Ode to Madrid

Dear Madrid,

I’m leaving you today.

I want you to know it’s nothing personal. Winds have changed, I’m being pushed to a new home. The horizon seems to be on the other side of the world again.

But please know how deeply, deeply grateful I am for all you have given me. Incase you’re not fully aware of everything you have given me, of everything I will miss with all the cells in my body, I write this list: a meaningful and haphazard list of us.

Thank you for your sun. It shines so bright and hot and contrasts your sky’s brilliant blue like a well-instagrammed photo. Thank you for your colorful buildings. I’ve banged into street poles and tripped on many a broken sidewalk admiring those colors. Thank you for your cheap, cheap wine. It justifies getting buzzed at noon. Thank you for Tiger. One-stop shop for all your needs that aren’t necessary. Thank you for the smell of hot piss on the streets. It wouldn’t feel like Lavapiés without it. Thanks for the dog shit. Kept me present. Thank you for providing me with English conversation students… never again will I get paid 25 euros to talk nonsense for an hour. Thank you for the people. I mean it when I say how overwhelmed I feel often at the kindness and brilliance of the people I’ve met here. Thank you for Retiro park. It’s perfect. Thank you for your cobblestones. Thank you for your small apartments. Thank you for your funny washing machines. Thank you for your Indian restaurants. Thank you for your coffee. Thank you for your confidence. Thank you for your plazas. Thank you for your street lamps. Thank you for your bratty children. Thank you for your mountains. Thank you for your metro. Thank you for your museums. And your chinos. And your artists. And your laziness. And your rallies. And your families. And your gypsies. And your tortilla. And your tostas. And your  cañas. And your pharmacies. And your street performers, like Dora the Explorer, who always takes his head off. And your dogs. And your flowers. And your language. And your liveliness. And your parties. And your douchebags. And your creepy neighbors. And your fruterías. And your foreigners. And your villages. And your openness. And your sympathy. And your languor. And your love. And my love. Thank you.

Sorry

I wasn't very good at keeping up this blog this year.

Video compilation from our WWOOFing experience

Music: "The Gardener" by Tallest Man on Earth

Thanks to Lynn and Pepe for the experience, and to Asturias for being so damn breathtaking.

WWOOFing thus far

Hi everybody,

I thought I'd give a more thorough update on my experience in Asturias. I actually have only been here for about a week and a half so far, but it feels extraordinarily longer. Also, Greg and I took a 3 day trip to Galicia to visit a friend so I've only been working for about a week, maybe less. Nevertheless, I'm going to barf out everything I've been feeling, thinking, doing, because maybe when this month is over I'll find it interesting. Or someone else will.

So! We got here 2 Thursdays ago and I was immediately paralyzed by the beauty of this area. Literally numb. The views are unbelievable.. green mountains, blue sea, little white houses dotting the valleys, cows mooing and silence actually silent.. no cars or air conditioning buzzing or crowds of people. It fit the romanticized image of farm life in my head perfectly. We get the eggs from the chickens, the veggies from the garden, the cheese and milk from a neighbor. The couple we live with is so impressive, building their own houses, doing their own compost, growing their own everything. I've forgotton that in life, we don't have to buy everything.. that us humans are capable of making and growing and producing ourselves. Wild! But of course, this beautiful, natural life I wanted to try for a month isn't like those happy cow commercials. Farm life is hard.

I always try to paint the best picture of myself to myself, think of how I want to be and then just imagine I am that way. I like to think of myself as super outdoorsy and down for anything and strong and fearless when I have to be. But I'm not really. 1. I don't know shit about gardening. So many basic questions I had to ask about which plants were weeds and how best to hold the hose and where to throw all the mulch. Maybe I feel weird squishing slugs with my fingers. Maybe I am afraid a spider will hit my face when I'm hacking away at that plant I forgot the name of. I had no idea stinging nettles could be brewed and drinken. I didn't know onion plants had flowers. And man, I was pulling sprouts off of old potatoes for a whole afternoon and thought it meant they were rotten. Nope, they're just reproducing, we can still eat them. Silly Connie. 2. Despite the morning runs around my highschool track while in the US in July, despite the Comcast On-Demand yoga sessions and the tennis games with my parents, despite despite despite, my body was not prepared for this sort of work. I have an entirely new admiration for any and all people working on farms and in fields. I ache! It feels good because I sleep wonderfully at the end of the day, but ooof I need to stretch every few hours or my body hates me later. Am I old? I think I'm just terribly unprepared.

WWOOFing here is definitely putting me further outside my comfort zone than I've been in a very long time. But it's what I wanted, and it's what I still want. I don't want to be afraid of spiders! I don't want to be clueless when it comes to growing vegetables and herbs and taking care of animals and composting and being smart and sustainable. Not even for the environment, for me. To know I can grow my own food and raise chickens and get eggs and not be so dependent on the luxuries surrounding me. The things done on this farm are so basic and natural to us humans, but I am so far removed from anything like it in my everyday life. I planted kale and bok choy and turnips and when I saw them growing, felt like a proud mother. The first time I collected eggs I thought "OMG they just come out like that? And then we just crack 'em and eat 'em?". I've literally had so many thoughts that would classify me as straight idiot, but it's cool. I like being surprised by the obvious.


We've done other things in the late afternoons and on weekends, like taken hikes around the mountains (often accompanied by their dog, Lex) or to the beach, which was about 2 hours away on foot (we got lost/confused a few times).

This is a long entry. Summary: This is beautiful and interesting and tough and I feel really good.

It's been nice to have Greg here too. He makes things lighter.

Here are some PHOTOS! All taken by Greg except for the ones with him in it, and the ones of the kittens (who have also made the work much lighter).

where we sleep

view from the farm of the atlantic

first day's work

a walk with Lex

on top of the hill

hiking to the beach

Playa del Silencio

KITTIES

On a farm in Asturias

THIS PLACE IS BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But all I see when I cloes my eyes are potatoes and spiders, which says something about the past 2 days...

hasta luego

HI EVERYBODY!

Wow, so, I was doing really well for a while about updating this but then fell far, far behind. It's not even like I've been too busy to update. I've spent most of the past month or so painting and reading Harry Potter (not that I'm complaining... I've really learned to enjoy slow days and Harry Potter's been a marvelous adventure). But it's past due time for an update.

Greg and I leave Thursday (yes, in 2 days) for the USA and I cannot contain my excitement. One, to escape this 100+ degree heat, and more importantly, to see my family and hug my mom and dad and see my friends and hug them and hang out and re-learn the English language, of which I have awkwardly lost bits and pieces to the point that I say everything with an air of uncertainty, and end a lot of sentences with "do we say that?" ----(example: the other day, I was telling an American person how I was going to go running if I could animate myself, and then I was like, "animate.. do we say that?" and she said, "no". And I realized I made it up from "animarse" and she was like, "you mean motivate?" and I said, "yeah", and I closed my eyes and shook my head).

Work has ended and I'm not too upset about it. The only thing that stinks is this entire summer, Greg & I will be surviving on savings. I don't get another paycheck until October.. so I've got to be quite smart. Luckily, we'll be spending the entire month of August working on a farm in Asturias, northern Spain, and therefore (hopefully) not spending much. July in the USA, however, is another story... since it's Greg's first time to the land of the free we'll be doing a bit of a tourist route in NYC, DC, Philly.. it's cool though, because I don't remember the last time I went to the Empire State Building or Ellis Island or the White House (maybe a STAND rally?), and I don't know nearly enough about American monuments as I should, so this trip will force me to learn a bit so that I can spit it all out at Greg like a well-rehearsed tour guide.

Madrid lately has been been like a slow, blurry haze, as if the city was stuck inside a microwave oven. Smells of urine and dog poop only multiply under this heat, and though they've started air-conditioning the metro cars, everybody still smells like sweat. We fortunately have AC in the flat, but because we're trying to save for the summer, we only use it limitedly. I used to guilt-trip myself for spending a whole day inside, but in this heat, I can get as far as the fruteria and then I'm like "meh, I'd rather read Harry Potter".

The Eurocup's been going on, and even though I'm not a big soccer fan, it's fun to get into a bit. Also, soccer's really easy to follow (aka I know what's going on most of the time), whereas American football still confounds me. Recently, we went to the Bernabeu stadium to watch the Spain-France match. They put up big screens outside the stadium and tons of fans (9/10 Spanish, 1/10 French) gathered with flags, facepaint, and hot blood to watch the game. Why do I say hot blood? I'll tell you why---people get buckass CRAZY at these games. Maybe because the Spanish were the clear majority and being in a mass does dangerous things to people, but it turned violent and disturbing. Some guy stole Greg's France flag and almost punched him when he grabbed it back. In the metro another guy spit at him and I had to pull him away. It's really quite disgusting. Sports are a great way to bring people together and get people excited, but crazed fans can be straight idiotic. Spain won. I'm glad, because who knows what we would have endured if France did.


Anyway, that's a bit of a negative note to end on, but I can't think of anything else to talk about. This year has been very interesting, and I've learned more about what I like (and what I don't like) than I could have predicted. I'm excited for this summer and I'm excited for next year... to continue exploring and carving out a path that I've just started to break into this year.

I send my love to everybody!!


Connie

Tour of my "new" apt