Moving, Settling, Moving On

Tonight I was waken up by one of the kids wanting something, I think it was Matteo asking what happened to his car with a propeller, and even if I certainly couldn't think of any car with propeller that he ever might have had, I said convincingly that it is in Bari, waiting for him. So Matteo went back to sleep calmed, and up to the moment no further references to the mysterious flying car were made. But I couldn't go back to sleep, I felt fresh and turned many times in the bed before the sleep could come back to me.

My mother claims that such hours in the night are given to us as a gift, as a quiet slice of time, unperturbed and full of silence, so that we can think. In the haste of the daylight thinking, recapitulating or just staying silent within yourself is not easily achievable. And so I was turning in my bed and the thoughts and the feelings were trying to find some order within me, to stop buzzing around and to come to a rest.

Of course, since life is a process and not a state, there is always something ready to happen and to throw you into new worries and new recapitulations. Mornings come busy, messy, and often rainy.

Since I was married, and that was some four years and a half ago, we have lived in 3 countries, and have changed 6 homes. I realized this yesterday night and I didn't know what to do with the stats so I kept turning from the left to the right and from back to tummy. I am sure that if we succeed to arrive at our destination, wherever it is, after our long nomadic march, it will all look like a funny and rich experience. And, nomads as we are, now we are trying to colonize a German town which was once called Colonia, because it was colonized by the Romans. The Roman empire crashed and then, again, nomads came and colonized it on their turn. Centuries passed and it is now our turn to try our colonizing skills. Or, putting it in modern terms, we are trying to buy a Einbauküche, built-in kitchen, which is rather a hard nut for nomads like us. We are used to just setting a fireplace, or using one already existing, just maybe buying some kitchen utensils from IKEA. I believe we have developed nomadic reflexes, so we keep staying always ready to burn the kitchens behind us and leave again. Settling is not as easy as it may seem to the settled. A nomad needs not only a spot where to set his tent, but also a considerable amount of luck, so that no flood comes and sweeps away the little settlement. Being unsettled prevents us from settling.

So we need to move on and become civilized, to build walls against the winds, to buy umbrellas and good shoes against the floods which are literally coming onto us these days, to find a wardrobe where to keep the umbrellas and the boots. We need to move on and stop believing that we are nomads. And then maybe just a little bit of luck, and please keep your fingers crossed that our little tent will survive the autumn rains.

Cologne, ca. 1411

Rhine