SUMMER PROCRASTINATION

I'm back.

I returned to the UK a little over a month ago. In many ways I wasn't sad to leave Italy, because it felt as though my time had run its course and all was over. It was 'right' to return. That doesn't stop me from missing Italy; as out of place as I often was, it was familiar. I miss the language, the expressions, the way of phrasing things. I never expected to be bilingual - when I left school, all I could manage were a few words of German - and it feels strange; as though there's another person inside me who's been gradually growing and coming to life, and now she's motionless and silent. I wasn't fluent by any means, but it brought out a whole new side of me. It's strange.

The other thing is that a lot can change in a year. Almost everyone I know has graduated. Shops have shut down. Bars have changed hands. The library has introduced a self-service desk. My younger brother has left school, works full-time and drives a Ford Capri.

So, in short, I've been spending the last month getting over my sense of spatial, social and temporal displacement. Whilst battling this rather affected leviathan, I've been getting on with translation for the year ahead, reading for courses and my dissertation, watching the first three seasons of The Wire, dog-walking and painting. It's been fun. But I've decided that my personal crisis is now over, and I should probably get some actual work done. And blog, of course.


Dissertation introduction. Ready.. Steady.. Go!