'I' ignore 'Me,' except after 'We'

Remember that rule in school???? 'I' before 'E,' except after 'C?' Yep. Apparently my dry humor does, too. :)

I'm tired of being the collective.

How's that for a thesis statement, eh? I figured it was deep enough to make you ladies swoon. Or at least deep enough to catch your interest. The swooning part will come later, if you play your cards right. But, truthfully, we must return to the topic of the day, for there is no better time to discuss than while drinking a cappuccino and listening to music in a caffe'.

On a quick side-note, I am still upset that there is literally no one to make a mocha around here. I would like a nice, Hershey's syrup mocha, and if I don't get it by whining enough, I'm actually going to have to resort to buying chocolate at Esselunga (like Winco, for all you Twin-Fallsers) and having a little DIY party. That stands for Do It Yourself. Just in case you were fretting with incomprehension at this point.

So the collective pronouns need to stop. I am a bit (and by bit I mean enormous proportion) exhausted with considering myself a we rather than an I. In a (relatively) small program like study abroad NYU, you run into the same people all the time and having classes in the music program is generally synonymous with dating every person in said program seriously. Like, Take you out to a nice dinner and pick up the check seriously.

Knowing me, you can probably predict the part where one (count it, singular) of these relationships tends to stress me out. Although (this is where your audible gasp should be held at the ready) the real relationship I currently find myself in is not traditionally stressful commitment-wise (Gasp!), all the other metaphorical relationships that I am committed to are driving me into committal hell.

Which is to say I'm overly frustrated with being forced to spend constant amounts of time in the company of so many people. And furthermore, to be chastised for trying to find time for yourself is not necessarily beneficial, either.

On another side-note, I'm playing in a soccer league in Florence! That's pretty much like drinking beer in Germany or wearing a coat in Russia. It's pretty cool- for those of you who were wondering, my soccer skills are extraordinary. Extraordinar...ily rough. :) But, fortunately, Jared's high school soccer (tap dance?) skills pull through to more than make up for mediocrity. Oh, his skills, and Bryan's blood on the soccer field. Wrap your mind around that.

Anyways.

Solutions? Hide. Talk to a couple collections of brick that vaguely resemble walls. Blend in.

Damn.

A Pretty Saucy Pocket Full O' Blood-Suckers

I have so much to talk about, and so little time to talk. Literally. Like, ten minutes of my life. Which is barely enough for the exposition. But I shall try, my wee little munchkins, I shall try.

I have found the haven/niche/hidey-hole I will be inhabiting for most of my intellectual life here in Florence. This is where I currently reside, on the second floor (they have multiple floors here!!), thirsting for more minutes in the day. The problem is such: I waste too much time on the weekends doing absolutely everything. Everything in that I am always busy looking up things, or talking to people, or making beautifully intricate constructions that can barely be deemed sandwiches, and I really don't have time to do anything. Which, of course, is a happy thing, because it beats having all the time in the world to do anything. Because that would imply that you weren't doing anything. HA! Twisted logic prevails again!

So let me begin with the cornucopia of things that I've done in the past weeks (cornucopia has slyly melded itself into my vocabulary again and I couldn't be happier about it). For un aperitivo (this is what the Italian language calls pre-gaming, except you actually pre-game at a bar, and only for one or two drinks. To think, there's a word for that? Where have I been?!), I went to the opera this past Thursday. In all reality, the act of 'going to the Italian Opera' is like getting slammed, if we're going to continue using the aperitivo metaphor. It is no pregame- that biddy is the equivalent of three double scotches.

So I went to the opera. Lucia di Lammermoor, if you're interested. In the show, Lucia is forced into marriage with a man of her brother's choosing, considering the man she actually loves is her brother's archrival. Lucia goes mad, kills her husband and, under the pale moon, sings a lovely aria about the shadows in her head and all the blood on her clothes, of which there is a plentiful amount. She then slits her own wrists, after which her lover returns and kills himself, in the style of Romeo and Juliet. How quaint, how cute. Yeah, it blew my mind, too. Especially when you can only understand the gist of the story, considering the subtitles were also in Italian. However, as compelling and epic as the story was, it wasn't the narrative which made the evening. It was Italy.

'Slow down, hoss,' you think, 'ludicrous! All of Italia?' No, children, I didn't mean all of Italy. It was that wacky metaphor tomfoolery I use so often. What I really mean is that the many varied components of Italy made the entire experience for me. It was in going next door to the Operahouse caffe' and having champagne before the show, it was flirting with the Italian ladies that took our tickets, it was eating a panino and having a beer during the 20-minute intermission, and it was leaving the Operahouse and walking home under a starlit sky along the Arno river that made the Opera so good. It was in how I felt sophisticated, like a real person rather than some student, always waiting for the end of something, for some sort of result (I literally just tried to stereotype students, which is like trying to eat an entire cow when you only wanted a cheeseburger from Mcdonalds).

It was like I was enjoying the moment, for the moment, and not for anything else about it. Who knows. It was good. So was the aperitivo. And Lucia/Edgardo. And the Guinness afterwards. Does that count as a post-ivo?

Aperitivo two of this illustrious (and somewhat overbearing) drink-cornucopia is that I just returned from the Firenze/Lazio soccer game. Which, coincidentally, also blew my mind, but in a much different way than the Opera did. If they were similar mind-blowings, I would be sitting gape-mouthed and mute at the soccer game or jumping up and down, screaming inappropriate Italian curses at Lucia. Both of which would make my company unhappy. Anyway, soccer. It was a beautiful 1-0 game, with Florence scoring in the final three minutes. My part of the well-oiled machine that is European soccer is only that of howling like a loon and desperately attempting to discern the chants emanating from the literal horde of Fiorenzians.

See, there's something about watching live professional sports that strikes a common chord with every single male I have ever encountered, and if you are A) a male, and B) disputing my claim, don't. You know you get that feeling when hundreds and hundreds of other guys are screaming at the field. Whether it's rage or joy, you feel that shit, because there is something inexplicably addicting about either 1) feeling like you're part of the most bad-ass army of best friends ever or 2) feeling like everyone around you is screaming bloody murder at something and you'd better quick hurry and do the same thing or else God may just throw some lightning straight at you. It's impossible to deny it. Jumping up and down there at the stadium today, feeling that feeling, I couldn't help but feel like I should start chanting about killing pigs and stuff. If I'd had a conch, I would have blown it.

On a less tribal note, I've changed a bit. It's finally come to that, has it? Well, I have many a thing to tell.

For starters (Again with the aperitivo. I'd be pretty drunk by now, if you've been counting), I curl my toes when I'm nervous. I noticed this as I was walking into my hidey-hole (which is named La Cite'), wearing my sandals. The issue is that you can't wear sandals here. I mean, you can, but it is a very unfortunate thing that the Italian culture frowns upon, for reasons I am still currently unaware of. Perhaps, as I overheard it explained (by a Florentine man) to a fellow English-speaker the other eve: 'Florentine women are  beautiful in that timeless way probably because they believe it is their job to reflect the timeless beauty of Florence itself.' Which, when you consider the pride of the Italians for their own city and for their culture, makes a lot of sense. I guess Florentine women don't have a lot to do with me wearing sandals, but if you investigate that metaphor a little deeper than is relatively comfortable, it actually makes a creep-load of sense (yes, I just invented creep-load. It wasn't misspelled). So I was hesitant. And scared. But alas, every single pair of socks I own is drying on my convenient drying-rack, and I was inclined--nay, forced--to wear the sandals.

     Thing 2, though it isn't in a red leotard nor a Seuss character, is also strange. I am such a giant. Honestly I never thought my height would be that noticeable, but in a foreign country I seem to dominate the sky. I don't know if that counts as learning anything. It was interesting, though.

     Third (and final for now), I have actually discovered something of worth about me. The first two I joked around with a little, but in all seriousness I have unearthed a (very) valuable gem of life-knowledge. I do not need to be friends with everyone. It is not necessary to solve everyone's problems. There is no significance to being on (what seems to be) everyone's mind all the time. What those little semi-obvious statements have in common is that they are the most difficult vampires to vanquish I have ever encountered in my crypt of insecurities. And I am forging my crosses. Albeit slowly, my silver is being poured. Sooner rather than later, something is going to get stabbed in the metaphorical heart. And it's not gonna be me.