deep thoughts...

when i left you last, i was typing on a computer (much like this) after climbing the 463 steps to the top of il duomo, looking over the beauty of this town...after that, i went on a hunt for the best gelato i had tasted. i got lost, but that's when i happened upon the internet cafe and let you know what i we had been doing since leaving the states. after i left the internet cafe, i found that gelato place, then i decided to go up on piazzale michelango and catch the sunset.

a few minutes before the bells started ringing in the 9:00 hour, i reach the summit. basically, there's a parking lot that has a copper statue of the david standing in the middle of it. from the edge, you can see the city, ponte vecchio, the beautifully lit bridge over the arno, il duomo, the huge dome i climbed earlier in the day, and all of the same-colored roofs of the homes below.

of course, i take a million big-head shots of me in front of the david (you can't do it in the galleria accademia), and then just sit. the weather is perfect, a slight breeze washing over the small group of people that are there at dusk. my gaze wanders...the david...the city...the river...the people...the david...the people...the city...the river...you get the idea.

as the sun goes down, the lights come on, and the city is transformed before my very eyes. i have pictures in the waning moments of day and in the beginnings of night. then i start to become more attune to my surroundings. a class of students from germany, scoffing at their teacher and the, what i can only surmise as, guest speaker. a cute couple, trying to get the timer to work just right on the camera as someone ignorantly walks past at just that time. two young american girls, teaching the vast wonders of mormonism to a chinese woman who was, initially, practicing her english. a group of italians with a priest who had a beard longer than my goatee and his gray hair pulled back into a pony tail, joking with the tour members and laughing hysterically at his antics.

there were people representing nations of the world, all right there in the square. italians, chinese, japanese, americans, germans, french, english, indian, kenyan...the air was peppered with these songs of communication, laughter, children crying, stories being told, and evangelization. my mind wandered, racing from all of these thoughts, to being still, watching what was happening. all the while, i was comfortable, sitting there, atop this fine city, by far my favorite in the world.

i walked from the center of the piazzale to the corner, nearest to the river arno. the group of german students broke into two, one sitting on the ground, playing a guitar and singing american popular songs, a beatle song, and german drinking songs. the other was on the rail, smoking their cigarettes and drinking their booze.

i have this theory...i'm still buffing it out, but it basically goes like this: if you have a box, on one side you would have good, on the other, bad. right there in the middle, everything turns fuzzy - there's a fine line between good and bad. i choose to view this whole box, instead of judging what's universally good or bad, as simply what is. there are things that are good for me, bad for you, bad for you, good for me, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, that the whole box just exists. it is what it is.

come back with me to the piazzale...i don't want to leave. i really want to stay in that moment forever. it's as perfect as perfect can be. both nostalgic (hell, i was just here two years ago in another phase of my life) and producing fresh memories from this phase in my life. i decide to leave anyway, more because i didn't want to (it means that i'm going to want to come back) than anything else.

the bells start ringing again, bringing 10:00 with it. i walk down the steps heading back to the hostel. that's when i tap into this nirvana-like, zen-ish, kind of revelation...or something. i realize that as everything happens, it happens just right. whatever the joy or the pain, it happens the way it is supposed to. and those two things, joy and pain, seem to be the highs and lows of life.

there's really no secret to life. there's really nothing more than those two states in varying degrees. i firmly believe that if one is to embrace this, that life can be so much easier. break the expectation. go against the grain. do what you want to do. you can shape your life into whatever you want.

some sort of karmic interruption came down upon me like a lightening bolt. as i'm limping along, i step wrong on my bad foot, roll my ankle, and strain my big toe. luckily, i didn't fall! just then, my journey back to the hostel moves from about :40 to an hour and it's almost impossible to walk. shit. practice what you preach, right?

my state instantaneously hops from sheer bliss to utter pain. it hurt so bad to walk. now what am i going to do? why does this always happen?

just kidding...i didn't ask either of those questions. my mind was transferred from the reflection i just described to the pain in my foot (it really hurt...bad), but that revelation stuck with me. everything happened the way it was supposed to.

i think this calls into question the whole, "everything happens for a reason" line of thinking. i absolutely do not believe this. everything happens, sure, but there is not always a rhyme or reason for why it happens. therefore, if something happens, you cannot change it, merely accept it for what it is. it happened the way it was supposed to happen. you can't change the decision that you made. you can't hope and pray for a different outcome. it happened. the sooner you can embrace that it happened, the better off you will be.

this may sound counter-intuitive to my nature, i am an optimist, after all, but i disagree whole-heartedly! i can't change the things of the past, but i sure as hell have a say in what happens in the future! i believe that things like karma play a part in what happens (how this relates to everything happening for a reason is completely different tangent/discussion, and, yes, i can have my pie and eat it too - i have an opinion on that as well).

envisioning what i want to happen to me and my life. guiding the things i do in a particular direction. that's what i can do to change the future. will mishaps occur? certainly. will it go according to plan? absolutely not. but i have to be okay with however which way it goes.

even if it includes bathing in the smallest of showers, goshdarnit...