(June 7 journal entry)
Oh, how long this tour seems! how it flies by me! Only yesterday -- wait, over three weeks ago -- I was in Liverpool! Now, I know better than ever why so many letters were once written. I see separated families, men at war, explorers, all sitting down near flickering candles at gorgeous desks, in tattered tents, writing. My beloved, You are all that I think of. How your voice is missed. I'm grateful, as sporadic my usage, for the telephone! How did a young Mozart, his father & sister survive three years travel around Europe? How did (do) families split by immigration, families of soldiers, survive? A voice is everything. Joyce Carol Oates was on target, recognizing a "mood of loneliness, dislocation, and general melancholy-malaise" while on sabbatical in London. As she describes, these feelings descend upon one's self when abroad, but when they evaporate? Well, scholars & amateurs have Oates journals, her novels & at worst, one has their own unforgettable adventures. It's normal to feel away. I read a battered copy of Steinam's Marilyn: Norma Jeane; I'm easily lost within the pages & feel at home, curled up in bed. I wander the local grocery store, Spar (imagining I'm at Giant Eagle with Mom), selecting needed foods (ten rolls: 1,20) & treats to lift my spirits: biscuits & chocolate (0,89), Fugi apples (1,99/kg) & lemon drops (0,99). "Where troubles melt like lemon drops/away, above the chimney tops/that's where you'll find me."
Don't think I'm not having a wonderful time in Europe, in Austria! Only fantasies of travel fed my imagination, and as strong, as urgent my wishes, Europe didn't seem feasible at this point in my life. I wondered if I'd ever actually make it. Depressing. But here I am on a Saturday night, ignoring a televised football game (sports bore me, no matter the country), aware of the Alps, recording petty thoughts, listening to Judy Garland (whose final apartment I tracked down while in London) in Europe. I wouldn't have guessed. And what an appropriate time, the summer before beginning graduate studies & teaching English Comp at John Carroll. I'm in Austria!
Last night, Allison & I enjoyed delicious dinners (myself, Schweinsbradl mit Krautsalat und Semmelknödel -- figure it out!) at the foot of Hohensalzburg Festung, in a small restaurant hideen from tourists, St. Paul's Stub'n.
(June 8 journal entry)
I've become a journaler who records activities & thoughts in days to follow. Oh, how I hate that, but I'm left unable to deny it any longer. With infinite discoveries to absorb, process & write of, by night-time (which seems to come much later than at home; or is it then lengthening of days?), I'm starving & whooped. And yet I constantly recall Vita Sackville-West's reminder: "It is necessary to write if the days are not to slip emptily by. For how else to capture the butterfly of time?"
I split from Allison yesterday, while she participated in a Sound of Music tour, beginning my morning at the nearby grocer (fresh rolls & yoghurt for breakfast), wandering streets in my cardigan, carrying my messenger bag & canvas grocery bag (everyone carries bags in Europe: logical & best for our environment), feelings as natives might. I heightened my experience & blasted Pink Martini; headphones are more common in London & Paris, but I didn't care. Sky a perfect blue, sun beaming warm rays, I wanted to salsa my way down Franz-Josef Strasse. Already, how much cheerier my spirits. This is living.
Lunch packed (more rolls (which I must stock up on before departing for Vienna), an apple, cookies & sparkling water -- I climbed my way up Monchsberg to Hohensalzburg Festung for views of the Salzach, Altstadt, Neuestadt & mountains that no camera can convey: wondrous depth & distance. A three-hour walk took me around the cliff, along the Medieval fortress walls, to landscapes that must be experienced in person for a proper rushing of one's blood. So grand & endless a view, I wouldn't have been surprised had I seen Neuschwanstein in the distance. I climbed over iron fences, ate my lunch in a deserted corner near the shade of a watchtower & let nature command my thoughts. I walked. And walked. I sweated, in the shade breezes chilled me. I walked, finding a private area left undiscovered by tourists to sit (carefully & precariously) on a section of the wall covered in ivy & protected by old trees. I enjoyed my times alone with sights unlike any others, ate my apples & wrote postcards. How mind-cleansing! I was quite close to forgetting my whereabouts on Monchsberg, only of my existence in Austria's natural magnificence. I walked for hours, and when it was finally time to return to city-life & meet Allison for a self-guided tour of Mozart's residence on Makartplatz 8 (an original piano of his on exhibit), I passed Muller Kirche (on Salzburg's outskirts; a wedding having just occurred) & returned to the city's center along the Salzach.
TODAY, Allison & I started through Mirabelle Gardens, umbrellas out (wrong city, miss Andrews!), sadly, the free Sunday concerts in the garden was cancelled as a result of the rain, but I can't complain: we've had mostly fair weather. Afterwards, the graves of Mozart's wife & father, Constantine & Leopold and a walk down Steingasse, a Medieval road -- only route south of the Alps to Venice -- free of tourists. Great history: Josef Mohr's birthplace at 9 (author of "Silent Night"), carved beggars' graffiti on doors, Altstadt & river views & more fortifications (able to survive for centuries only to be bombed during WWII). But most interestingly, a building whose side was gouged out by and American GI, attempting to squeeze a tank down the narrow street to 24 -- Masion de Plaisir, a centuries-old brothel still open daily: 12-4 -- and left as a reminder. Looking for fun? Hooray for Americans...
As the rain stopped and the sky cleared in the evening, after a catnap & reading Marilyn, I walked again through Mirabelle Gardens (nearby our hostel), my mind free of any worries & Puccini my company.
Oh, how long this tour seems! how it flies by me! Only yesterday -- wait, over three weeks ago -- I was in Liverpool! Now, I know better than ever why so many letters were once written. I see separated families, men at war, explorers, all sitting down near flickering candles at gorgeous desks, in tattered tents, writing. My beloved, You are all that I think of. How your voice is missed. I'm grateful, as sporadic my usage, for the telephone! How did a young Mozart, his father & sister survive three years travel around Europe? How did (do) families split by immigration, families of soldiers, survive? A voice is everything. Joyce Carol Oates was on target, recognizing a "mood of loneliness, dislocation, and general melancholy-malaise" while on sabbatical in London. As she describes, these feelings descend upon one's self when abroad, but when they evaporate? Well, scholars & amateurs have Oates journals, her novels & at worst, one has their own unforgettable adventures. It's normal to feel away. I read a battered copy of Steinam's Marilyn: Norma Jeane; I'm easily lost within the pages & feel at home, curled up in bed. I wander the local grocery store, Spar (imagining I'm at Giant Eagle with Mom), selecting needed foods (ten rolls: 1,20) & treats to lift my spirits: biscuits & chocolate (0,89), Fugi apples (1,99/kg) & lemon drops (0,99). "Where troubles melt like lemon drops/away, above the chimney tops/that's where you'll find me."
Don't think I'm not having a wonderful time in Europe, in Austria! Only fantasies of travel fed my imagination, and as strong, as urgent my wishes, Europe didn't seem feasible at this point in my life. I wondered if I'd ever actually make it. Depressing. But here I am on a Saturday night, ignoring a televised football game (sports bore me, no matter the country), aware of the Alps, recording petty thoughts, listening to Judy Garland (whose final apartment I tracked down while in London) in Europe. I wouldn't have guessed. And what an appropriate time, the summer before beginning graduate studies & teaching English Comp at John Carroll. I'm in Austria!
Last night, Allison & I enjoyed delicious dinners (myself, Schweinsbradl mit Krautsalat und Semmelknödel -- figure it out!) at the foot of Hohensalzburg Festung, in a small restaurant hideen from tourists, St. Paul's Stub'n.
(June 8 journal entry)
I've become a journaler who records activities & thoughts in days to follow. Oh, how I hate that, but I'm left unable to deny it any longer. With infinite discoveries to absorb, process & write of, by night-time (which seems to come much later than at home; or is it then lengthening of days?), I'm starving & whooped. And yet I constantly recall Vita Sackville-West's reminder: "It is necessary to write if the days are not to slip emptily by. For how else to capture the butterfly of time?"
I split from Allison yesterday, while she participated in a Sound of Music tour, beginning my morning at the nearby grocer (fresh rolls & yoghurt for breakfast), wandering streets in my cardigan, carrying my messenger bag & canvas grocery bag (everyone carries bags in Europe: logical & best for our environment), feelings as natives might. I heightened my experience & blasted Pink Martini; headphones are more common in London & Paris, but I didn't care. Sky a perfect blue, sun beaming warm rays, I wanted to salsa my way down Franz-Josef Strasse. Already, how much cheerier my spirits. This is living.
Lunch packed (more rolls (which I must stock up on before departing for Vienna), an apple, cookies & sparkling water -- I climbed my way up Monchsberg to Hohensalzburg Festung for views of the Salzach, Altstadt, Neuestadt & mountains that no camera can convey: wondrous depth & distance. A three-hour walk took me around the cliff, along the Medieval fortress walls, to landscapes that must be experienced in person for a proper rushing of one's blood. So grand & endless a view, I wouldn't have been surprised had I seen Neuschwanstein in the distance. I climbed over iron fences, ate my lunch in a deserted corner near the shade of a watchtower & let nature command my thoughts. I walked. And walked. I sweated, in the shade breezes chilled me. I walked, finding a private area left undiscovered by tourists to sit (carefully & precariously) on a section of the wall covered in ivy & protected by old trees. I enjoyed my times alone with sights unlike any others, ate my apples & wrote postcards. How mind-cleansing! I was quite close to forgetting my whereabouts on Monchsberg, only of my existence in Austria's natural magnificence. I walked for hours, and when it was finally time to return to city-life & meet Allison for a self-guided tour of Mozart's residence on Makartplatz 8 (an original piano of his on exhibit), I passed Muller Kirche (on Salzburg's outskirts; a wedding having just occurred) & returned to the city's center along the Salzach.
TODAY, Allison & I started through Mirabelle Gardens, umbrellas out (wrong city, miss Andrews!), sadly, the free Sunday concerts in the garden was cancelled as a result of the rain, but I can't complain: we've had mostly fair weather. Afterwards, the graves of Mozart's wife & father, Constantine & Leopold and a walk down Steingasse, a Medieval road -- only route south of the Alps to Venice -- free of tourists. Great history: Josef Mohr's birthplace at 9 (author of "Silent Night"), carved beggars' graffiti on doors, Altstadt & river views & more fortifications (able to survive for centuries only to be bombed during WWII). But most interestingly, a building whose side was gouged out by and American GI, attempting to squeeze a tank down the narrow street to 24 -- Masion de Plaisir, a centuries-old brothel still open daily: 12-4 -- and left as a reminder. Looking for fun? Hooray for Americans...
As the rain stopped and the sky cleared in the evening, after a catnap & reading Marilyn, I walked again through Mirabelle Gardens (nearby our hostel), my mind free of any worries & Puccini my company.
posted by Colin at
2:06 PM
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