Viva España

Pals,

What a whirlwind the past two months and change have been! As always, I've proven myself a liar and a fraud when it comes to my sporadic promises that this blog will start having full posts catching up on my travels of at least 18 months ago, so I'll hesitate to repeat them... but I write this on a blissfully cool (23° C/74° F) morning as the sun comes up in Barcelona, having cleared the pre-orientation hurdles of my summer and with two weeks of relative calm on the horizon. So, if nothing else, it's a moment to catch up on now, so let's do that after the jump! Aroo, y'all.

IS IT NICE TO BE WELCOMED HOME WITH CAVA AND FLOWERS AND A SIGN AND BALLOONS??

I arrived to Barcelona in May; Jenny and I quickly set to getting our place put together, as she'd largely been in the crunch of voiceover and performing work since I was last here over spring break. We live in a gorgeous and almost completely untouristy neighborhood in what Barcelona folk consider "far outside" the city center, but feels very close for someone whose geography is Chicagoan. We're surrounded by little carnicerias, pescarias, panaderias, affordable cafeterias and lunchtime-only restaurants, and a ton of folk who have moved here from other parts of Spain or Latin America.

This is my uh. Public library. (OK it's not the immediate-neighborhood public library, it's the one you have to walk 15-20 minutes to get to, but it still counts as neat.)

May was also a chance to start in on language work; ridiculously, I'd put off learning Spanish easily half a dozen times in my life, opting for German in high school, French as my second "translating language" in grad school, and Italian/Japanese for travel purposes. "When am I gonna need Spanish?" I kept thinking, very intelligently and with no sense of hubris. Well, joke's on y'all, cos what I really want here is Catalan, but Spanish is where we're starting, since most of the (free!) Catalan courses here will be taught in Catalan and Spanish, not English. So the summer has included some waves of intensive Spanish study (shoutout EOI!) and a lot of attempts to practice with a very patient partner and refreshingly generous shopkeeps and pals.

Like Frank Loesser, I also talk to the trees, but they never listen to me.

It was also a month of getting into the life of the city again; I've missed the activity and energy of city life quite a bit, and being somewhere that there's always a movie or play worth dropping in on is both exhausting and exhilarating. Jenny being as plugged into the theatre scene as she is here means we've always got something on our must-see hit list (more language immersion for Pat!) and also means lots of delightful coffees, picnics, and snacks/drinks/dinners with good folk. I am aware that I'm extremely fortunate to have her helping me settle in, having made the leap herself some 17 years ago.

Sala Beckett! Have we discussed how great it is that every cultural institution of note here has a basically solid-to-great cafe/bar as part of what they do? Lots of civic centers too! Oh well!!!

 Two particularly giddy memories of the summer so far: the first is going to Girona with Jenny (she had a touring show playing there one weekend) and getting to walk this gorgeous old city and meet our wonderfully thoughtful and huge-hearted hosts in their brink-of-the-countryside home, a perfect balance of country life and city arts and culture.

bird

The other grand memory is our neighborhood fiesta. Every neighborhood in Barcelona has one, scattered throughout the warmer months of the year; it's a week of concerts, workshops, and community events ranging from markets to "community paellas" (yes: huge paellas cooked and shared in the street) to classes hosted by the multiple types of community organizations in each neighborhood. Have I mentioned that my favorite thing about Spanish culture is how incredibly communal and social it is, in stark contrast to the increasingly isolated culture of America? Well it is. And fiestas end with one of the cooler chthonic Spanish things: diablos y correfuegos. Clubs of "diablos" (which in our neighborhood included a few Certified Old Guys, a solid cohort of 20-30something men and women, and a cluster of honest-to-god kids, all dressed up as devils) march from one side of the neighborhood to the other to the tune of a drum corps, then start lighting off an insane display of fireworks as they march back the other way, most devils swinging/carrying a spinning contraption holding a firework that creates a sort of fire umbrella. Often, kids will be skipping down the street under these flame-umbrellas with the devils. It's insane and wonderful, and being present for this made me profoundly grateful to be anchored in this community, even as a (FOR NOW) newcomer/interloper.

is catalan culture good

IS CATALAN CULTURE GOOD

 Anyhow, that was plenty of plenty; these two months also included a lightning-quick loop back through Chicagoland to line up my research visa with the Spanish consulate (gotta apply in your home consulate, y'know) which worked out beautifully to see my family, including my brothers, who gathered so that we could have a brief and quiet memorial for Kat, seeing the brick that was laid in her honor at the Morton Arboretum, and generally have some good time together before we split apart again until, most likely, Christmas. This was obviously very emotional for your big feelings narrator, as was a whole whirlwind spree of farewell-for-now catchups with Chicago friends. It wasn't nearly enough time (I would have loved to have seen my Michigan pals on this loop as well) but it did my heart a lot of good.

Inez not making a great case for her readiness to get turned back into the service dog organization oh no what if she has to cuddle with us FOREVER

I love them

(While we're speaking of America: it's been a surreal summer to watch the news coming from back home. There's not much to say except that I desperately hope y'all are registered to vote and plan to vote to minimize harm to human beings, since that's about all we can manage in a first-past-the-post two-party system. Still matters! I'll be mad if you leave people I care about out to dry with the cruelty of an authoritarian administration! K bye!!!) 

Inez also wants you to be on the watch for Humanity

Back in Spain for July, I've mostly been drilling half-day language intensives (now mercifully finished for the everybody-runs-away summer break) and getting used to no-AC days in the 90s, though as with much of Europe, Spain has good strategies for surviving this stuff... and I'm glad to have the cooling Mediterranean, unlike the truly-baked interior of the country. I did get a surprise jump start on my research project when Jenny (did I mention she's the best) wrangled us an invitation to the final tech/dress of the 50th anniversary concert of Dagoll Dagom at the Grec Fest. But mostly it's been about preparing myself as a human for the year to come, and boy do I need that time.

IS THE GREC THEATRE A NICE PLACE TO HANG OUT OF AN EVENING. VIEWS DIFFER (AMONG IDIOTS)

Things taper now; the next two weeks I'll keep up language study by myself while tending to a host of household setup things while Jenny sprints through a hefty load of voiceover directing and performing work and a short remounting of a play. We'll have a short beach getaway (a real beach holiday is not in the cards this year, but it'd be silly not to get a couple of days in) and then for about three weeks in August I'll be in London, house sitting for a much-loved old pal and living the good life. We'll chase that with a couple weeks with Jenny's parents, celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary in Italy (did I mention I am very fortunate this all feels very extravagant) before I careen back to Madrid for orientation and my year of research.

Deciding what to bring for a transatlantic move in a very "weigh your bags 8 times and make hard decisions" way really shook out a lot of Stuff... but there are some keepsakes of cherished memories that I refuse to relinquish! SO THERE!!! Anyway take this as a metaphor about the year to come being a marathon or something I don't know.

 It's good! I'm exhausted! And happy! And content! And learning how to set new tempos and patterns! And boy howdy am I grateful.

That's plenty for now - I miss y'all back home ferociously and will try my dang best to at least slightly better keep you up to date here. In the meantime, be good to yourselves and each other and keep in touch!

#España