when i die, let me stay here.

i don't even know what to say. i thought people were inspired to create when faced with difficult times: sadness, loneliness, frustration, betrayal...i believe that most are. i, unfortunately, am not one of those people. when i am feeling any one (and oft times more) of these emotions, i am practically a ghost. i just exist, only mustering enough energy to keep on waking each morning, to keep staring blankly at that stark white wall. maybe inspired to create is not what i mean. it's more so the use of creative outlets as a means of catharsis. i don't know how that works. i wish so much that i could paint my emotions, or sing them away. and no amount of pages written here or anywhere could rid me of the pain. when i am feeling the weight of life, my choice is rather to do absolutely nothing. perhaps it's just the masochist within that sees this as prime opportunity to wallow and make me sick with my own thoughts, as they fester, dull, and resurface yet again.

still _______.

someone please stop me from setting the consulate ablaze.

reverse culture shock is strange and makes me feel queasy. no sir i don't like it. just last week i sat on shimmering cobblestones, sipped espresso, and people watched beside a historic church of hand-painted tiles. now i am in hell. hell, contrary to popular belief, is so very cold. it is also filled with void satiating materialistic crap, not to mention an excess of townies. these where am i? how the hell did i get here? moments reached their pinnacle and hit me like a brick to the head early this morning.

having developed permanent jet-lag, i now groggily rise from slumber at approximately 6am. this not only means i consume about three breakfasts, but also that i view a totally unacceptable amount of morning television (which might i add is god awful and chock full of infomercials). this morning my mother requested that i flip the channel from good morning america over to what she referred to as the religious channel. this is fundamentally wrong on a variety of levels, and i sighed in disappointment that this, of all her four hundred channels to choose from, was the newest addition to the only two networks she actually watches: lifetime & hallmark. both of these, in the opinion of anyone with a smidgen of taste, are gut-wrenchingly nauseating. and i regret to admit that the holidays are the worst time of year for these channels to exist, as on a daily basis they air what my mother refers to as cute christmas stories, her face warming at the mere mention of them. essentially, they serve solely as a home for the multitude of D list celebrities who fell from grace, or those whom have climbed the actoral ladder from soap operas, to produce a wealth of unremarkably painful made-for-tv movies. good for them.

the religious channel consisted of walks through jerusalem and a montage of jesus in various art forms, set to a monotone group chanting of the rosary. hail mary full of grace hail mary full of grace, on and on and on. having contracted the flu (perhaps swine?) i lay there and felt as though i were being exorcised, intermittently heaving and hacking up delivish phlegm, linda blair style. my mother may as well have been hanging over me, splashing holy water upon my overtaken body. and so...i am home, home bitter home.

i am severely behind the times when it comes to traveling. unlike the slew of my relatively wealthy and privileged friends of yore, i myself was unable to travel or even study abroad during college. perhaps it is my own fault for never having a clue as to the direction my life was headed, or for my post-collegiate inability to take time off from the series of heinous businesses that have employed me. or perhaps i'm just a frugal bitch, hoarding my unimpressive amount of hard-earned savings in anticipation for 2012 when we will all turn into dust. nevertheless, i am by no means worldly.

the only notable trip i had ever taken was when i was eleven years old, and my family traveled from southern switzerland down to sicily over the course of a sweltering three week tour-bus haul. the extent of my memories of this experience can be counted on one hand. there was my notable infatuation with a fellow tour adolescent named topher; blonde hair, buck teeth, and a total pre-teen hunk. topher and i were enjoying a magical after-school-special romance until he confessed his love for the snotty girl with the polo shirts and pretty pony hair. and then there was our guide roberto, whose jheri curl mullet was righteous beyond belief. he wore a baby blue banana hammock swimsuit, and i swear the man perspired olive oil. or how about the time my father accidentally filmed his tighty whitey-clad reflection in a mirror while trying to capture the amazingness of our venice bathroom. or another time when my sister marisa, having been gravely disappointed with the no-photographing rule in the vatican, violently ripped a camera out of a chinese tourist's hands, reprimanded her, and spent the following week cussing racial slurs. all the most precious of moments, but ask me what the sisteen chapel smells like and welp i haven't a damn clue. i can sure as hell tell you, however, that on that specific day topher wore a navy t-shirt depicting wolves in front of an undulating american flag, no problem.

perhaps it is my lack of travel, my naivete, or my downright laziness that has resulted in my being entirely unprepared for language immersion. or perhaps it is a combination of all these factors. nevertheless, learning a language in adulthood is much more difficult than i had anticipated. the portuguese language is insanely, mind-bogglingly impossible. while my knowledge of spanish has helped significantly, i still find myself wanting to bang my head against the wall with the multiple word meanings, formalities, and countless rules of grammar. they seem to have no rhyme or reason. i've been practicing, however, by reading children's comic books. at the moment i'm delving into the shenanigans of donald duck and co., and maybe just maybe it's helping um bocadinho.

* * * * * *

i hate the european union's travel regulations for americans. i suppose i should be specifically targeting portugal here. if i were to overstay my 90 day tourist visa before returning to the homeland (which i had completely planned on until hearing some horror stories and researching the consequences further), i would likely be fined a large sum of money and perhaps even prohibited from re-entering the country for a long period of time. complete and utter balarky. since my man, at this point, has become as vital to me as a major organ, this is certainly not an option. and thus, despite the fact that we've just officially settled in lovely porto, in one week i'll be returning to the states to apply for a student visa. what a joy that will be; we've phoned the general consulate of portugal in new york city so frequently that the secretary has identified us and insisted that we stop calling and visit the office in person.

on the up side of things, upon my return to portugal i will begin classes at engenho e arte; school of contemporary jewelry, in their two-year professional program in metals. all of the classes are taught in portuguese; however, the lovely owners (one of whom speaks english) have graciously offered to work with me one to one! i will confess that i'm shaking in my boots just a little bit, but i am flat out jazzed to finally have some creative stimulation in my life. i have a lot of ideas and can't wait to jump on in. blessed be.

and this

i am devastated that i will miss halloween in the states this year. i had grand plans indeed; it was a toss-up up between being tina turner or angus young of AC/DC. either would have been fab. it's so strange/awesome how we use the term, "I´m going to be...", as if we aren't just pretending. last year i was nigel tufnel of spinal tap. oh the righteous mullet, skeleton tee, low IQ, walking around all night saying "but this one goes to eleven"...halloween should really come at the end of every month, for serious.

i'm pretty much destroyed all around for missing fall in new england. summer is swell and all, but the month of october pretty much makes life worth living, especially when followed by seven cruel months of frigid temperatures. granted, i will be enjoying those months in a country that never sees snow, but i'd give my left tit for a steaming pile of pumpkin pancakes, a mug of fresh apple cider, and a glimpse of that beauteous foliage. and ohh shipyard pumpkinhead ale, come to mama. gagaga. for me, no season smells or feels better than autumn. perhaps it's just my fixation on nostalgia, but i can't help that i want to pick apples, roll around in piles of leaves, and stuff my face with candy corn. i love you brach's. i miss you. i need you. let us never be apart again.

it is possible that i may have predicted europe to feel more my speed (whatever the hell that means) because both of my parents were immigrants. i had always felt significantly ostracized from the norm of suburban living, whether it was the other children laughing at my nutella sandwiches or my pre-pubescent italian femme-stache or the fact that my mother forced me to give the bus driver a giant, garishly wrapped panettone every christmas, i was no suzie-high-school. but i had not anticipated for europe to make me feel so god damn american. perhaps i'm just home sick, but whereas in the states i would likely shun everything 'merican, i now find myself glorifying it. our waitress tonight told us of how she was moving to new york in a couple of weeks. ooo how great! was my response, and my face lit up at the thought of the city, the electricity, the filthiness, the crudeness. she snarled and proceeded to explain how unenthused she was to leave europe for the ughUnitedStatesugh, because really there's no comparison, gesticulating with her palms up a scale of incomparability. and then i felt stupid. and then i felt angry. and then i was consumed with the urge to curl up in an american flag snuggie and cheer myself up with disney's hocus pocus. hmph.