Posi!

Just wantyedf to let everyone know that i survived the move out of Venice (just barely!) and I am now enjoying some time in Positano!

Back in Italia

It has been a long time, again. I am now back in Italy, currently in Venice closing up my apartment. I have made the decsion to move back to Washington DC, at least for the meantime. After everything that happened this Spring, I know it is not only the right choice, but the only choice. It has been difficult and sad, but I am also looking forward to a new adventure.

I was just in Puglia for several days, and before that Giuseppe and I were job hunting for him in Washington. It was very successful and he is now going to the Visa process to come to the States! We will starting working there in September.

In the meantime we are taking some time in Puglia, Venice, and the Amalfi coast to tie up some loose ends and relax after what has been a ridiculous 4 months.

I am feeling better and am looking forward to the Prossimo Passo!

Stroke Part 1

I thought I might start talking about my whole stroke experience, so that at least I have it "documented" on my blog.

During Carnevale, at the end of February, I got the flu. I ached all over, was very tired, and had a fever for two days. I pretty much stayed in bed and by the fourth day I was felling better, and had that typical lingering cough one gets after having a cold.

One day I coughed, and I got an immediate pain on the back of my neck, on the left side. I thought that I had whiplash or had perhaps pulled a muscle in my neck with the movement of the cough. It was not a particularly strong cough, nor was the pain that bad. I figured that I would wait and see if it went away on its own.

It didn't. It did not get better or worse, although certain times and positions were worse than others. After two weeks I bought myself a neck brace--one of those big soft white ones, thinking that I was putting stress on my neck and this way I could let it rest. I wore it around the house, but it did not help. Again the pain was really not that bad, it just wasn't going away.

After a month I went to see a physician-- a general practice guy-- and told him about my neck pain. He examined me, poking me and asking if certain areas hurt. I was lying on the table, and while examining my neck he told me to relax. I did. Then he cracked my neck.

I had an immediate stroke. I felt panicky (probably also because I was not expecting the neck cracking, and would have absolutely refused it had I known). The room started spinning, I got "pins and needles" in my left hand, I had trouble keeping my left eye open, trouble walking, and I became very very tired. The doctor thought I was just scared after hearing the neck crack, but I insisted he call an ambulance. I knew something was wrong.

Table Manners?

Today in the Style section of The Washington Post, a reader wrote in to "Ask Amy", an advice columnist. This reader complained that he was so disgusted with American table manners because after cutting their food, Americans switch their forks from the left hand to the right in order to then lift the fork to their mouth and insert the bite. He mentioned having to turn his chair in a restaurant to avoid seeing this. Is it really that disgusting?

I'm glad Amy shot him down.

Are European table manners better? I've never really thought about it.

I'll try and post the link when the article comes online.

Crime?

Recently I have been reading some Italian expat blogs that have complained of theft and crime in their respectives cities and towns. Getting my car stolen in America would be hard enough, but having to go through it in Italy would be ten times the nightmare-- the bureaucracy and foreignness of the whole ordeal--dealing with Italian police would be a pain in the arse.

Anyways, back to the point: One of the many reasons I love Venice is that one can galavant around at 4 in the morning without any fear of getting kidnapped or mugged (and of course, no car theft!) Actually it is the absence of cars that makes the city so safe. Kids walk to school on their own and come home from their friends house by themselves after dinner. Women aren't worried about walking home alone. I cannot say enough about how important this is.

Okay, I just had the feeling that I have already blogged about this.....

Missing Italy

We all know that there are positives and negatives to every country, but after 6 years in Italy, this is my first summer in the States, and summer is definitely one of the positives of living in Italy. Italians just change in the summer time, and that feeling washes over the country. A beach is never too far away, and the days seem to last forever. Nights become... special.

Luckily I will be going back for about 5 weeks, a bit in Puglia, a bit in Venice, and a bit in Positano, so I will not miss out completely on l'estate, but one of the major drawbacks to moving back to the USA would be knowing that I would have such limited time in Italy. How could I do it? 2 weeks a year would not suffice. I was so lucky with my job in Venice--I was able to take so much vacation time to come back to the states, but working here would not give me that opportunity. I'm considering teaching so that I know I could have summers off, but that doesn't seem like a good enough reason to make such a career change!

You won't believe me....

...but I had a stroke. On March 28. In Venice. It's true! I had no previous health conditions, but I had something called a Vertebral Artery Dissection, which is the leading cause of strokes in young people. Basically, it is a tear in the lining of a vertebral artery (you have two of them running up the back of your neck). It causes a clot to form, and that clot can go to your brain a cause a stroke. I spent a month in the hospital, and for a good part of that time I could not speak, eat, sit up, walk, or even turn over. It was a traumatic and scary experience. My mother came over and spent a month in Venice, and with the help of physical and speech therapy I started to get better. On May 4 I came back to America, both because I wanted to go home and also because I had a lot of pressure from my family. I have since been continuing with rehab, and would say that I am at 95%.

This is the very short version, to update my blog. I thought many times of how I had unwillingly abandoned my blog a second time, and imagined all of the entires that I wanted to write and how I could possibly explain everything that has happened. I hope to be able to cover everything, and I am excited to get back to my blog.

I have had many life changes in the last three months, including having to face the decision of which continent I will be living on in the near future. I am in Washington DC right now, but still have my apartment in Venice. I'm a little freaked out by everything that has been going on, but I'm going to try and hash our some of my impending decisions on the blog!

I missed you, blog!