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I'm sitting in the library of our faculty, being super dutiful in getting things done before this weekend. For some reason (like as not related to the last 6 nights I've been up for one reason or another until 3am and beyond...aha 'sleep when you're dead'...right...), I battled an intense sleepiness while reading. Somewhere in some direction I could not pinpoint, there was this very slight cool breeze, which chilled me to the skin, easily working through my thin Nepali shirt. I remembered some fact from somewhere that if you are freezing to death, mostly you just fall asleep and never wake up. I perhaps entertained that thought for a moment, though "freezing to death" was a rather grand exaggeration of the cold. 

To my left is a shelf of "305 študije spolov", and a bunch of books on sexuality. Casual reading, anyone? (Memememememememeeeee!!!)

I figured now would be as good a time as any to catch up, though I hardly remember where I even left off. 

Mm. Venice. 

Mhmm. 

By day time 

the slap of the sea and a sky that eventually cleared 

me being pleasantly lost down canals and alleys and the Monday morning sounds of a slow start

GONDOLAS!!!

Which I didn't ride, but I did take the water bus on tight timing back to the bus loop (haaaaa) and managed to get to where I needed to go in time. 

And it is true when they say this city is sinking, temporary walkways set up around puddles-turned-rivers. As I walked by the cafes by the Rialto bridge, one of the waiters waiting on customers to approach said "lunch and a swim?" and gestured to the amount of canal swirling around the tables. I laughed. For real though. 

Made it back into Ljubljana in enough time for class, which in part featured a Russian economics prof, and I struggled with someone's opinion on how to fix things and with Russia being Russia (yoh) and migrant attitudes and then went home and slept. 

Slept through Tuesday and commenced my week of catch ups, still reeling in delight over the necessary weekend that had passed. 

I think we know who is better at making faces ... (ahem) 

Can you see the me in the postcard? 

And it was long chats and catching up but surpassing that, really, and discovering the meaning of family and of complete intensity of feeling and what two hours of sleep do to your dreams (Francis) and watching sunsets through the Internet and being able to hear again voices that have been gone a while. I wondered over feelings of together again,  just as easily as I eyes my calendar of 8 months with a fluttering sense of unknown and untethered-ness. That gripping of the oars and setting sail, kind of, except here I still struggled with the swing and pull of it, what rides feel like late at night and walking home alone, that sort.

I was overwhelmed with a need to bake.

So I did.

And words jarred batches of cinnamon cookies into burning ness and I thought, huh, that's probably related, and words shook me and I was a bit of a mess, flour included, alone on a rainy afternoon/evening/night. 

And then I slept and then I woke up and this happened 

Metelkova by daytime, and then bus rides and sharing cookies and exploring caves and definitely being a hobbit with long lines of flickering light along edges of cave paths and a roaring roaring river that flushes the significance right out of you on the inevitability of nature 

Lights and skies at the end of the tunnel, and this was me emerging

And people just became such a thing, such a thing. And lifted me and being outside and people. 

Yoh.

these people :) 

So we explored 15th century frescoes in old old churches and that Slovenian countryside that keeps reminding how beautiful things are 

And i love it. 

Monday was a drag into class and then a truly kick-ass, intelligent, not-patronizing, pregnant professor ruling the world for a bit, and then I left to pick up some juice to go with some rum and then discovered the hilarity of mirror angles and tattoos 

and danced my kukere way to the bus stop and to a gathering of Germans and Spanish and Finnish and Lithuanian and Slovenian and Czech friends and soon to be friends. 

A gathering like the times before, alcohol and good playlists and chats for always and then dancing. 

And because we rule so much more, limbo'ing. And cha-cha'ing. And macarena'ing. 

Tomfoolery and hilarity on the way to the club and hey, it's a Monday night. Dancing cut short and fresh walks home and hello, 4am and that delicious soreness of foot that arrives from a night of fantastic people and dancing. 

And this I love. 

This sign was especially funny the next day. Duck-headed triangle child. 

And then it has since been a pick me up of people and points of brightness and lunches with friends and plans to Belgrade just happening to work out.

And I'm left looking at the things that have lines up and I feel like I am catching my stride, a weight has been lifted and I can move freely now. 

Freely to class that is. 

And then to Belgrade tomorrow. 

And the next next next days, and who knows all of this, all of this possibility, if only of being found and letting this happen. I am gathering energy after chasing, perhaps reaching, and I am no longer. 

I am made and feel this. 

keep going

-k

*"Don't chase people. Be yourself, do your own thing, work hard. The right people...the ones who really belong in your life will come to you. And stay."

had

I want to eat the five franc coin. 

I realized this when I landed in Geneva, from Venice, and I was purchasing a ticket for the train into the city. It spit out my change, of which the five franc coin was a part, and I laughed in delight at how very large it is. And then I wanted to eat it. I don't know how this thought appeared but that it didn't. Chomp. Maybe it reminded me of those cheap chocolate loonies we'd have when we were little. Except it's silver and larger and made of real stuff you can't easily digest. I wasn't particularly hungry...I just...I wanted to eat it. 

I battled this craving and came out of the other side, managing not to eat the five franc coin on my ride into the city, and not eating it when I arrived, totally lost and with no sense of where things would be. Okay, just so you're not in suspense: I never did eat the coin. But if you saw it, I think you'd feel the same way. 

Wandered past a high school thinking "not sure this is where I need to be", so I drift along the afternoon sunny streets of Geneva until off far in the distance and just over the tops of those beautiful balcony buildings I spot this misty spray jet of water and I think: go there.

So I do, wandering past Gare Cornavin and that main street there and I say "wow", and it is wow, it is almost sunset and I find myself on the edge of the massive lake in the middle of Geneva. I walk over the bridge and you could try but you wouldn't succeed at wiping the grin off my face, I'm in so much awe. I laugh about all the beautiful things, the swans, the colour of the water, the flowers posted along intervals, the Jardin Anglais, the everything. 

I'm smiling this big, at every one who passes 

and part of everyone who passes are the business men in their shiny Rolex watches and tailored suits who are wearing backpacks and taking pictures of the sunset. One rides by me on a scooter, one of those basic metal contraptions that could amuse you for hours as a kid, just swinging his leg and pushing off and not a care. 

So I fall in love with them all in their humanness, because you forget that even the suit jackets see the sunsets sometime. 

:| 

I just lost two hours of words here. 

*looks at the tower of feels and frustrations*

Grrrr.

So I will tell you my weekend like this:

because it was something I needed that I could never have known if it wasn't for the ways in which Octobers have become strange for me and this time it was still too, and what I thought was freedom was some kind of emotional tethering to a beautiful kind of once we'd had and no longer do, and I didn't realize how much I will never get what's gone back again until I look up into my horizon and even though my arms are out like I can hug the whole world I hadn't left the harbour yet, 

so I've set sail and grabbed the oars and am harnessing this wind I've got that has come from the present, and of loving in the letting go and one loves the sunset when one is so sad and were you so sad then and I don't know what it is, what it was but that I am setting into what I will have, perhaps we, but we've never been recap people, and this was the beauty of the weekend, contained in that and spiced wine and chocolate chaud and quiet corners on wide lakes and finding people you like in the world and fountain moments that take you back and away and all the waiters who are all so attractive and the moments when the universe affirms what you've been wondering and I wondered, oh my fuck have I wondered these last weeks and now it is different, it is none but still all of the words said before 

because 

Wherever you go, go with all your heart. 

and do you know, I think I'm moving, because time (and we've got it), time will squeeze into when we left and when I will return so it is terrifying to think of continental drift in between but it is also freedom and weird without you but not, as well, because of how we live now

So we, Kui and me, wandered streets and around and there was sunshine and being alone and talking about the differences between Canada and asking to go out for coffees because people can still lead such human lives and the changes in time, what and however it decides to be, and how you can sleep when you're dead. Jay walk the streets and squeeze onto cable car wire trams, walk through markets selling mushrooms and meats and all of it, writing lists in chai latte coffee shops and the little children and dipping fingers in the lake and the city lights at night when it arrives, the six hours away from fondue and warmer evenings. 

People are people first, first and last born beside a swimming area and postcards found and bartenders not, hippie lettuce or two or three and sparkly roads and tight spaces squeezed and warm rooms and sleep, existentialism on Sunday morning and the sunshine that showed up instead of the rain. 

What do you know, wishing Chloe's luck for future train rides and timelines and then I saw this

and a foggy Venice found me alone and so grateful for the time I'd had with such a dear dear heart, same same but different, and getting to sound out the last month and knowing I am okay and looking at more time apart than ever again/before and we won't be the same any more. 

And so last night I slept in Geneva, and tonight I'm in Venice and tomorrow should be home again in Ljubljana and what even how the who and why, except it does. 

This is what Venice looks like at night. 

gelato in piazza de San Marco 

masks in bright shops down dark alleys, it is Sunday night and doors are locked and most bars still open, English Italian French a lot, display cases and the people who belong and the ones who wander

Rialto bridge and sleeping gondolas and the selfies of people beside me and laughing and the slap of canal waves on the boat docks 

streetlamps like works of art on the side of grand canals and dark water that smells almost like the sea, boys playing accordion around the corner and before the bridges, the hands holding and swinging and swaying and the unbelievable reality of such a sinking city. 

I had a moment of such déjà vu just now lying on this bed in this hotel room(...no but those words are significant). I sat up to get a sip of water and I've never felt more strongly like I've been exactly here, and I think I've maybe dreamt this before and it's funny to think, as I imagine such moments, that as such I am exactly where I should be. 

Because it's just after 11 now and somewhere in the absolute labyrinth of this city a cafe I couldn't find my way back to is closed and there is a young Italian man who is off work. And tonight he's not taking a Canadian home.

 I've got his card still. 

As in...welcome to Italia, LAWL. 

 I was walking in awe after crossing the first canals, really simple map in hand, backpack all backpacky looking (...no, you don't say?!) . And I have a Canadian flag luggage tag on my backpack, and I feel someone beside me before they say, "Canadaaaaaaa." 

Me: "haha yeaaahhhhh"

Him: "where are you staying?" 

Me: *knows exactly what this is* "oh, I'm just here one night. I've got some hostels to find." 

Him: *knows I'm lost* "here, wait just here I work here." *points to nice cafe beside us*

Me: "oh that's nice" *wavers on flowing or going* 

Him: "wait here"

And like, okay. So I flow, I do. He comes back with a card. "You can stay with me. I have a place in San Marco. I work now 6-11."

Me: *...............aahaha* "no, it's fine, I've got these other hostels..." 

....

and I still believe in humanity enough, so *takes proffered card* 

 "okay, well if I don't find anywhere, I'll call."

Him: "it's not my number, just the cafe. But come back here at say 9 or so with your bags and it's okay. Okay? See you then." *looks at me* 

Me: *laughs* "okay we'll see" 

Him: CIAO! ...like, a hello/goodbye ciao that is more a ya ya, okay, see you soon. 

Not even ten minutes in this city and I grt someone's number. Aish. 

Also: 

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA x10000000

wut 

No, (looking at you, parents) I was never actually going to take him up on his offer. I just humoured the universe a little. I'm safe and sound in a fine hotel with a door that locks and no Italian man in my bed. LOL 

But like...you know. these things they happen. (the side of me that is always looking for that moment to forever disappear into a life off any recognizabe path and just do crazy shit will probably always be wondering now whether i should have returned anyways just for the shits and giggles and 'reckless twenties' of it. And then have some great stories to tell and maybe an Italian child or two.) 

Ahaha. Wow. You are all welcome for putting that out there. 

I think we have all just levelled up in terms of what I do and do not relate here on this blog. 

Welcome to phase who gives a fuck we're in this for real now, apparently. 

Aie. 

ON THAT DELICIOUS NOTE

I'm going to go not sleep to get cracking early in order to swallow this city in daylight. 

Here is for all of this, and the universe, and seeing the stars in strips of dark sky, the way the hollow church bells toll midnight to me now. 

oh, but keep going

-k