[continued from previous entry]
Anyway, face of pain, blah blah blah.
The café in which we sat -- remember that café? -- is often crowded, and the crowd sometimes brings with it little bitty critters. Babies, dogs. As S. and I sat talking, a teeny canine trotted past, happily heading toward the rear of the establishment. Its carefree passage caught my attention, brought an immediate smile to my silly face. S. saw that smile, turned and saw the reason, smiled as well. Then the dog's owner passed by, a scary, raggedly-dressed, dentally-challenged woman, barking into a cellphone, radiating ill humor. S. saw my expression change, turned and saw why. We stared at each other, wide-eyed. "Madre mía," said I. "¡Qué espanto!" S. could only nod in agreement.
Hours later -- once again in the early, early morning -- neighborhood noise woke me, I made the trip to the loo, bleary, far more than half-asleep. Sitting where people sit in the loo, lights off, I leaned forward to rest my face on my hands, my forehead hit one of the edges of the long, curved doorhandle, hard enough that I saw stars for a second. Head aching, resting in my hands for real now, me trying to figure out why something like had just happened. The pain did not subside, fingers massaged skin, I gradually realized the skin was not dry, that the blow had opened up my forehead. A look in the mirror revealed an ugly gash, blood seeping, all that. Cleaned it up, found a band-aid, covered it, eventually made the stumble back to bed.
Next morning, got a better, more awake look. A genuine gash. In my very forehead. Ugly. And uglier, more attention-getting with a bandage, given where it was. It had started to heal up, so I elected to go out sans band-aid. Not pretty, but what the hell. And as with every single haircut I've gotten here, no one said a word about it. Eyes stared, but no one inquired, everyone maintained absolute discretion. Even in my ongoing twice-weekly language class that night, a room full of non-Spaniards. Not a peep. (Maybe out of nerves and uneasiness more than anything else, maybe they just really did not want to know what the hell had happened.)
And so Easter week slipped by. Wednesday more waves of Madrileños fled, highways clogged with vehicles, news programs tallying up highway deaths on a daily basis. Around the country, Easter processions wound through towns and cities, ugly winter weather bringing rain, snow, sleet to some places, resulting in newsclips of tearful faithful unable to do what they'd spent the last year preparing for.
Here in the barrio, nighttime meant big partying out in the streets, daytime meant most stores, businesses, newsstands closed up, streets awash in cold sunshine and people looking for somewhere to go, something to do. And in the middle of it all, me, feeling strangely adrift, with a growing sense of not having somewhere to be, somewhere I belonged or people to be with. Realizing slowly that the local version of that was only the trigger for a much larger, more all-encompassing version.
[continued in following entry]
España, te quiero
rws 10:02 AM [+]
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