Belonging

Where do I start?  I’ve been back in Anghiari for six days and have been hesitant to write about it.  There are a few reasons for this, the main one being I’m really out of practice when it comes to writing and find myself a little afraid.  How did I used to do this so often?  What did I write about that people found compelling enough to read?

Culture Shock

I just returned from a three month visit to the US.  I arrived there the week of Thanksgiving and came back on March 1.  I wrote very little while I was there.  I wrote about the power of seeing loved ones, the memories that are stirred after a long absence, and my idea of the perfect culture.  To be honest, I was a little befuddled the entire time I was there.  It was all so familiar to me – the geography, the people, the traffic, the language – yet I didn’t feel a sense of belonging.  I felt like a visitor, an interloper, sometimes even an intruder.  It was a feeling I wasn’t expecting and I spent a lot of time thinking about why I felt that way.  Was this not my home anymore?  How could things and people that were so familiar to me be so foreign?

I think the visit to the US served to shed a little perspective on this life I have chosen.  This life, one that is still perplexing to many people, is not for everyone.  It is not an easy path we have chosen.  It’s a romantic and adventurous notion – selling everything and moving to a foreign country – but it is not without its complications.  Anyone who’s ever done it knows what I mean.  It only works if the rewards are greater than the obstacles.  That’s true of life anywhere, but it’s so much easier to regroup when you’re in your own country, with laws and customs that are familiar to you and people who speak the same language.  It’s much more difficult to pack up and move back home when home is 8,000 miles away.  The obstacles are also much more challenging.   Some of them assault you and offer no logical resolution.  You are left gape-mouthed and wondering what you did to deserve such a fate and if there will ever be a time when reason and order prevail.

So what was the perspective that I received on this trip?  I learned a lot about home and belonging and how all that comes together for me.  And it was a jolt to me to realize that I had none of that figured out until now.

A Circle of Harmony

When I got back to Anghiari it was cold and rainy.  A hard, slanting rain driven by the tramontana, that icy wind that comes from the north.  Friends of ours, Amy and Greg, had come by the day before and turned our heat on (which proved to be more complicated than it sounds) so it was warm inside.  The house longed for light and air and for people moving once again amongst its rooms.  I opened the outside shutters and left the inside ones open for a while, despite the rules governing shutter protocol.  They’re designed to keep cold and hot out, so throwing them open during a cold, windy rain is not advised.  But I had to have some light reach the walls, ceilings and floors.  If for no other reason that I could clearly see the cobwebs and litter of bug carcasses that had accumulated.

After two days of cleaning and scrubbing, the first two floors started to breathe.  As if to signal its approval, the sun came out on that second day and we could venture outside.  We relished long walks down forgotten paths, seeing familiar sights, greeting familiar faces.  Our bodies ache from the strain of the hills and the stairs, but in a good way.  We feel alive and vital – and woefully out of shape.  As we walk, we stop to take in the magnificent views.  Views that are etched in our minds but so incredibly good to see in real life again.  The Apennines across the Tiber Valley are all crowned with snow despite the bright sun, reminding us that winter is not quite done.  This makes the views even more dramatic, with that outline of pure white against the deep blue sky.  Deep breaths, inhaling the fresh mountain air,  renew us and give us energy.

I move through life here with such clarity.  Why is this, I ask myself.  Being away for three months gave me the perspective I needed to answer this question.  It’s because this place is where my soul, mind, and heart form a complete circle.  A harmony that completes me.  Some people call this bliss, but that sounds too much like a bumper sticker to me.  It’s a state of being that makes you so aware of your environment that it’s startling.  You don’t just take a walk.  You become part of the landscape, a landscape that is so dramatic that it moves you to tears every time you see it.  Every time.  You don’t just walk down a winding lane in the village, you see every stone, every crack, every cobble and you feel the spirits of those who have traversed this same path for thousands of year.  You don’t just hear voices speaking in Italian, you feel their passion for life and their joy at being alive.  You become part of the place and the place becomes part of you.  I’ve never felt this anywhere I’ve lived in my life.  If you have, then you’re lucky.  Enjoy that feeling and treasure the connection it gives you to the world.

It’s not that I was unhappy in Atlanta.  I loved the vibrance and the excitement and the forward momentum.  I loved the warmth of friends’ homes and the pleasure of listening to a concert on the grass in Piedmont Park.  I loved the springs with the symphony of color and the fragrance that permeated the air.  But that circle uniting the elements of my spirit was not formed there.  I don’t know why and I really don’t care.  Because I think now that it’s been formed it won’t be broken.

Italy has given me the gift of completeness.  It has taught me that harmony is multi-faceted and not easily attained, but so worth it when you find it.  It has awakened something in me that I didn’t even know was there.  It gave me a sense of belonging.  And I will be forever grateful for that.  And that’s what I learned on my trip to the USA.