Siena

Siena is, perhaps, my family's favorite place in Italy (and if it's our fave in Italy, it's kinda our fave in the world). So when I set out to schedule our time in Tuscany, it seemed obvious to me that we would have our headquarters in Siena.

Here are some highlights from our time there.

Since Siena was our base not our destination, we spent our day times away from there and usually only returned in time for dinner.

View of the main churches in Siena from near our hotel

Piazza del Campo in the evening

Val at the fountain across from our hotel

My mom and I have fond memories of what we call "the cave restaurant" from our 2005 trip when we were in Siena for the Palio and watched the race in the kitchen with the locals at our dinner restaurant. We chose to seek this restaurant out again just the two of us and found it! It's called Antica Osteria Da Divo and is just around the corner from the cathedral. If you're in Siena, it's definitely worth checking out.

I also insisted on visiting Siena's cathedral because of its unusual black-and-white stripe interior. My mom had never been inside despite being to Siena twice before.

star motif dome interior

We stayed at the Hotel Villa Liberty for the second time. This hotel strikes the perfect balance as far as I'm concerned: homey but not bed-and-breakfasty, close to town but quiet, beautiful view and fair priced.

Julie and Val enjoyed the company of staff, too.
This one even gifted Val with the biggest lemon we've ever seen.

Our time in Siena was limited but it's always nice to return to someplace familiar and comforting. My mom and I have many memories of visiting Siena with my dad in 2004 and 2005, so it's almost like visiting him in a way. It was nice to share this gem with our fellow travelers this year and continue the tradition.

enjoying the perfect Italian light lunch: prosciutto e melone, olives, bruschetta

Eat, Pray, Love: India (I)

Page 132

You are, after all, what you think. Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions.

After my Dad died, my Mom and I made a conscious effort to "think positively" as much as possible. We were in the middle of the most intense grief either of us had ever experienced (very different types of grief, of course, but still) and we knew that if we didn't deliberately choose positive thoughts over our negative ones, we would each slip into a dangerous depression. It takes a lot of practice to control your own thoughts like that, but I wrote many journal entries trying to focus on the things for which I was thankful instead of the things about my life I wished I could change. For example:

Journal entry from 11/3/2008: "Substituting is not the ideal situation, but I get to go to work every day in a place where I hang out with teenagers and talk about books. For better or worse I am a teacher and this job allows me to keep doing that. I'm lucky to be so sure of my purpose and to have a passion that so readily translates into a career."

After 2 years of practice it has become much easier to think positively. (Plans is even better at it than I am and the reinforcement of being around him and always finding the "bright side" also helps.) Even more than that, it has become harder to be around people who do not try to find the positive in their own lives. The phenomena of Facebook is that people are constantly projecting themselves to the world. I can't help but start to categorize my Facebook contacts into The Complainers and The Thankful. I am drawn to the people who find joy in their lives, especially in small things. I grow weary of people who consistently choose to post status updates that are negative. When I want to whine about something that went wrong in my life that day, I try to get a little perspective and then post the "bright side" instead.

From A Return To Love: "Love in your mind produces love in your life. This is the meaning of heaven. Fear in your mind produces fear in your life. This is the meaning of hell."

The more you repeat negative thoughts, the more powerful they become. The more you concentrate on finding beauty and joy in your environment, the easier they become to spot. I could complain that my boyfriend lives in another state, that I am financially dependent on my parent, that I had to get a second job and I don't have the career I want yet. But instead I am happy that I have people in my life who love me, that I live with my best friend, that I still get to function as a teacher even if it's not in the most ideal way, and that I am healthy and living in a beautiful place. (And when I'm getting away from these thoughts, which happens often enough, I revisit the Vision Board. The vision board is ALL positive. Again, "If you don't have one, get one!")

Page 177

There is so much about my fate that I cannot control, but other things do fall under my jurisdiction. There are certain lottery tickets I can buy, thereby increasing my odds of finding contentment. I can decide how I spend my time, whom I interact with, whom I share my body and life and money and energy with. I can select what I eat and read and study. I can choose how I'm going to regard unfortunate circumstances in life -- whether I will see them as curses or opportunities (and on the occasions when I can't rise to the most optimistic viewpoint, because I'm feeling too damn sorry for myself, I can choose to keep trying to change my outlook). I can choose my words and the tone of voice in which I speak to others. And most of all, I can choose my thoughts.

Eat, Pray, Love: Italy

I decided to read Eat, Pray, Love for the second time in December because I find it comforting to revisit books I liked. (Right after my Dad died I re-read the 7th Harry Potter because I wanted to be with characters who felt like friends. Coincidentally, I think Eat, Pray, Love might have been the next book I read.) It has been about 2 years since my last trip through Italy, India and Indonesia with Liz and, considering the VERY different personal space I am in, thought I may feel differently about the thoughts and revelations of that book. Here are my notes (I am such a student...):

Page 37

Total delight! Liz has been to the gelato place near the Pantheon in Rome that I have literally been raving about for a year and a half!

Il Gelato di San Crispino has some of the most original flavors of gelato I've ever seen (and I've seen a lot of extensive flavor selections between Italy and Spain). Liz even mentioned specially the cinnamon-ginger ice cream I craved (with McDonald's french fries of all things) for at least a year after my Italy trip with my students. I admit now that this is not the most enlightened note I have in the book. Lisa will be the only person who reads this and understands the truly transformative experience of this particular gelato.

(Note the picture is mine of the menu at San Crispino. That's how much I love this place; I took a picture of the MENU!)

Page 41

When I don't know what I'm doing, I look like I don't know what I'm doing. When I'm excited or nervous, I look excited or nervous. And when I am lost, which I frequently am, I look lost. My face is a transparent transmitter of my every thought. As David once put it, "You have the opposite of a poker face. You have, like... miniature golf face.

My thought: Oh! Me too! Me too! That's why I can't lie or pretend. It's why my students like me and sometimes my bosses think I'm not respectful enough - I can't hide anything. I can't fake it. I don't know how. I'm just ... me... all the time. For real. And real me thinks everyone should be able to share what they really feel. (I've found that this is not as well-received in the World of Work as I think it should be.) The only thing I would say differently is that when I am lost, which I too frequently am, I look so damn confident about where I am going that not only do I not necessarily look lost, but people with good senses of direction will actually follow me into the complete unknown assuming I know exactly where I am going. When traveling the confidence is good, the lack of direction is awful. The miniature golf face is a bit of a liability when traveling alone, too.

Page 62

For me, though, a major obstacle in my pursuit of pleasure was my ingrained sense of Puritan guilt. Do I really deserve this pleasure? This is very American, too - the insecurity about whether we have earned our happiness.

I think one of the reasons I like this book so much is because I identify with Liz in many ways. I'm a good student, a good planner, someone who sits in the first row of class and takes genuine self-worth from whether or not my teachers (bosses, colleagues) like me. I'm good at following the rules and doing what I'm supposed to do. At an early age (I usually say 16, but 12 if I'm being honest) I put my life on a scheduled path of school and hard work and degrees and a job that would make it all worth while. I'm not good at idleness. Too much relaxation makes me feel lazy. My self worth is too closely tied to job performance and productivity. That's why unemployment was so difficult for me in the beginning. For about 4-6 months I suffered a kind of mild depression because without work I felt indulgent, irresponsible and lazy. How could I justify being happy if I wasn't doing my part to contribute to society?

But as I said in my 2009 blog, I realized that being happy itself is a contribution to society. Happiness is a natural right. You don't have to earn it. The size of my paycheck and the number of hours I spent slugging away at a job do not correlate to how much enjoyment I am allowed. This concept, expressed in just a few sentences, has taken about 2 years to really believe and there are still days when it slips my mind completely.

Page 95

It is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection.

They should make a bumper-sticker out of this one. It's just a great motto to live by. I want to hang it on a wall somewhere.

Page 115

You were given life; it is your duty (and also your entitlement as a human being) to find something beautiful within life, no matter how slight.

My mom and I have discussed this concept at length in the last 2 years. Somehow in our Puritan society self-sacrifice has become the ideal many women strive for. "Look how successful I am! I do everything for my husband and kids and parents and friends and never think of myself at all!" Or, better phrased for my taste, when asked if she ever has needs of her own Jane (in 27 Dresses) says, "No. I'm Jesus."

But this ideal has it all wrong. You can only offer yourself to the people around you if there is something there to offer. Self-care is not a luxury, it's a necessity. If I don't take the me-time to rest, read, breathe, and do whatever I need to do to rejuvenate myself occasionally, what exactly am I offering to the people I love? Finding and experiencing beauty and joy and tranquility as often as possible is not indulgence. Living a life of balance is not something that we should feel guilty for, it is a basic human necessity.

Stay tuned for India...

2009 Year in Review

If 2008 was a year characterized mostly by big change I did not choose nor want (Dad's death, losing my dream teaching job after just one year), 2009 has been a year of making new choices for changes I want. 2008 was a year of survival until my trip to Argentina for Habitat for Humanity. That trip in many ways gave me the release I needed to start a new life for myself, to decide what I really want in order to be happy. After 11 months of grief and disappointment, it was time to change my perspective.

In December/January, I was convinced that in order to be happy, I had to effectively traumatize myself out of my comfort zone by completely uprooting and moving to a new country. I thought that if I had the courage to move to England, I would come back with the confidence to find the life I really wanted here.

I had a lot of free time during those months (5 sub days in about 10 weeks...) and I used it to read, write, and generally figure out what exactly I envision for myself in the big picture. I read and re-read Eat, Pray, Love; He's Just Not That Into You; A Return to Love. I watched Oprah. I made a vision board. (If you don't have one, get one!) Slowly, I began to change the way I look at my own life, my own choices, my own attitude. I began to break out of the patterns that had kept me lock

ed in my house for nearly a year.

(The vision board includes my goals for my life in the areas of

romance/home, travel, teaching, world citizenship, family, and self.)

The goals for 2009?

1. Be happier with myself as a person.

2. Be more social.

3. Find ways to feel worthwhile and satisfied that are not related to employment.

At first I thought I had to go out and find new friends; a daunting and unpleasant prospect. In the meantime, I wanted to be more consistent about the friends I already had. My credential friends and I started having monthly "Diva Dinners" to catch up. I started a book club without having any idea of how beneficial it would be for me to reconnect with people from high school. How was I to know that having those people in my life again would accomplish my exact goal of "making new friends?" I didn't need *new* friends, I needed people who knew and understood me already. I needed the Divas and the Lady Longhorns.

A year ago, I would've expected to have entirely new friends, a new place to live, a completely new life at this point. Instead, I have old friends, a home filled with love and support and family, and a life I had all along but am so much happier to be living now. The bullet points of my life right now don't seem like much (unemployed 26-year-old who still lives at home and is rapidly running out of savings money to live on...), but in reality I am just so undeniably happy. I live with my best friend. I am friends with my sister and get to spend time with her regularly. I have a boyfriend who makes me feel confident and happy and excited. I have learned to be happy with the accomplishments of every day tasks, rather than feeling like a failure because I don't have the job I want. If this is my starting point, I can only hope that 2010 will be even better.

Wishing everyone the peace and hope and happiness I feel this season.

It Starts Now

I'm sorry, but I had to steal this idea from Miss Teacher's blog, because it's just so perfect:

Former President Bush was inaugurated when I was only 17 and was just barely getting into the whole political awareness thing. My senior class vehemently argued over the candidates and the recount and everything that went on that year even though none of us really had any clue what we were talking about. Then September 11 happened and suddenly Pres. Bush was a hero. (huh?)

The last 8 years, my entire grown-up lifetime, I have been part of the minority. My government has made me feel like I should be ashamed to believe the things I believe. Somehow I was "unpatriotic" because I don't think an idiotic combination of war with some countries and isolation against others was a legitimate foreign policy. Somehow I was labeled as "unsympathetic to our troops" because I vote for peace. Somehow I became "morally wicked" because I identify myself as a liberal. Somehow "liberal" became a dirty word. I've felt frustrated and angry and misunderstood and demoralized. My beliefs were wrong and my opinions were futile. I watched in utter amazement as the President of my country - someone who is supposed to represent me and my fellow citezens - ruined our reputation worldwide, botched the English grammar I work so hard to convince my students matters, smirked when talking about body counts and refused to admit he had made so much as one mistake. And then I watched in awe as my fellow Americans inexplicably elected him again.

2009 is the new beginning I've been waiting for in many ways. After the December 2007 death of my dad (and the most important man in my life) 2008 was a year of adjustment and refocusing priorities. The first six months were all about loss and unwanted change, the second six months felt more hopeful. 2009 is a year of deciding what I really want in life and taking action to pursue those goals. I feel inspired now. I feel my country is finally on the same page as I am (besides the outrageous passage of Prop 8 in California, but that's another discussion). It's like the air shifted. Things changed around and within me. It's like my life will forever be separated by 2 dates - the day my dad died and the day my country elected a man of vision and hope. The time in between felt bleak in many ways. The time after (my trip to Argentina with Habitat, my new inspiration and courage to make Big Moves in my life) is new and exciting.

Now, when the President is on TV, I won't feel the need to change the channel to avoid nausea. Because he inspires me to do more. President Obama. From the first time I heard him speak I knew I would follow him for as long it took for him to become president. I am thrilled I didn't have to wait long. I have hope. I know the situation we're in as a nation is a perilous one. Nothing in the next few years is going to be easy and it will all take faith and patience. But I believe. This is a person who stands for the things I believe in. Diplomacy, conservation, integrity, responsibility, family, volunteerism, critical thinking, ... Will it be easier to teach my students to value those things when there are good role models on TV?