Santa Cruzing

Here I am in Santa Cruz again. I meant to write more immediately after my arrival in California but now is as good a time as ever. In fact, it's an ideal time, especially because I should be studying. So of course the impulse to write is back.

I think now that I'm here I have time to absorb all the things I thought about and learned and came across while abroad. And I'm realizing things that I didn't even know I learned, or that I always thought about but didn't think I was working on them, consciously or subconsciously. Maybe it's just seniorhood: all things fall into place when you are on top of the heap. But not necessarily. Not that anything is clear of course. Who knows whether this time next year I'll be in Ireland wiping down tables or at the Monterey Institute of Language or in Santa Cruz trudging on through the master's program or starting over with urban studies in some other university or going out into the real world "to get pissed off" to eventually come back to school.

I'm back to yoga, back to the redwoods, back to the OCEAN (not the sea!), and back to belonging where I am. Yes, I certainly enjoy the fake world right now. Here I have an ocean view and a social life and a purpose and a routine.

For now Italy is in my daily consciousness as fascist history and as Primo Levi and as my memories of the nooks and crannies of Bologna.

It's funny...here majoring in Italian Studies one could construct a whole identity based on being interested in a foreign culture. In Italy it's a bit strange to walk around on the street and major in that reality. How do you explain to people you're interested in what they live and eat and breathe? Just like the fish in water metaphor: could you tell a fish you major in water studies? Would it be able to conceptualize water? Certainly Italians can conceptualize Italian studies, but I wonder if they get the feeling they're being examined.

Until next time (I have a pressing assignment),
Robyn