O MIA PATRIA, SI BELLA E PERDUTA!

I can't post any photos at the moment because I decided not to schlep my laptop to Venice - an excellent choice. I will add some when I get back to Vienna so watch this post.

I had completely forgotten what this country is like, and even if I hadn't, nothing, nothing in my life could have prepared me for Venice - yet at the same time I feel as if everything in my life has prepared me for being here. Every second is amazing. Someday you and I, dear reader, will return here and rent an apartment for a month or two. I am not sure which reader I am addressing but it could be any number of wonderful people. Of course, there is also something so precious about being here alone, going wherever I want, seeing exactly what I want to see, taking as much time as I need in front of the Bellinis in the Museo Correr (there is no way to understand from seeing a picture of the pieta that is here, no way to explain its magnificence in person), going to Mass in front of the Madonna Nicopeia in St. Mark's, seeing the view from the top of the campanile at St. Giorgio Maggiore, finding Titian's hidden fresco of St. Christopher in a little back stairway at the Doge's palace.

I had always heard it's easy to get lost in Venice, but the opposite is true. There is no way to get lost because everywhere you are is exactly where you are supposed to be. There are no wrong turns, no missed vaporetto stops, no bad restaurants, nothing wasted or lost ever. If I could learn to live my life this way, knowing that there are no mistakes, knowing that whatever happens is right...