Arrival.

What did I learn about myself today? That throwing me in a foreign country with absolutely no idea of what’s going on and taking away my cell phone with its internet and gps system results in a very flustered, very lost, very angry attitude for me. I definitely wandered around for about two hours trying to find my hotel after the sketchy “cab” driver dropped me off and pointed me in a vague direction down a street. “It is right down there, you can’t miss it,” drives off in a hurry. Well he was wrong. But that’s okay! Because you know what else I learned about myself today? That take away everything that I have always relied on, and my ingenuity kicks in! I bought a map from some random guy on the street, tried to mime and communicate with locals looking for my hotel, and got some damn good exercise after sitting on a plane or in an airport for eighteen hours all before finding my hotel and getting in to my room. Boom. Beautiful.

Rome was both not what I expected and totally what I expected at the same time. Which I know is a contradiction but that’s the way it is. I look forward to exploring more of it tomorrow. Getting off of the plane and hopping onto the train Rome was very rundown and kind of icky looking, but the closer I got to the city the prettier it became. I can’t wait to go to St. Peter’s, The Fountains of Rome, the Colosseum, the piazzas of rome, to the Vatican Museum and anywhere else I can wander to! The first day of the festival was a bit disappointing if I’m to be completely honest. I had very different expectations for the end result, although the vocalists that were featured at our concert tonight (yes I played for forty five minutes in a rehearsal and then performed in a concert on that repertoire, nuts) were excellent. That’s a good sign. But rather then dwell on the missed expectations there I think I’ll leave the discussion of the festival for a later day. Maybe it will get better. If not I will just spend more and more of my time wandering around this beautiful city and planning my week and a half backpacking adventure after the festival is over. Let’s stay optimistic about the festival though! If anything I can use this time to practice and prepare myself for my final year of graduate school.

I miss have instant access to my good friends back at home every time I want to chat. It’s ridiculous how reliant we become on our technology like cell phones, internet, facebook, email, and countless other things. Ask yourself, how many times did I check my email today? Or how many text messages have I sent in the last hour? For me those numbers are extraordinarily high so I’m even looking forward to the opportunity to wean myself out of those addictions as well. That being said I’m still on the lookout for a pool hall. Because lets be honest, how many of you thought I could stay away from a pool table for over a month?

Thanksgiving alone

Today was the first holiday I’ve ever spent alone- no family, no friends, not even a puppy to keep me company, and I think I learned a lot about myself. I got up early and made the decision to be happy, rather then dwelling on the fact that my plans were cancelled at the last minute and being sad and gloomy all day. Since I hadn’t bought food for Thanksgiving the first thing I had to do was buy some food…I was not going to be hungry on Thanksgiving, no matter how alone I was. I decided to go the route of comfort food and bought the ingredients for some chicken and gnocchi soup (I was hoping it would taste like Olive Garden’s soup, alas it did not) and decided to buy a bottle of wine as well—a nice Zinfandel I have had in the past that never disappoints—plus it was on sale!

I spent all morning making soup, enjoyed it around noon, and then proceeded to sit around doing nothing. It was at this point that I realized that I wasn’t extremely sad or lonely, I was content just relaxing in my apartment with some good soup and the full day ahead of me.

I’m not going to go through my entire days activities, mostly because it would bore you to tears, but I did get some good practicing in. Unfortunately my upstairs neighbors do not appreciate flute music, we have gotten into mini fights about the amount of time I practice, the amount of loud music I am always playing (note that I do not play loud music all the time), and various other things of this nature. So I wasn’t too surprised when I started hearing a lot of obnoxious stomping around upstairs and loud shouting. Alas, such is life.

I’m thankful for so many things in my life: my wonderful family and friends, the teachers and colleagues I have met at my new university, my students who seem to teach me more then I teach them, and my newfound comfort with being alone. It’s not that I was always afraid of being alone before, but I always preferred being with people, running around and doing stuff with friends and family. It was very rare for me to want to stay home and actually stay home all day and enjoy myself. I think a big part of growing up is being comfortable enough with yourself to go out alone, stay home and relax, and just enjoy those moments of alone time without being bored or distracted or just wanting to be somewhere else.

Although this Thanksgiving didn’t have turkey, mashed potatoes, ham, stuffing, pumpkin pie, or good time with family, I think I have found myself to be more thankful for much more of my life after thinking about it all day alone then I would have if I had spent all day with family and friends. Sometimes one needs time to reflect in order to truly appreciate how much one has.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you, I hope you enjoyed your day of food, friends, and family—or if you didn’t get the chance to partake in those traditional activities I hope you enjoyed yourself anyways!

So much soup!

….also here’s a picture of my soup! Yummy!