Holiday week

Sorry I haven't written lately, but there's been so much going on it's hard to squeeze in a moment to think, much less keep up with correspondences.

I've been reading a lot. There's only so much Spanish "I recognize the film or format but don't understand much of anything" TV I can watch before my attention span wanes and it's either time for bed or a new distraction. I could probably watch Netflix in Spanish with English subtitles. Or in English with Spanish subtitles? Which one would help? On the recommendation of a pop culture blog which after these titles I now trust implicitly, I've been reading the Duncan Kincaid series by Deborah Crombie, Min Jin Lee - Pachinko, Sally Rooney - Beautiful World Where Are You, Claire North - Touch. The Libby app is liberating.

A couple hours this morning of the first rain. Along with lots of wind. It blew over the plants on the balcony. They're fake, but full of real soil to be swept up but not of the edge lest the dogs leaving their messes below receive a surprise from above as unpleasant as the ones they deposit.

The long, last, brief, wild dash to the new year has begun with last week's first holiday week. A shortened week of work with wandering focus and then back to regular weeks while still the focus wanders, thoughts scatter until the final couple of empty weeks pregnant with expectation and meaning. I think about what celebrating in my new home will look like. How will I choose to mark the moments? Will I? Stripped bare of the standard, treasured options for gathering with family or friends, does those missing increase the poignancy? If the obligations and traditions are absent, does the meaning shine through?

My HM invited me to join their Thanksgiving to be celebrated on Friday as all the other guests would be working Thursday and Friday. So Thursday we Americans went for drinks and sushi. 

(I forgot how unmoored it can feel here on these American holidays. Everyone going about the typical routine whilst I wander freely, not competing with everyone else over the same groceries or space.) 

They knew where to go for sushi and it turned out I'd seen a place for drinks that they hadn't so street cred tipped in my favor. The drinks place is two full walls of retail wines with a lengthy, broad communal table down the center for drinks and talks. Dark, elegant, comfortable. The sushi was familiar - rolls, edamame - and kept bringing up thoughts of the dinner in "A Christmas Story". All of it walkable. All of it - good food, good friends, overindulgence, thankfulness - Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving Friday, sunny, chilly, quintessentially fall. I started the day with a holiday appetite priming ride past castles, vineyards with rusted gold leaves and ongoing incredulity that I call this my local loop. Oh the places you'll go. Having seen the first turning of leaves in Utah and now hearing stories of snow covered canyons I feel the frequent but never often enough sensation of awe for the roads I am gifted to ride and rue the all to frequent resistant attitude to get out there. 

Showered and fed (volo's coffee, avocado, egg and blistered tomatoes on toast, a slice of carrot cake, holiday-level moderation), I made a visit to my future apartment and its current resident to talk about furnishings. He's South African and semi-retired and moving to Valencia after two years in Sitges. He has a lot of household items he doesn't want to bring and I have no household items to bring. We're a perfect pair. We talked about moving countries, proper care for the plants he's leaving and I'm inevitably going to kill, and settled on a price for a furnished flat. I don't know exactly what will be there when I arrive though. I've started filling an Ikea cart and hopefully will be able to empty most of it.

Visit, social and practical, complete, I walked back home intent on lounging, feeling a bit bereft realizing I hadn't had any chips or football yet. Is this Thanksgiving or heresy? Back at my apartment I realized I was due at my host's house in St Pere de Ribes, too far to walk. So, another adventure - the bus! All the local buses start their runs from in front of the train station. I knew the number, L2, the departure time, 16.10 and I thought I knew where I'd find the bus. Standing in the area, a bus arrives at the right time but it's a 72. A popular 72. I've seen the L2 around town. Like the L1 and L3 it's small and blue. I've seen these as well. It's big and white. I don't know the difference. But this one isn't small and blue. It's big and white. Everyone in the area begins to board. It's a few minutes yet until I expect my blue L2 so I stand back. It's time for my L2 but 72 is in the way. Taking a longer look at the stops flashing by on the front of the bus I see "S P Ribes" spin by. This is my bus! Probably! It's beyond my ability to check. But that's my destination and this is my time. So I board. What could go wrong! I wave my phone across the payment scanner and a big red X flashes. That went wrong. Flustered. The driver says something that I don't understand. I think I see a passenger point at a scanner behind me. Of course, wrong scanner. Duh! I flash my phone across this one and a big red X flashes. That went wrong. Flusterederer. The driver says something more that I don't understand buy I think I hear "efectivo" which I know means "cash". And he's pointing at a tray next to his driving booth. I have to pay with cash! I brought cash just for this purpose! He points at an icon that shows a ticket and 2.40euros. I have that! I put 3.00euros on the tray. He prints the ticket but doesn't hand it to me. He points at the 2.40 and says something. Probably says it very slowly and clearly. I have no idea. Flustererest. Since he's not handing me the ticket or change I assume he's saying exact change only. I don't have exact change. I tell him that, hoping he'll just give me the ticket and keep the difference. By now, the passengers already on the bus are throwing fruit at me and starting to light torches because I'm making them late. (They aren't. This is all in my flustered, anxious, silly mind.) The bus driver points at the total again and then at my coins. My two 1.00euro coins. I'm .40cents short. I add another euro. He hands me my ticket and change and we set off on time.