oh, the caffeinated insanity which is my brains

Hi my loves.

So much has happened - I don't have time to talk a bout it all because unlike usual I forgot to prepare my blog post ahead of time, before I actually got to the internet. The days when I could spontaneously blog... well, those are gone. =)

My honors project got approved, Professor Perrin is most likely going to direct it although there are a few wrinkles to iron out, I will be living and working on campus over the summer (and I so look forward to seeing all of you that live close - we need to make weekend trips to the beach or something! Or perhaps the Ren Faire, Lucy?), and most importantly of all (which I almost hesitate to talk about), there's a doctor who thinks he knows what Dad's sick with and thinks he can fix it. So! =)

Things are full. Woodblock printing class is amazing, I love Katie and Elena and am so glad I'm living with them next year, I got to hang out with a Franciscan monk from Assissi this afternoon, I'm consuming vast quantities of gelato and coffee (the best place to get internet is, ironically, at a bar, and since I don't want to consume copious amounts of alcohol, I consume copious amounts of coffee whenever I try to connect with the outside world via teh interwebs). Graduation is approaching for all of you Messiah-ites... I wish that I could be there! I'm missing all of you, and I'm so looking forward to the days when I can see you all every week at least (even if we're nuts as seniors and can't see each other every day. And even if maybe our group has grown to fill up with people I don't know). Where are you all living next year? Katie, Elena, and I are living in Mellinger.

Tonight we're going out to dinner at a really nice place... nonna amelias? I'm not sure how to spell it. But it sounds vaguely like that. Oh, and Lucy - I met Lucy and Charley from the Oxford semester - they came out to visit Jeff and Orvieto. And also, Prague got cancelled, so what weekend would work good for me to come out and visit you or vice versa? We will have to plan. 'Cause I really do want to see you this semester! My schedule is very open - just let me know what works best for you, because it sounds like you have an actually intense academic semester, where for me it is mostly just messing around. =D (Shhhh.... don't tell Skillen I said that! I heart him, but I get distracted way too easily here in Italy.)

So, loves, until I have time to do a real post.... I heart you! Don't leave me next year! Let's all be back together at least sometimes! I'll host weekly pro tempore dinners? Yes?

Kenzie

Hey loves!

Yet another update from the land of Italia, where the sun is getting brighter every day, the wisteria blooms are dropping off, and some new kind of white trees are blooming, along with some other kind of yellow bush-things whose blooms look a little bit like orchids. Sorry, I’m not really a horticulturist. But I have been drying some flowers and using them in my sketchbook, which is kind of fun. I haven’t dried flowers since I was really little - good grief, probably not since I was twelve and someone gave me a little plastic flower press for Christmas one year. I wonder if I still have that? The poppies are also blooming, and Katie apparently loves poppies, so we went on a poppy-gathering expedition around the cliff this week. Unfortunately, Marlene, Elena, and I couldn’t precisely find the way back when we wanted to, so all our poppies died in our hands (well, Marlene really only had a cornstalk in her hand, and she just got sick of carrying it and threw it away). But those went into the sketchbook too, so I suppose it’s alright. It served a purpose.

Could it be that I am coming to terms with the color pink? I walk into my room and I’m not positively revolted by the pink flower on our sill (and it is, let me assure you, an electric pink). Nor am I positively revolted by the electric pink of my bedcover, although I did turn it over so that the gray side is foremost. The nice thing (and it may be the only one) about pink is that it casts warm shadows.

If spring is this warm, though, here in Italy, I think I may die when summer comes. Or at least take three cold showers a day. Elena and I have started running early in the mornings, now, when it’s still chilly, because neither of us can take the heat in the afternoon. It’s actually been good. I like seeing the world when it’s new, and when I get up early I don’t have to listen to Alexis interminably hitting her snooze button (the one thing that is a bone of contention between us - otherwise I think we make great roommates). My mood, frankly, has been great every morning that I wake up to my alarm going off just once, and getting out of the room for some untalkative time when everything is beautiful and fresh. Today I’m sore, but it’s still good. Would you be ridiculously shocked if I came home and kept on running? (I think I would be! But it would probably be good for my cholesterol? Lord, we eat so much cheese here that it’s ridiculous.) I don’t know - I just feel better about myself when I know I’ve gone running, so maybe that’s worth keeping, regardless of whether it actually helps me regulate my weight or not.

I have conceived of an unholy passion for asiago cheese, artichoke hearts, and honey. Not all together, of course - that would be interesting, but odd - but oh man, in separate dishes, or (in the case of asiago cheese) just by itself.... I swear, when I get back to the states I am learning how to cook artichoke hearts, and I am using asiago cheese whenever I can. And I am going to try and find some honey without all of those ridiculous preservatives and texture-regulator things in it. I like the texture of real honey, although not in or on everything. Also, sheep cheese is pretty good. I love just spreading it on a piece of toast (‘cause it’s kind of soft). Nutella is also pretty rocking, but that at least I can get back in the states.

I went out and bought a little espresso maker, too, so that I can have easily-made espresso back in the states. I’m so excited! Whee! We can make some seriously good coffee drinks now. I am so looking forward to it. As soon as Laura teaches me how to use it. =)

I don’t know that there’s really a lot to tell - I got to get in some good solid reading time yesterday, so that was nice. I ended with mainly negative feelings about the book (White Oleander - she wielded her language well, but the reason it sold so well is probably because it’s filled with sex. What the author thought was real in the story was not what was real in the story, and so when it came time for her to wrap up at the end, she fell flat. No belief in narrative, as Skillen would say. So yeah, I guess I just feel like the author kind of lost her way along with the character. There was an ending there, waiting to be found, but the author forgot to find it.), but just being able to sit down and devour a book in a day again was great. You know what I got a hankering to read, the other day, though? The Sabriel books again. So genius. Someday I want to be Garth Nix. Except I still want to be me. So basically, I just want to steal his brilliance. Someday when I am a master thief. =D

This weekend is great, because it marks the end of Italian class, and the end of Renaissance history class. I’ll be a little bit sorry to see the end of Renaissance History class now (although I freely admit that it drove me completely bonkers at first, and I still bear no great love towards Renaissance art. I’m just more intellectually piqued by it I suppose), but I’m so darn excited to get back into the studio. Sure, it’s a higher pressure environment in terms of comparing myself to other people, but I’m ready to keep learning and keep pushing myself and getting back to making something with my hands that I actually care about. The Italian class I’ll miss just in terms of impetus to continue learning Italian, but I think I’ll be able to manage without that. I’ll certainly be able to manage without those stressful tutoring sessions.

Alright loves, it’s such a beautiful day that I just can’t sit inside typing on my computer anymore. I’m thinking of going to the park near the fort, or heck, just sitting on the terrace and doing some writing.
Kenzie

alora....

This so not a great picture of the bangs. But here it is anyway! I'm sure we will be taking many more pictures, so a good one with teh bangs will go up here eventually. I'm holding a plant because... well, I'm not sure why. Alexis was just like, "you should be holding flowers!" So I was like, "OK, Sure, grab that one by the window!" The end. And as a bonus, you get a few other pictures of random places! Venice mostly, I think. =)

My loves,

So Mom, you remember when you said once upon a time that you thought I would look cute in bangs? And you remember when I was talking about cutting my hair really short? Well, I compromised a little. I didn’t cut my hair really short, but I cut my bangs pretty dramatically. It’s kind of a funny story, actually (cue kitschy 80s cartoon theme music):

I went for a run with Elena yesterday evening after tutoring, and I was in a super good mood. Like, ridiculously, ridiculously good mood. Like, Elena and I took the first quarter of our run a little too fast and talked the whole time in a good mood. After the run I was in a good mood too - I stopped only once, at the top of the hill, where we always stop to stretch and take a look at the valley spread out in front of us (I figure, that’s not laziness, that’s just ensuring that there’s something on the run to look forward to in terms of beauty). And I ran up all of the stairs this time. And I wasn’t even dying! I was pretty ridiculously proud. And excited that this week I might actually enjoy going for our brief run every day (it really is brief - maybe half an hour or something, and we probably go only a mile, or maybe even less).

And of course, I always look forward to the shower afterwards. Frankly, the shower is the best part! It’s a challenge to be disciplined and keep the showers to the brief 5-minute limit that is recommended at the convent (to ensure equitable distribution of our limited hot-water supply).

So, I dunno, it was all really good, and when I got out of the shower, I was looking at myself in the mirror, and I just kind of thought, “What the hell? Why not?” And I got my scissors and chopped my bangs off.

Only I only had my big desk scissors, which aren’t very sharp. And as everyone who knows me well will know, I suck at anything involving straight lines.

Next thing I know my roommate is back, and there are suddenly five girls in my room going, “Wow, your bangs! When did you cut them?” So I started laughing, a lot, and trying to explain the whole run-shower-what-the-hell-cut-my-bangs sequence in between breaths and bouts of laughing hysterically. And then when they all told me they liked it, I thought I should get an honest opinion, so I started running down the hallway yelling for Katie and Elena, because I wanted to catch them before they left for their tutoring session at the champagneria.

So there’s me, running down the stairs to catch Katie and Elena, and there’s a group of about seven girls gathered down on the landing (including Laura, the actual 22-year-old Italian who sort of adopted us this semester and who already thinks I’m a nutcase) and they just stare at me, and Elena starts cracking up and Katie says, “How did you do that to yourself?”

I just busted out laughing again. “Honest opinion,” I said, “Should I ever do this to my head again?” Oh man, it was hysterical. Especially when Katie actually noticed the bangs. She thought my hair was really crazy looking, which it was at that particular moment in time, since it had partially dried and was frizzing and flying out behind me as I ran down the stairs.

Then, later that night when they got back from tutoring, they busted into my room and we had a hair-cutting party. They straightened out my bangs for me and adjusted them a little bit and showed me how to use a hair dryer and a round hair brush to make them stop parting in the middle as they used to do (thank goodness for Katie and Elena! And you know the best part? They don’t make me feel stupid for not knowing things like that). And they decided that Jeff’s hair needed trimming again, too, so we had Alexis’ and my desk chairs set up and we had a hair-cutting party involving six people in my room (which is so teeny! When you see the pictures, you’ll understand how funny this whole proceeding was) until 1:30 in the morning. Then Marlene came in and all seven of us piled onto our beds and had a great conversation about the political system, group dynamics this semester, and what really constitutes spiritual maturity. We kept talking until I literally started falling asleep where I was leaning against the corner of the bed and the wall.

Professor Skillen was really funny when he came in this morning to breakfast to check on Marlene (she’s been having the worst tooth troubles ever, and now it turns out that her root canal has to be delayed again until Friday, because the dentist was on vacation for Easter at the beach and on the way back his car broke down and he’s stranded). He noticed right away, and said, “You cut your bangs?” And I said yes, and then in classic Skillen style he said, “Well, I think that - well, I always come across wrong when I’m saying things - but I think there’s something nicely old fashioned about bangs, but I don’t mean to say that you look old-fashioned; I think it’s avant-garde in an old-fashioned way... It looks good.” Considering that I apparently already look like a librarian and have a librarian glare (totally unintentional, but something I mean to take advantage of know that I know about it), I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not - but he meant it as a nice thing, and I appreciate that. Professor Skillen really is like a fun, hilarious, slightly awkward father figure this semester, and I love him to pieces. He’s so great. He even lets us call him “Skills” (or “Skill-set” as Alexis affectionately calls him) and “Skillano” (if he really was Italian, we decided, his name would be translated into Skillano, and Mrs. Skillen could be Mrs. Skillana). And he gives us extensions, and loves it when we have charades games based on the fresco cycles we’ve been studying (“That’s a professor’s dream,” he said, and I so loved that we make him laugh). And when I was trying to get my phone interview and it wasn’t working out and I was really about to cry he pulled up a bunch of pictures from past semesters (“Look at that Greg Snader,” he said, “doesn’t he look like he’s having a great time? Look at that smile.”) and I think he was trying to cheer me up a little. He’s just so cute, and genuine, and pretty amazing.

So that was a little bit of a tangent. I’m posting a picture of the new bangs (at some point, when the stars align and I can upload it from a faster computer - I was going to today, but there were issues), and you can honestly tell me if I should ever do this to my head again. I’m not insulted if you think the haircut sucks - you don’t have to see me all semester, and I can totally have them grown out again by the time I go home. But you know how it is with new haircuts, and everyone says they look great even when they don’t? Yeah, I’m paranoid about that. So I depend on you guys to tell me the straight truth about how it looks.

I so love this semester. I don’t know what I’m going to do when it comes to be summer and I have to leave everyone here. I love them! I have the best roommate in the world, and I get to talk to amazing women like Marlene and Juanita every day, and have crazy conversations with Jeff on the terrace, and sunbathe, and run along the most beautiful cliff, and talk to Italian high schoolers, and learn from Professor Skillen every day, and wash dishes with the nuns, and have Suar Therese laugh that my name doesn’t really mean anything because it’s a last name.... I just can’t even tell you how much I heart the nuns, and Professor Skillen, and ‘my’ group of students here.

At least Katie and Elena and I are going to be living together. I was realizing that we really only have nine more weeks in this semester, and I just had a little flip-out moment. I really honestly can’t believe we’re almost halfway through. I’m just starting to really love it here and fit in. Of course, I couldn’t imagine leaving my housemates last semester either, and look how wonderful Italy has been... but you know? It’s so beautiful here, and these girls (and Jeff) are so amazing, and I feel like I’m learning so much (not really academically, but you know. On a personal and community growth kind of level). I so love it and I so want to be intensely in every moment from now until the end of the semester. I don’t want to miss out on a thing. And I want to do every crazy thing I can think of, like cutting my bangs off, just because I can and I’ll never have another chance to try these news things here, at this time, in Italy.

All that goes to say, I’m doing fabulously, even if I decide these bangs don’t suit me at all and I can’t wait for them to grow out. This semester really has been “redemptive” (to use Marlene’s new favorite word) in a lot of ways. I don’t know how much of this I’m going to be able to keep and use and continue to grow with back in the states, but I’m treasuring up every bit I can in hopes that I won’t forget.

The wysteria here is blooming madly, and the smell is drifting into our little convent room, Alexis is finally typing up her Mary paper (it was originally due last Friday), I’m about to go down to the coop for groceries with some of my favorite people ever, and if this semester gets any better, my heart is going to rupture from happiness.

Love,
Kenzie

back in action

Hey loves!

Just another weekly update from the land of Italia. My Italian is growing by leaps and bounds, although my grammar frankly sucks. But I am learning! I know more this week than I did last week, and I know a thousand times more today than I did the first day. I can definitely tell a difference in its improvement since we went to the high school to hang out with the kids and talk about Dante in Italian, both in my ability to form sentences and in my motivation to learn. I hope that I continue to get better and better over the next four times we get together with them. I’m still anxious, and I know that I probably sound like a complete idiot, but I’m also thinking that it will be good for me.

I’ve been pretty disciplined, lately, about doing things that will be good for me. For instance, I started running. All the health-nuts out there would be so proud of me, except that mainly I’m just running as a form of self-defense against the ever-present nutella, chocolate, Laura’s mom’s cake, and all those delicious varieties of pastries and gelato that are everywhere (If I could pack up one thing that you all need to try from Italy, it would be yogurt&nutella gelato with caffe gelato - and also coconut gelato). Elena, Juanita, Maria Louisa and I have been running every day this week (except I missed one day). Just short runs, maybe a mile, but it’s good. Or it will be good, as soon as my body stops hating me.

This semester is striking me as an example of the perfect artist’s colony. There are people here that I love, a beautiful setting, and everyone is so very creative. We’re all feeding off of each other and growing in tremendous ways, on personal levels at least, and I think also on artistic levels. I know that I’ve been challenged to keep a better visual record of this semester by Katie and Elena, and I really appreciate that. Also, the workload is not absurd. I have time to hang out, time to write, time to read a little, time to run, time to have long lingering meals, go for hikes, and still make things. It’s good. I can only imagine that it will get better when this Renaissance history class is over, and we’re back in the studio.

I am all registered for classes! I may have to rearrange my schedule a little, depending on if my application for honors in English gets approved or not (last I heard, my application was the only one the department had received, so my odds of getting someone to advise the project are good, even with the deadline being extended). If it is approved, I’ll be taking eighteen credits and working at least ten hours a week. It’s going to be crazy, though. I have senior seminar for the art major, advanced two dimensional studies for the art major, and then hopefully my honors project class, as well as linguistics, post-1900 lit, and newswriting. Then next spring I’ll have my senior exhibit, my capstone writing course for the English major, and hopefully the last half of this honors project. I’ll admit, I’m flipping out at having to deal with so many senior projects all at once. But somehow it will all work out... right? I’ll just keep telling myself that I wouldn’t trade either of my majors for the world. I would, however, trade some of the coursework away. It’s ludicrous.

It’s Easter, and the liturgical calendar is quite full. Last night there were Maundy Thursday footwashing services, and we had a sort of Italian sedar (how do you spell that? Cedar? Say-darr?). Today is a fast day, so we had simple food, and we’re doing the stations of the cross later today with both the Anglican English-speaking congregation and the town as a whole is doing a via croce procession at nine. I hope to go to both, although I will miss Vespers at 6 tonight which is kind of sad (I go at least once a week, and I wish that I could go more). I am really excited to be able to catch, a little bit, the rhythm of the liturgical calendar on such a town-wide scale. We’re also having the traditional Italian picnic-feast on Monday, and I’m going to the midnight Easter vigil on Saturday night/Sunday morning.

Somewhere in there I also have to fit in working on my paper. And to think that my first weekend here was boring! There’s always something to do, but I don’t feel overwhelmed. I love it. It’s good. Va bene. And hopefully even the paper itself will be good. I just need to cloister myself and work on it, and not let anything interrupt me other than meals, church services, and possibly occasional bathroom and sleep breaks.

Lots of love,
Kenzie

and the convent is...

Hello loves,

This week you are just going to get a short update from me, rather than a tome as usual. I am somewhat overwhelmed recently with this Mary research paper, Italian vocab lists, and the desire to socialize at any and every opportunity. There are such fabulous people here, and I don’t want to miss a second of them. Nor do I want to get terrible grades. Nor do I want to come back from Italy without being able to speak some Italian!

Last night I got out of the shower at about 10, and was settling down to read “Mary, Grace and Hope in Christ” for our Mary research paper, when Katie knocks on my door. “Mackenzie!” she mock whispers at me with the excited smile which is the epitome of Katie Ness, “Come with us! We’re going to sneak up to the terrace and look at the stars!”

I didn’t understand why we had to sneak out to the terrace, seeing as it’s common property for all the students, nor did I understand how we were going to be able to see the stars when the kitchen lights were shining out there. But sure, why not? I’m in for anything involving excited smiles this semester. It’s been my resolution. “Openness is the operative word,” I tell myself, and my inner English-major chuckles at the alliteration.

To my surprise, we don’t go right down the hallway to the sala and the kitchen and the students’ terrace. Instead, we turn left and sneak down the portrait hallway where the piano is. Katie even took off her shoes and went barefoot on the cold floors so that she would make less noise. At the end of the portrait hallway there are a few doors, which I just always assumed led to closets or something. But the leftmost door, at least, leads into another hallway, and from there you can see a small chapel and stairs on the outside of the building. These stairs lead up on the outside of the building to a small roofed-in terrace overlooking the cliff. It was a beautiful view, and the moon was full. Apparently Alexis goes there in the early mornings for devotions. (Alexis is full of surprises - she’s super spiritual, and motherly, but also gets locked out because she forgets curfew, dances hip-hop excellently, and sneaks around the convent exploring before anyone else is up. I so love rooming with her.)

So maybe that made a lousy story. But it was a great experience: five of us sneaking through the hallways of the convent at night, stretching out into forbidden territory for a glimpse of something shining. And at the far end of the terrace, there’s a small niche with the Madonna and child in it, and it lights up with a small spotlight if you can find the switch. It’s totally kitschy, but it also somehow fits, at least with the silliness of us sneaking around to find it.

I feel like I am growing a lot this semester, I guess especially in coming to terms with the amount of my own courage. I’ve been afraid, as far back as I can remember, of the most ridiculous things. I lived in fear of our bathroom mirror for years, all because one of my little friends told me some ridiculous bloody mary story back in the fourth grade. I mean, seriously, there was never much courage there. So to be here, in a situation where once again everything is scary and new, but to be having fun in spite of that, and sometimes because of it? To be discovering that I like breaking the rules and venturing into scary territory sometimes? And to discover that placing myself in new and scary-as-hell situations can be a generative thing, that out of that comes a lot of creativity and new thinking is... well, freeing. Not that things are becoming necessarily less scary for me (although some things are, through simple repetition), but I feel lighter, and maybe a little bit fuller. And to be frank, this semester has involved stretching out into some new relational territory too. I find myself having to re-order a few threads of my twenty years’ worth of thinking, and I am finding some of it to be very good and some of it to be a little freaky. If it’s only April, and the semester has already been so full of growing things, will you recognize me by the summer?

It seems fitting that in a semester where I am coming to terms with so much of myself and my fears, Juanita calls me “the little black spider.” Because spiders, after all, were my worst childhood fear. And if I can conquer that this semester, well, I could pretty much take over the world.

i am developing an obsession with climbing to the tops of buildings

Ciao i miei amici!

So the internet access thing hated me last week, but here is an extra-long post to make up for it. Lots of love from Orvieto,
Mackenzie

Monday, 3/19/07

Ciao tutti,

Maria Louisa and Juanita have started giving salsa dancing lessons - whee! I missed the first one, unfortunately, but they assured me that I can get in on the next one and learn to salsa like a maniac. Actually, I’m not sure they know the word “maniac” in English, but that was the sense of what they said.

Schoolwork is, unfortunately, beginning to pile up on me as well. The big research paper is due in two weeks exactly, and I have a lot of Italian vocab and writing exercises to do this week, not to mention a translation due next week. I’m trying to sit down and be diligent, but it is hard when there are so many fun things to do and so many fun people to talk to. And now that we’ve started doing weekend trips, the work time I’ve got is pretty drastically reduced. But who wants to do homework over a weekend trip to Padua and Venice? Seriously.

I’m also sick now, which makes me sleep a lot and not get much done. I guess I could, actually, get more done. Theoretically. If I could keep from falling asleep all the time.

Orvieto has changed my senior honors project thesis. I hope, I desperately hope, that it is good enough to get someone to advise it... and I’m even crazy enough to hope that it’s Professor Perrin who advises it. That would be pretty much the most rocking thing ever.

We arrived in Padua on Friday afternoon, after an early start and a 4 hour train ride. Intense! I think that’s the farthest away we have to travel, though, so that’s good. Any longer would get ludicrous for a weekend trip! We stayed at the Casa dell Pellegrino, or Pilgrim’s House, which is huge and echoing and full of people making pilgrimages. It was nice not to have to worry about how much hot water I was using for once.

After we dropped our stuff off at the hotel, we went on a walking tour of Padua (walking tours are one of Skillen’s favorite activities, if you haven’t gathered that by now). We ended up in this academic square, which was flipping amazing. Not that the square was amazing, so much; it just so happened that we arrived in the middle of a Paduan graduation ceremony, which we’d heard about but never expected to see. Graduates wear a wreath or crown of laurel leaves, and then are made to run through a gauntlet of slapping hands a couple of times (and then they’re fed an olive - who knows why!). Then the friends and family of the graduate make them stand on a podium or high curb, and present them with a profane and absurd poem written in their honor on a huge piece of posterboard, complete with caricatures of the students. The graduate has to read the poem out loud, and then chug a bottle of champagne (Katie and I want to replicate the festivities for Elena’s graduation, all except the chugging a bottle of champagne bit). It was really, really hilarious. Very often the graduates are also made to put on a goofy coat or hat or something, too. Laura tells us that the posterboard with the poems on it and the laurel wreaths are kept as prized possessions for the graduate’s whole life.

Friday night Marlene initiated my first-ever bar experience. This semester, obviously, is going to be full of firsts. We spent forever trying to find a place for dinner. I mean, we must have walked at least an hour and a half. And then we had to settle for pizza again. Everything else is just really flipping expensive, and we’re most definitely on student budgets. Then we walked around for like an hour because Marlene wanted to find the best place to have a drink, and finally we all just got tired and went into this place not far from the hotel. It actually ended up being a really nice place, despite the obligatory group of sketchy Italian men standing around outside (I swear, we can’t go past a guy without him checking out someone’s bum, usually Elena’s). Our barista was totally cool, and told us all about the kind of drinks favored by the Paduan college students, and we tried some, and they were good. Not as good as this coconut-tasting thing Marlene got, but good.

I have a little rule for myself regarding drinking. It’s called a one-drink rule. It’s working pretty well for me so far. I get to go out and have fun at bars with my friends and try different drinks, but I’m still at the maximum alertness level to deal with a foreign country (and a language, which, admittedly, I butcher). I’ve also, in recognition of my status as an alcoholic light-weight, developed some personal codes about always having a full stomach, and avoiding things like vodka and whiskey.

I’m letting you all know this because I have a feeling there are going to be some funny stories this semester regarding tipsy students, and I want to be able to tell them without anyone worrying (I know I’m breaking pretty much every Protestant church code of behavior, and that someone is bound to get worried I’m turning into an alcoholic). For instance, if I had to censor myself about going into bars, I would be unable to tell you all that Jeff, apparently, gets giggly once he’s had a few drinks. Elena develops an asian glow, but she’s so ridiculous all the time, I have a feeling it would be hard to tell if she ever got tipsy. I felt like it was funny that I was the roommate who was out at a bar until one in the morning. Not the role that I ever expected to play. I feel like, though, I would be hard pressed to find a better group of people to have my first bar experience with. And there are definitely sketchier places to have it in.

The weirdest thing about the bar was the ages of the people there. I mean, there was the whole range, from fifteen year-olds to late middle-age. I was so weirded out at first, but then I thought about it a little more. And you know what? If bars in America were places frequented by people like your little siblings and your parents, the whole drinking atmosphere would get a hell of a lot more responsible.

There’s a little bit of interpersonal drama going on here, but I think we’ve been handling it pretty well so far. There’s also a little medical drama going on here, what with literally half the group being sick with something right now, and Maria Louisa having a more serious doctor’s appointment on Friday that caused her and Juanita to join the group later. Maria Louisa is only 17, which I feel might be a little young for a trip like this. Juanita is 19, and very mature, so she ends up taking care of Maria Louisa a lot (and they’re the two really fluent Spanish speakers as well, so I guess it makes sense for them to team up). Alexis thinks she has bronchitis, and her parents think she has walking pneumonia, so she’s going to the doctor tomorrow. As much as Italy is full of crazy fun stuff, it still has viruses and group stress, so keep us in mind!

We also made a day trip to Venice over the weekend, since it’s just half an hour from Padua. It was interesting. I think I like Padua better, honestly, but we had fun. We ended up getting lost about five times. Thank goodness for Marlene, who has both a sense of direction and the ability to read a map! She also understands enough Italian to understand directions, not just ask for them, which is pretty rocking. Towards the end of the trip things got crazy, about when we were finally headed back to the train station to go back to Padua for the night (we left at around 9 p.m.). Somehow we fell in with these four Russians, who had probably had a few drinks. Juanita, Marlene, and Elena were being their usual crazy selves, and they started running and jumping and whooping through the streets. The Russians joined in, and whistled and chanted the directions to the train station, and it was so nuts. The streets were mostly empty at that point (Venice actually only has a stable population of maybe 60,000, when it could hold probably three times that amount. So most of the shop owners go home at night, and the crowds during the day are mostly tourists), so it was just us having a crazy race. Then, at one point, Juanita decides that she should start waving to all the people in the cafes we pass - so they start whistling and shouting “ciao,” and yelling. Oh man, it was nuts. Definitely not the kind of thing I would start, but I figure I might as well enjoy it if I’m caught up in it already. =)

We also got to visit the Guggenheim museum in Venice. I think that was my favorite part. Apparently Peggy Guggenheim (who I learned slept with about every male artist ever) had a house in Venice, and her ashes are there next to her dogs’ ashes (she had like twelve and treated them like her kids). The museum is kind of small, being in her house, but it was stuffed full of amazing stuff. We spent a very happy two hours there. It was great to just see some modern art for once. Renaissance is all very well and good - I’m perfectly aware that it’s sophisticated and symbolic and whatever, but all of the churches we’ve seen so far combined couldn’t equal the emotion in one of the Pollock pieces we saw. I guess, if nothing else, this semester is teaching me that (as much as I feel claustrophobic in modern art museums sometimes) my feet land squarely in a place of loving modern art. I’m going to have to treasure that little bit of modernity, I have a feeling, because I don’t think we’ll have the chance to see much more of it this semester. Just more tombs and frescos. = /

Sunday morning we went to mass at the church near the Casa Dell Pellegrino. It was nice. This Sunday I understood twice as much as last Sunday, even if it still only amounted to like 10 words. Then we found our way to a park market, and everyone else shopped while I sat in the park and wrote for a while. I really needed that! It was great to just sit in the sun and process things. I was approached by two Italian Jehovah’s witnesses, though, and one creepy guy. I’m not talking the typical Italian stare-at-Elena’s-bum creepy, I’m talking creepy. Good thing I have that death-stare down pat (as Mom is forever reminding me), and am great at pretending to be deaf (I do it in lectures all the time). The Jehovah’s witnesses were actually nice people, but they spoke no English whatsoever, and I only caught a few sentences of Italian. So they went away and sat down a couple yards to my right and started praying (probably for my soul. And they didn’t even know I’d been to a bar the night before). Who knew that the language barrier could work in my favor? I don’t have the heart to be rude to people who are actually sincere, so I felt relieved to escape an awkward conversation.

Also, Juanita and I discovered that we have the same birthday! Isn’t that crazy? I’m exactly, to the day, two years older than she is. That is pretty much cool.

Today, Monday, is the feste di San Giuseppe. That is, the feast of Saint Joseph (Mary’s husband, who, according to Catholic dogma, never ever had sex with her ever in the whole course of their lives, because she gave birth to God. I am learning all kinds of weird things for this Mary research paper.), who is the patron saint of Orvieto. So the schools got a holiday, and the stores all closed, and they had some kind of procession tonight of his statue from one church to another. I sort of slept through the festival mass, though, and then decided that since I’m sick and it was pouring rain I was not going to go to the party afterwards. We’ll see whether I end up regretting missing that cultural event or not, but I have a feeling I just really needed that three-hour nap to get over this cold crap.

I’m thinking of cutting my hair really short. Really really short. But I kind of feel like I would regret it later. Maybe I’ll dye part of it blue? I feel like I’ve been talking about doing that since I was graduating high school, and never got around to it. Maybe Italy is making me crazy, and that’s why I have the urge to make some drastic change to my appearance. = ) I definitely feel like I need to disassociate myself from being quite so much myself right now. How fast does one get over culture shock? (It’s interesting, the crazy stuff they get away with here in terms of style. In the bigger cities, they have half their hair chopped off, and some of it braided, and bits here and there dyed crazy colors. I love their shorts, though. Much more modest than ours.)

So this has been freaking long, but a lot of stuff is going on. Next weekend is the Florence trip, so probably there will be a lot more forthcoming. I don’t seem to be able to help it, once I get started. It must be the English major in me. Hopefully reading all that wasn’t too arduous. You can take it in stages, or something. = )

Ciao loves,
Kenzie

P.S. It is now Tuesday, and I am so wildly, shiningly happy to be me that I am forgetting all thoughts of cutting my hair short. I may still dye it at some point in time, but maybe not for a while yet. I think sleeping twelve hours yesterday has put me well on the way toward recovery from this cold. And I’ve got to keep this brief, because I’ve got a resounding load of homework to deal with. But you know what? It’s gonna be OK, and I’m gonna get it done and make it good and make it work. So there. = D

Monday 3/25/07

So, I didn’t get internet access last week to send you my e-mails and updates! Sorry! Suddenly everything exploded, and I couldn’t make it work. Hopefully this week will be better, although we have a huge image identification test on Thursday, and our big paper is due next week, so we’ll see how much free time I end up having to go in search of internet. Alexis is on a promising lead, though - there might be a coffee shop where you can get coffee and free internet for as long as you need, which would be by far the best deal in town if it’s true. If that works out, I may find it easier to keep in touch in the next couple of weeks, despite yet another time change, this time in Italy. The time difference between here and Alabama is now 7 hours again, and the time difference between here and Messiah is 6. Ah, well. The 5 hour difference was nice while it lasted.

We went to Florence (and briefly stopped in Arezzo) this past weekend. It was a good trip, although by far the most trying one as far as I’m concerned. I had to room with two people who really get on my nerves, so that was trying. And I think my personality is just not one which travels well. I find it stressful, and I really need time to sit and just be quiet for a little every day; not something that’s available on these weekend trips. But! I have cool friends, and we had picnic dinners every night on the floor of our hostel rooms, and we went to markets and walked through the rain and saw churches (Lord, the amount of churches we’ve seen!), and we climbed to the top of Brunelleschi’s dome at the Florence duomo, which was amazing. I think I’m going to develop an obsession with climbing to the tops of things after this semester! Every time there has been something to climb it has been so worth it, so beautiful... so breathtaking. Even if I don’t like to stand too close to the edge. = )

I am not sure what else to tell you - life here continues to be good, despite those minor irritations and stresses. A lot of people are undergoing relationship drama and trauma while they’re here, so I’m glad to be standing in an unworried place. I can’t believe that we have been here a month already! In one way it’s been long, and I can remember packing a lot in, but at the same time... I mean, where the heck did it go? We will be in Orvieto for only two more months and about two weeks. And then two weeks of traveling and back in the U.S. It sounds like a long time, but I have a feeling that it won’t be. There’s plenty to fill up all that space - so many possibilities! I’m trying work out if I can do weekend travel during the semester, or whether I will need to just save my money for the two weeks at the end of the semester. It sounds like we’ll be going to Bosnia, Croatia, and Greece. How fabulous does that sound? I’m so ridiculously excited that I can’t even say. I don’t even know where to start with figuring out specific things to do, but at least we have country goals! = )

This Thursday at 2 is my phone interview for the summer/school year job at Messiah, so be praying for me... I really, ridiculously, want to get that job. It’s time I got some actual writing experience. And it would solve the problem of hunting for a summer job when I get back, which is just really stressful. If I have something assured for when I get back, I just feel like the transition into the summer will be so much better overall, even though I won’t be at home, which will be bizarre, and I will have to do some serious quick packing and moving up to PA when I get back. I don’t know. Either way will probably be stressful. I just think that in the long term it would pay off to have that experience with the publications office. Particularly if I’m thinking of supporting myself with an English/editing job while pursuing a grad school degree (whether that ends up being art or english I still haven’t the faintest clue).

Whew! Life is complicated! And busy! So I’m going to go and work on my Mary paper for a while before I get brief internet access to send this collected chronicle to you. I’m feeling much better, although I still have a cough and some congestion, but I’m encouraged by the fact that after a week I’m improving. My roommate Alexis has been sick for three weeks now, and even the antibiotics the doctor gave her last week didn’t make any improvement, so she’s getting worried now, and is going back again this week. It’s just a little complicated because the doctor speaks no English, and Laura doesn’t always translate into Italian accurately from English, etc. There are literally only 5 out of 20 people who aren’t sick with something right now, so keep us in mind! It’s pretty nutty.

Love,
Kenzie