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Monday, May 31, 2010

Connections

Today I'm in get-out-of-my-way mood. No specific reason. It just seems that everything is going wrong: the weather won't be sunny, the Internet connection won't work at the cafe and the coffee I bought there was awful. Everything is out of my control and even if I remind myself that this is the way things are, I'm angry with the world around me. I know there is no point in it and I know at least in part I'm just trying to protect my emotional self, the part of me which I try unsuccessfully to keep under control. And there is no way I can control what affects me, and pretend I don't feel anything about people I meet and things that happen.

These days my unconscious is playing funny games with me, I guess I deserve it. If I'm waiting for a night out, I forget my keys at home and get just what I wanted: an adventure night. I also have funny dreams with people I don't intend to think about.

Some dreams are completely absurd, like the guy I danced with and just kissed because I was quite drunk. In my dream he would become a waiter who didn't want to give me my dessert! That was really mean, even in a dream, and I can still remember the taste of the vanilla ice cream that so desperately needed to be topped with hot chocolate!!!!
Or a dreamt conversation I didn't have with someone who I wanted to be friends with, but I guess was not up to it.
Why some people get through to me? I won't think about them for a long long time, and years after, suddenly, I would remember a night spent together, a kiss, a conversation. Like the moment I had speaking about life with John in a Chinese restaurant in Barcelona. I was looking into my cup of jasmine tea, where two leafs where dancing around like two dragons just before the force that bound them together in a flight disappeared slowly and they fell to the bottom of the cup. I was thinking about my relationship at the time. Now behind me, I dreamt about him having a new girlfriend, a posh one, just what he used to say he didn't like. Just as he used to talk about other things but in the end he actually wanted something else. Conning himself or me? I guess it does matter to me, even now after months.
It made me wonder about the way the connection happens. I meet many people these days and even if I don't know how the things will turn out I can see the instant connection or a lack of it. Sometimes a conversation with a stranger becomes more meaningful than the exchanges I had with people I used to spend time with back in Madrid. That's the difference between connecting and just spending time with someone without affecting each other at all.
During the Camino, a fellow pilgrim asked me what would I change in my life and it could be only one thing. There were many changes I wanted to make but the one I decided then was the people around me, or rather the way I was relating with people, safely unconnected, keeping the important thoughts to myself.
I'm giving a thought to my friendship relationships. Some of them are very loose, because of the distance or just because the way I am, always keeping lots of space for me, or avoiding to get too close. I use to protect myself with layers, that at the end only oppressed me and made me sink.
So now I promised to show who I am and not push away people I appreciate. It's a struggle I believe is worth making the effort.



Yesterday I was showing some pics from the blog I wrote when I was in US. I realised that it was exactly 3 years ago when we said goodbye. It seems an eternity has passed, so many things have changed, other remain the same. Finally I got to the last post with Mika’s song “happy ending” in a way it’s a goodbye song for my friends there. I still feel some of them very close and I wonder how is it possible to feel so close to someone you haven’t seen in a couple of years. Instead just some messages, sometimes online conversation, but you still have so much in common or rather so much to share. Probably what we had in common was the sense of adventure and the willingness to go for it and discover that strange country. We lived together the discovery of the unfamiliar culture with so many extremes and different things mixed up together. Just like us, a mix of nationalities, faces and dreams. When I think about my friends there is no one group, it is this mixcure of origins languages and experiences. No one is like the other, they are unique in one way or another. It's good to be one of them.

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