34: Hung Out to Dry

Saint Mark’s Square being decorated for Christmas, Venice, IT.

An early December morning, wind whips at the laundry on the line, soaked from a night’s rain. I’ll have to wash it again, rehang it inside. The bathroom will grow humid, an out-of-place tropic. I wait for guests to wake, contemplating another pot of coffee.

What does it feel like to float out of tradition, out of family into a foreign land? I wonder if I should buy a Christmas wreath, a miniature tree. I ponder how it will fit in one of my three suitcases during the return flight, deciding against the fleeting joy of decoration. I am temporary here. 

Instead, I opt for wandering the Venetian streets and squares and taking in the holiday frills adorning storefronts, the lights hung above the footpaths in measured succession like floating, glowing garlands. They put it all up later here, the local consensus being December sixth, unlike the post-Halloween or post-Thanksgiving traditions of the States. 

I take videos for my mom but secretly also for myself. 

It was hard to wait. I didn’t know how good it would feel to share something more with locals than a love for cappuccinos and red wine. 

Last night, I had my first full conversation in Italian with a waiter at a waterfront restaurant. He asked if Sam and Chris were my friends and if I was alone. I told him “Loro sono insieme. Io ho un ragazzo in America”(They are together. I have a boyfriend in America.) as he tried to woo me into returning to his restaurant, a classic move. 

For my beginner Italian to be entertained, though, I was so grateful. Often, if I pause to gather a sentence in Italian, people will switch to English before I get a chance to try. I deeply appreciate being given a chance to try. 

In a way, that’s what this all is: a chance to try. A load of laundry hung out to dry was still a chore completed, even if the rain came. We just have to keep trying. 

“The credit belongs to those who are actually in the arena, who strive valiantly; who know the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spend themselves in a worthy cause; who at best know the triumph of high achievement; and who, at worst, if they fail, fail while daring greatly, so that their place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.” - Theodore Roosevelt 

Thank you for reading!

-gab