Summer Coma

I have been officially unemployed for a little more than a week. This is the first time that I've spent a week in Bologna without working in more than 14 months - all of my vacation since then has been spent in Cambridge or (even cooler) Korea.

So it's been nice to see Bologna during the day, on weekdays. To actually be able to go through the day without worrying about having time to anything not related to work - grocery shopping, ironing, cleaning. All the boring stuff. But I've also been able to see more of the people I care about, and I've eaten good gelato. I registered for a library card and as dorky as it is, I'm extremely excited to start taking out books. Even better, tonight I went to dinner in the hills outside Bologna to eat a meal that's already been immortalized more than once on this blog - basically, bread and meat and cheese. But it's so good.



The restaurant is in an incredibly beautiful place, which looks like this.



Or more specifically, like this.



It's really hot here, but I have lots of sunscreen - brought from the US, where SPF 20 isn't the highest level of protection and doesn't cost 30 euros a bottle - and tap water runs freely. I don't regret the decision I made to leave my job, at all, even though I really don't enjoy the uncertainty of not knowing what comes next. I do miss my coworkers, but that probably won't change, because they're wonderful. I'll just have to get used to it.



Bologna is emptying out. Almost everyone I know is leaving for vacation next weekend. And I might be going too! We'll see. Plans are in the works for a trip to southern Italy. Hopefully I'll be able to re-imprint my brain with something other than memories from my trip south during June, which was less than ideal (to put it mildly).

It feels like it's really time to relax and I'm excited. My anxious brain needs to calm down for a bit, even if I have to force it. This is what summer should look like.