Changing Minds, Changing Hearts

Buon Giorno!!  This weekend has been a whirlwind adventure! We started out by heading to Bologna by train.  I didn’t really know what to expect because the only thing I knew about the city was that it is the home to the oldest university in Europe.  I love the atmosphere!  As opposed to crowded, tourist-filled Venice and Florence, Bologna is a breath of fresh air.  Culturally, it is 100% Italian and I love cities that are less influenced by tourism.  We ate at a quaint Italian restaurant, explored some shops and markets, visited ancient churches, and finally we climbed to the top of a frighteningly tall tower.  You guys, I don’t think I could describe how scary it was to climb the centuries-old stairs.  Some of the wooden structure was worn so much that it had holes in it.  Part of it was even tilted!!  I had to sing to myself to keep from passing out or throwing up.  And I don’t even have a legitimate fear of heights, but unstable structures apparently cause me a little anxiety.  Anyway, it was a beautiful view from the top, and totally (kinda) worth it I suppose. Ha!  After we were done exploring and got a great meal at a local restaurant and caught a train back to Ancona.  Our first train got delayed so we missed our second train.  We then decided to take another route, but thought since they never check for tickets on a regional train we just weren’t going to buy a ticket.  I talked about this in my post about the things I have learned in Italy, and this experience proved one of my other lessons to be true.  That would be “I don’t know half of the things I thought I knew to be true” because of course this was the one time our tickets got checked.  The nice conductor seemed confused, but understood that we knew nothing about what we were doing when we started talking in English.  Lesson number 31 I’ve learned:  I am a really bad liar and I should not test my own luck.  Long story short we made it to Genga where we stayed the night at an adorable hotel that was set up so that the downstairs was a restaurant and the upstairs was a hotel.  It made it very easy for us to get some pizza and not have to walk far to our roomJ.  We saw some children dressed up in their Halloween costumes and it made me yearn to be home with my family and especially with my niece for her first Halloween.  She was the most beautiful Ariel in the world.  My sister was flounder, Chad was Sebastian and Brent was skuttle from The Little Mermaid.  It was truly precious and very hard for me to watch and not be able to be a part of.  This Halloweekend for me has been all about the physical adventures and I absolutely love it.  First in Bologna was the tower, and in Genga we went “caving”.  For those of you who don’t know what that is, caving is literally going into a cave and risking the possibility of finding out you have claustrophobia.  We jumped over cliffs, navigated around water pools, and took in the incredible beauty of the sulfuric formations that surrounded us.  It was an absolutely incredible sight!!  I so wish they had allowed cameras into the caves because I can’t even explain with words how amazing it was.  At one point in the adventure we got so deep in the caves that there were no sources of light except for that of our headlamps.  The guide, who only spoke in Italian, told us to turn off our lamps and to remain completely silent.  It was the most eerie experience of my life.  I heard everything so much more clearly. All of my senses were heightened and it all felt so surreal.  I feel like in some way or another on this trip I have been put in situations where I get to experience what it is like to have a disability.  I say it’s too much of a coincidence to truly be one.  As I sat in complete darkness and silence I took a deep breath and thought to myself, what a healing experience this all is.  All we have in this world is each other.  It is love that lights our world, and even in darkness I felt a sort of calm and contentness that I have never felt in my life.  I realized I am getting good at this whole “change” deal, something I have struggled with my entire life.  Ask anyone who knows me and they will tell you I am not a fan of change.  I fight it, I avoid it, and I cry when it happens.  Somehow though I make it through every time.  I’m sure everyone has heard the saying “the only constant in life is change” and its true!  Whether it be exciting, terrifying, or anything in between, change is something one must master in order to be a successful (or even just functioning) human being.  Life hands us things sometimes that we think we cannot handle.  It throws us curveballs and sometimes throws a fastball when we were expecting a change-up (all my softball friends please appreciate my terminology).  And all we can do is try to adjust the best way we can.  I feel like for the majority of my life I’ve just been trying to keep up, and fooling myself into thinking I could handle anything.  And you know what?  I can. I’m not pretending anymore.  I know how to settle into my batting position and adjust so I can hit one out of the park. Every time.  You want to know my secret? Well to be honest it is a big helping of self-confidence.  I know I can do it, I know I’ve done it before, and my muscle memory is accustomed to knocking it out of the park.  So, as I stood at the entrance to these terrifying adventures, I stood there, I took a deep breath of gratitude, and I took a confident step forward towards who I want and am meant to be.

“The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.” –Alan Watts

Linsey