tottenham Hale, from there the Stansted Express – except that this was not an alternative route I had ever planned…so it does not count as an MPE).

I get to Finchley Road, I find the bus stop. But I’m not convinced the National Express will actually stop here since there is no sign (PTE No. 5). Instead I see a double decker heading for Golders Green. I get on it. (MPE No. 3). As we are chugging along, stopping here, there and everywhere, but at least we’re on our way, we’ll still make it in time, the National Express (the A6 to Stansted) sails past. Damn! 

I arrive at Golders Green at 9 o’clock. Just in time to see my coach leaving. I do not chase after it waving madly (MPE No. 4 ) Instead, I check the timetable and see that another one will be along in 20 minutes (PTE No. 6). Still time to get to Stansted (est journey time 1 hour and 15 mins). I decide to wait. (MPE No. 5) 

I wait 20 minutes, 30 mins, no sign of a coach. More and more people are arriving at the bus stop. It is very cold and raining. The minging shelter is not wide enough for all of us (PTE No. 7). Even though I was here first I have no place in the shelter since I cannot stand still (MPE No. 6), and need to pace up and down looking up the road in case I can see the coach coming. If I stop looking for it, it will not come. I am wet and cold. (Did I say that already?) I hate London. I hate England. There is no place on earth more horrible than Golders Green bus stop. 

I schlep over to the National Express office (risking missing the coach while I’m in there). I am reassured by the lone man. ‘The coach should be along in a few minutes’ (PTE No. 8). I decide to keep waiting (MPE No. 7).

After 40 minutes and no coach, a would-be passenger announces to us all that there are floods on the A41 and there will be no more coaches today! (PTE No. 9 and 10) You can’t get there from here. Taxis are not an option.

Why does nobody ever tell you anything? Why are we all left to work out our options all by ourselves? I estimate 90% of the people at the bus stop are from abroad, trying to get home. They haven’t got a clue what is going on in this Godforsaken hole that is London. They want to be home in their nice  starfish-shaped hotel in Dubai (I know you’re thinking if they could afford to live in a starfish hotel in Dubai they wouldn’t be taking a coach to the airport but you can’t be sure…the wise rich man knows that if you look after the pennies..) , or they want to be wandering past their Colliseum in Rome, or picking up pebbles on their beach in Croatia. Why did they ever come to London in the first place??? That’s what they’re all thinking. That’s what I’m thinking.

And actually, I soon know for sure what they’re thinking because when I head off to find an alternative route I am followed by foreigners – and we pick up more on the way. By the end of the journey I feel like the golden goose!  

The revised last-ditch-attempt-but-already-no-hope route is as follows (I have phoned my lovely Acton friend, who gives me instructions as she googles, no point in asking any transport worker for directions..): Golders Green tube , northern line to Euston, Victoria line to Tottenham Hale, from there the Stansted Express…Now I am really cross. If I had known, I could have got on that train to Euston an hour go!!!

Clearly, my plane is a lost cause. But Antonella is going to Rome  and Sanya is going to Dusseldorf and they might just make it, if they can follow me! All right, all right. I am very stressed and bad-tempered but what the hell. We spend tense moments on the Victoria line being stared at for 10 minutes by a train engineer who doesn’t say anything. And the train doesn’t move either.  (PTE 11 & 12) Then we are told the train is unexpectedly terminating at Seven Sisters. (PTE 13) Oh bloody hell! Luckily, it’s just a spritely hop over to the next platform to Tottenham Hale.

Surely at least from here the notoriously exhorbitant ticket price will be cheaper. We’re already half way to Stansted. But no – it’s still £17. (PTE 14) How is that possible? I have to buy the tickets for all of us because their foreign cards don’t work in the machine (PTE 15). They give me cash – and coins. Great! Just when I had managed to get rid of all my change, I grumble like Scrooge.

We get to Stansted. Antonella and Sanya run off to catch their plans. “Ciao!” “Grazie!” “Nice to meet you!” They wave and cheer gaily.

I can hardly bring myself to look at the departure board. My plane to Trieste has long gone – and the one to nearby Venice has just left. There are no planes going anywhere near where I want to go for hours.

I sit down to have a nervous breakdown and a coffee. 

Tune in to the next blog to find out what happens next…this has taken way too long to tell – and I need a break!

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Italian Roads Rant

Hmmm…so here we are in the bucolic paradise of Opicina, just 20 mins walk (10 mins cycle ride) from the kids’ lovely school. We travel along winding country lanes bordered with high stone walls, the smells of wisteria and jasmine wafting in the breeze, the buzzing of bees, the chirping of birds to accompany our own joyful song, etc. One small minor problem. No pavements – and roads not wide enough for two cars to pass. Result = pericoloso!!!

Add to that two very big, very fast main roads to cross – equals a recipe for high stress and lots of shouting between us, and kids not wanting ever to get on their bikes ever again.  Plus, zebra crossings here are hilarious (I’ll take a picture this afternoon and post it ). Since there are no pavements, the zebra crossings (le strisce pedonali) are put in arbitrary places that lead from one roadside wall to the next – literally. There is no where to go once you get to the other side! You can only walk backwards and forwards on the zebra crossing, crossing the road in the middle of nowhere. 

And anyway there’s no point since cars WILL NOT STOP just because you’re on a zebra crossing. Are you kidding? It just makes you an easier target.  

And since the roads are built ONLY with cars in mind, many of them are one way (senso unico) which means that as a cyclist/ pedestrian you either go the very long way round (not us, obviously) or you risk life and limb every morning and afternoon going contro senso. 

There’s something about Italians and cars. Prepotenti, my father-in-law explains. Or the overwhelming need to show who’s boss.

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Il piu’ e il meno

Gardener has just been round with a quote for re-laying the lawn which has blown my head off. “We’re only renting” I splutter”, “Exactly, signora,” he says enigmatically.

I had entertained thoughts of digging up an ‘orto’ (vegetable patch) to one side – and putting up a gazebo, planting berries and fruit trees, climbing wisteria and roses and…BUT must remind myself we’re only renting. 

Which reminds me not to think about the rental situation back at home in Acton, West London. Out of the frying pan (see earlier post on the Ukrainian situation) into, possibly, the fire…Would rather not go into it now (palpitations…) but will probably bemoan you with details at a later date.  

But here the week is a round of activities, for the girls, for me, for Stef. Micky has packed more into her week than is humanly (humanely?) possible: roller skating at the local ‘campo sportivo’ three times a week (I tried to persuade her into 2 but she loves it too much), basketball and drama; Fran is doing video and creative writing, piano and now possibly tennis. Stef is off to study for his motor boat licence (don’t ask) two nights a week and I manage to go to African drumming AND dance (yahoo! I found a class – it is soooo good..more later) down in Trieste, as well as yoga with the serene Roberto up here in Opicina (though I have never had a yoga teacher who talks so much). 

There is still so much I’d love to do. Horse riding! We’re in the country for goodness sake. How could we not go horse riding? I have only been a couple of times in my life. One of the few things I remember about my grandad (apart from his blue armchair and his terrible emphysematic cough) was his conviction (based on absolutely nothing) that I was a horse woman. No one in his family as far as I know rode horses so it was a propos of nada. Though I did inherit my mother’s long neck. 

And so far we have miraculously managed to coordinate ourselves without too much strain. Today, for example, Stef and I will both meet at the school for a one-to-one with Micky’s teacher, then he will cycle off with Micky to roller skating and Fran and I will go down to Trieste (by car purtroppo) to the dentist. Fran is getting braces put on today. TODAY! My God, I’m glad we forgot to remind her yesterday. Though she is excited. I hated having braces. It was torture. I didn’t smile for two years. But now it is cool and okay, and Fran has researched dozens of You Tube videos of fledgling adolescents showing off their metal mouths and explaining in intricate detail exactly what to expect, when it hurts and how much. 

Writing this has reminded me that I want to have a rant about Italian roads, cyclists and pedestrians, so I’m moving on to that now. See you later!

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Blogging Muse has gone…

Yeah, though I’ve had some time, I’ve really not had the head space.

It’s funny what blogging does to you (and here it’s very different from fiction writing). I find myself at various moments throughout the day thinking about how I will translate what I’m feeling/seeing/learning into a blog post (or a twitter – again, another very different writing animal).

As I sweep the floor I might compose a post which begins , ‘As I sweep the floor…’ Most days it’s really obvious what I want to write. Some days I have so many thoughts I keep them in a notebook as possible springboards for another day (yeah right, my writing persona is very well organised, don’t ya know?). Other days, I just think so what? who cares? Then I might get an e-mail or a comment from a friend asking what’s happened to my blog, they miss it, and that spurs me on. Or from someone who’s come across it for the first time and read the whole lot – all of my posts ever – in one absorbed sitting. That’s the kind of instant gratification I need.  (You can see why writing a novel has been tough for me…)

But anyway, with the muse cracked, I’ve been distracted by other things. Twitter is less impegnativo than blogging, requiring only 140 characters. Ignore this next bit if you’re already an accomplished twit…

Twitter entries are supposed to be your answer to the question ‘What are you doing? I took this rather too literally at first and all my tweets (as they’re called by the conoscenti) started with ‘Just..’ as in ‘Just hung up the laundry [yawn!] or…’just got up…’ 

Why twitter? is a completely different question – and equally hard to grasp but there is a lot to be said for condensing an experience into 140 characters – it’s a good writing practice and can throw up an interesting mosaic of thoughts. And you can get loads of material for fiction from scanning other people’s tweets. 

 You can see my tweets in the column to the right of this blog post under ‘Tonya’s Updates’ – and if you click on that title, you can see all the tweets I’ve ever written if you really so desire. I still haven’t mastered the art of twittering. There’s a hell of a lot going on out there that I don’t understand (like, why is Jay Z always a trending topic? I bet you’re thinking ‘ But I don’t even know what a trending topic is?’ Hah! Catch up!) 

Anyway, what I’m trying to say is, I’ve spent some surfing time trying to get to grips with some of the intricacies of twitter (I’ve absolutely given up on Facebook  again – for now) and I’ve discovered a great thing. When you read my tweets, you might see some that have this phrase #amwriting in red, or more often than not, #amnotwriting. I keep seeing people I’m following (yeah, if you like somebody’s tweets you can choose to follow them – then all their tweets show up on your twitter home page. One of the people I love to follow is Stephen Fry (just click @stephenfry )- cos he’s famous for being the most followed twitterer ever. Well, he used to be. And he has a pretty interesting life. Writes things like ‘ I just want it known that when I put that shirt on this morning I had no idea I’d be on C4 News 5 hours later.’ Good to know. And then he keeps on making websites crash because he sends so much traffic their way [hey, Stephen, send someone to me, why don’t you? I can take it!] 

Anyway, when you put  #amwriting  (it’s called a hashtag) in your tweet, it flags up to other twitterers that you’re communicating with all the other twits who’ve put that same hashtag in their tweet. And you’re instantly connected to the #amwriting community. And that, if you’re a writer who finds herself in the middle of nowhere (well at least that’s how Jan Morris describes Trieste) like me, can be amazingly inspiring (though I still haven’t been inspired enough to get back to the novel…)

Look at the kind of things these people are sharing –

johannaharness Fog rising off canal this morning=mesmerizing. Frost so heavy in surrounding fields that it looks like snow.

and 

mezpacker #amwriting Prostitutes, dead babies, sorcerers and social media all feature – an interesting combination

so you get real time descriptions of what writers are doing and thinking as they write. It’s really neat. I could only copy these tweets from people I follow but you can read all of them at #amwriting.

Then I explored a bit and discovered that Johanna Harness (quoted above) started this hashtag off, and she does a rollcall every morning to see which writers are up and running. She has a great blog too – where she explains that she’s primarily a twitterer who occasionally likes to blog when the twit word limit outdoes her… 

Anyway, I’m all twittered out for now. Not sure if this post is the one I composed while loading the dishwasher this morning but – at least I got it off my chest!

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The Meaning of Home

Have been absent from here for a week or more, just after I’d decided (realised yet again) that an hour’s writing and an hour’s jogging every day are what I need to keep me sane and happy (and so it follows that I took a week off running too). My inner saboteur strikes again. 

But there have been reasons enough. After school clubs and homework to organise, endless trips to government offices for the crucial documenti, a weekend visit from Stef’s parents, a dramatic finger-slicing accident in the woods, subsequent trips to pronto soccorso, and tetanus jabs…a needed break from the rigours of running after my heart felt like it was going to burst…a crisis of confidence (oh, when will those stop?) about blogging and time-wasting and splurging to all and sundry the dreadful intricacies of this turgid life…(esagerato, but I’m on a roll…).

The usual persistent, inconclusive decision-making crossroads about how much energy to put into starting up Wordplay again, looking for a space to run workshops (actually, update people, the wonderful Caffe Tommaseo has agreed…more of which later) or should I just kick back, and let the dust settle – oh, and how the dust settles round here….where is my duster???

You see how easily I am distracted?

And also, beneath the surface of all this activity, is the slow getting-used-to of this new home. Home is a big word. And a good word. It has nothing to do with wooden floors and a big back garden, or with cycle paths and sea views, or with the friendly greetings from neighbours and passers-by. It has everything to do with time. And we have a long way to go before we have had enough time here to make this place home.

So I am trying to balance, on the one hand, this objective sense that this place is beautiful – perfect in many ways – and the other truth that I have no roots here; I am displaced. It is a familiar existential feeling – one I first recognised when we were flying over Mexico City many years ago (1990) and all I could think was, why here? why now? why all these houses here?

It’s hard to translate that feeling.

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