View from my windows

Solid Life

I was studying at a café this morning, and there were some friends chatting at the table behind me.  I wasn't really listening to them, but I could here a constant noise from behind my back.  When they left I felt a silence, coming from the stop that just held four people.  And I thought, how crazy, for ten minutes, we were right next to each other, and now they are completely gone.  But I realized that they are not gone, they are still there, still doing something, still in the same body and mind, and with the same life, just not next me.  How nice it would be, to leave your own life for a little bit, just like that.  Just leave your body with your friends sitting there chatting at a table, and walk away for a minute.  Away from your everything that defines you, your name, your appearance, your history, and just exist without all that for a little.  If you consider it, life is a very solid thing.  Your life has to have an identity, a place, an activity, and even certain papers.  When you are with yourself, you are always with your life, and everything that your life was, is, and will be.  Even if there is nothing bad, nothing you want to change, wouldn't you want to be able to just wonder off sometimes?  Cut off some of those things that define your life?

I think that is why people who travel a lot are so attractive.  It's like their life is not so solid, it's more like air, it can bounce around from one place to another.  It's like they have less ties, they exist according to where they are.  That is also why traveling in general is attractive to people.  When you relocate your life, there are some things that you can cut, put a gap in, and start new.  But than it just builds up again, the gaps get filled, and you realize it's still that same life.

This is also the reason I felt so good when my purse got stolen in Madrid.  For once, I had no phone or phone number, no documents, no money.  The only thing I had that said, "this is me" was myself.  I felt light, I felt like all those things that tie me to that life are gone.  The only thing that existed was the moment, and whatever I was in that moment.

la verdad

os quiero decir la verdad.  la verdad es que no me gusta para nada el interfais nuevo de facebook. la verdad es que hay gente en el mundo por quienes daría la vida. la verdad es que hay alguna musica en el mundo que me hace seguir viviendo.  y de eso quiero escribir aquí.

Ok, sabeis de Pandora, sí?  Pues... la mejor, y no miento, mejor estación en pandora es la de Manu Chao.  Me encanta Manu Chao, no puedo decir cuanto, pero además, la estación es increíble.  Tocan de Gipsy Kings, de Bebe, de Emilliana Torrini (quien no he escuchado todavía) y muchos otros.

Pero quiero escribir de los cantores que me gustan.  No se si hay una palabra para describirlos todos, pero en verdad, creo que solo usando el adjectivo "emancipados" puedo tocarlos todos un poco.  Aquí hay una lista, primero en español; jarabe de palo, manu chao, gipsy kings; después ingles; joan baez, amy winhouse; después frances, pues, tal vez un poco patricia kaaz.

Se puede cantar del corazón, decir lo que quiere decir la alma, expresar lo que hay en el cuerpo.  Creo que la mayoría de nosotros queremos expresarnos así, pero no podemos.  Imagínate, si solo puedieramos siempre, siempre, sempre, levantar nuestras almas, en esa manera tan grande, estrechando las cuerdas de la guitarra, y dejar en el aire todo lo que queremos decir, apostar la verdad contra los nubes.  Toda la emoción para los que queremos lo más...

La Verdad es que extraño Madrid.

le gare SNCF

I love the trains in Europe.  They are a little expensive if you want to do it the fancy way.  But hey, 10 € Rome-Naples?  As long as the Italians who get on the train with nothing but a deck of cards and a piece of cardboard to play the cards on don't start flirting with you, you're in paradise, and even then, it's not so bad.

This summer I had a train pass.  It was for 2nd class, but I didn't realize it actually said that on the pass until I got on the last train of the summer, and nobody ever said anything, even when they checked.  So I would get by ticket, with a seat and everything, in the first class, on the fastest trains, slide into a huge 1rst class seat, squash my backpack into the one next to it, relax and enjoy the ride.

A picture I took out the train window on the way to Genova.

The trains are amazing.  They leave and arrive exactly on time.  The ride is so smooth, and the view from the window is beautiful.  Forests, fields, once you go around the Italy into the Southern border of France the railroad runs right along the sea.  Sometimes they stop at little towns, and you can observe the town people hustling at the station.  But the train from Avignon to Paris didn't stop a single time.  And in Paris it was cold, and raining when I arrived.  The trains get so cozy, by the end you don't want to get off.