saddling

what a week. these four short days in between my two trips to the continent must contain so many things:
-final partings with all but a handful of my friends, including my flatmates
-my application to my dream grad school program written and mailed off by thursday
-plansmaking and packing for city-hopping with rachel in france and pilgrimaging in the pyrenees with andrew (i'm going to have to carry everything on my back at all times, this should be a lesson in materialism for my girly self) and a last rendevous in london
-my last shifts at the restaurant (tomorrow morning is it)
-celebration of meredith's birthday and my friend jonathon's birthday as well
- commencement of the great edinburgh purges (fighting the eternal human problem of acquisition, exacerbated by my tiny but full room and few voyaging suitcases)

i'll be headed out to grenoble in the wee hours on friday and will be away for a total of 11 days. here's what it'll look like:
5/19: fly to grenoble to meet rachel and hang out there for a night
5/20: train it to montpellier for the next night - and hopefully see some mediterranean coast!
5/21: head to toulouse to meet andrew and our friend eva for the last night of civilized living
5/22-28: begin my great mountain-crossing walk from pou across the franco-spanish border, through some tiny villages and also spanish cities roncesvalles and pamplona, until a final departure in bilbao (hoping to see the funky guggenheim museum)
5/28-9: a night/day in london to say goodbye to john, walk through covent garden, possibly see uva friend katie bray and take my last train ride up the coast of the north sea.
5/30: begin moving out process! a going away dinner/evening with my coworkers
5/31: ceilidh in princes st gardens with friends; last day i'm allowed to be in this flat, so i'm probably leaving to move to andrew's flat and sleep there or wherever friends take me
6/5: the last broadcast: begin transatlantic voyage home midday.
thereafter: start over & remember how.

my remaining time seems like a tiny object i can hold in my palm and inspect and then keep clasped tightly. i am not thinking too too hard about my feelings on everything, but i imagine that there are some monumental experiences to come in these days i've laid out for you.
i have meanwhile been having some really splendid exploits, most of which as illustrated by the pictures i posted yesterday. along with the trip to paris, there have been indian food picnics in famous brad hills of edinburgh at sundown and sunday-afternoon journeys by into 12th-century-old neighboring towns where elaborate private gardens are open to public exploration and happy dogs and mama ducks with her line of babies roam freely and receptively. to travel to the latter, one has to walk through an abandoned train tunnel for an old line called the 'innocent railroad,' which was formed out of squeamishness for the new-fangled steam engine and industrialization: it was a horse-drawn railcar that up to 300,000 people in greater edinburgh used! such sentimental folk. inside the tunnel i was at first disappointed by the graffiti, which was lacklustre, but then i noticed these as i kept walking: 'EAT YOUR GREENS;' 'RESPECT YOUR ELDERS;' 'TV GIVES YOU SQUARE EYES' next to a face with square tv-boxed eyes. they made me laugh so, particularly as discovered in that order.

then of course there was paris. my weather was gorgeous (i even got freckles), i didn't feel that the people were snobby, i was comfortable with travelling around the city by myself, seeing art and monuments and doling out merci's and au revoir's just about constantly (they are quite formal and committed about these manners, which is actually rather endearing and establishes an even plane). brian, my host, was incredibly hospitable and generous, giving me his room to sleep in and making me vegetarian dinners, waking me up to a fresh croissant and juice. he walked all over with me on my first day and the two of us hashed out our impressions - there are certainly some disagreeable aspects of the city, for one that all of the parks consists of sandy gravel expanses and tiny patches of grass that can't be walked on and house excessively planned lines of trees. there is very little that feels natural and unreserved, which is actually my favorite thing about some of the parks in london - they are very peaceful and free. the english know how to take walks, i suppose. the french can have their cafes and coffees and pastries and crepes, which there was plenty of in a highly enjoyable way.

i loved many things about my trip. the art museums really, really got me good, and i'm so glad i took the time to see all three of the major ones (louvre, musee d'orsay, pompidou centre). brian took me to an english-only bookstore in paris called shakespeare and co. whose upper floor is only a library with couches for people to sit and read, not for sale, and i could love going there so much on a free afternoon. i met up with annie, my former suitemate from uva, and her visiting friend lenore, and she led us to the hippest neighborhood in paris, where we got both the best falafel and the best chocolate in the world (i echo these superlatives sarcastically, for i am wary of such things, but they were really good nonetheless) and went into a funky secondhand store, which are hard to come by in that highly fashion-&-quality-conscious bubble; we even sat at a little table in the calm evening, watching the world go by and drinking cheap bordeaux wine, as one practically must in france. i had some completely amusing exchanges with parisians actually, when they realized my americanness (oh my goodness my countrymen were swarming the place, much worse than edinburgh). i adored brian's flat, which was the converted servants' quarters in a very fancy and posh flat building; he gave me his room while he stayed with his bubbly and funny german girlfriend julia in her adjacent room, and it all was tiny and makeshift in the most endearing way possible. i found it very warming that people who work in the food service industry in paris really take pride in their jobs and are quite talented at it (not in a pandering way, just in a matter-of-fact way), unlike the people one encounters in the u.s. often who seem like they are depressed out of their minds and bored with existence. i wished i could speak french, so i could partake or at least understand what seemed like some terribly fascinating incidents on the metro. but, i suppose they are stubborn in their snobbishness and i in my inherited imperialism, so a tourist i remain for the moment.

more than anything there was the autonomy: it was wonderful to just do something alone and uninhibited for the first time in so long, to explore something in an inspired way that promoted perception and observation and reflection. i left feeling satiated and that i had exhausted my main desires there in those three days. but bigger than that, i was rejuvenated and refreshed, ready and excited for all that i have planned in my short time left instead of stressed and anxious as i had very much been of late. perhaps some of this has returned, never straying for too long, but it only because i want too many things. but this is how it is meant to be, is it not?

i hope the photographs will explain the rest. for now, i absolutely must write a proposal for why UVa must accept someone so inspired and devoted as myself into their master's program for english literature. this is the real stuff right here, the highest stakes my present young life has known. wish me luck, for earnestness i think i already have. after i mail it off i can hopefully exhale out some blogging, before my next scene change. pleasant dreams, i shan't be long-

p.s. i tend to care way too much about this sort of thing, but check this out nonetheless