A New Chapter

(Warning: A self-indulgent, reflective post ensues. Normal sight-seeing recommendations will resume shortly.)

Have you ever experienced the following feeling? You’re in a bookshop; a peaceful little haven of tranquillity. A slice of paradise away from the hustle and bustle of the tech-filled modern world. A rare vestige of time gone by. You’re blissfully perusing the shelves, ignoring all other demands on your time. In situations such as these time stands still. You could be in there for five minutes or perhaps an hour. Maybe you’re attracted to the title, the cover or the genre. But when you settle on something that tempts you, you pull it from its space on the shelf, you turn it over and lose yourself in reading the blurb and get a sense of intrigue, excitement, anticipation or if you’re lucky, all three. You know it’s going to be impossible to walk out of the shop without that book. Isn’t that one of the best feelings in the world? To be excited by something that you don’t yet fully know or understand but you’re sure the experience of it can only enrich your life.

I feel slightly like that at this point in my life. I was recently in a bookshop. I had nowhere to be. No one demanding my attention. I was able to fully immerse myself in those moments of unbridled joy. Just me and those pages. A rare guilty pleasure. It was of course no coincidence that I left as the grateful new owner of Marco Polo’s The Travels and Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations, two classics that epitomise two of my greatest passions: travel and history. Instead of ‘A New Chapter’ this article should perhaps be entitled ‘A New Book’, because that’s how significant I feel the recent changes in my life have been. Some of you reading this will know me extremely well, some less so and some won’t know me at all. But due to some significant changes in my life, it feels like my whole existence has been flipped on it’s head. I’m no longer a wife, a dependent, a significant other. Whilst this could leave one feeling unanchored and adrift, I instead have those same feelings of intrigue and excitement when you land on one of those books. Readers of these posts will know that someone significant in my life (both she and I didn’t perhaps know at the time how significant her and her words would become) once told me to “climb more mountains, eat more ice cream, smile more and cry less. Life should be lived as we go along.” If I’ve learnt anything from previous years, it’s that life is too short not to be happy. I’m not talking about just managing or getting by. I mean a life that brings you joy. Not just to you, but to those around you as well. If that isn’t happening then perhaps something has to change. Initially I felt a sense of failure. Those that know me, know that I don’t like to fail or quit at anything. Giving up is not in my wheelhouse. But then I realised that wasn’t the case at all. It was accepting the situation for what it is, addressing it and making the necessary changes to fully live life for all of those involved. Whilst that wasn’t the vision five, ten, twenty years ago it’s realising that doesn’t actually matter. Life is a full, exciting rollercoaster of a journey with twists and turns, dips and rises that makes it what it is. There’s no point trying to control where those tracks take you, it’s a futile exercise. There’s no changing the direction or trajectory, so we may as well embrace it, raise our hands to the sky and enjoy the ride.

“It isn’t the burdens of today that drive men and women mad, it’s the regret of yesterday and the fear of tomorrow. Regret and fear are twin thieves who rob us of today.”

I don’t think there’s many other places on earth where one can feel such a tiny, insignificant cog in the machine that we call life, as here in Rome. Alright, there are older civilizations but have they had the same impact on the world. I count myself lucky everyday that I get to call this city home. A city that was founded nearly 2,780 years ago. On April 21st 753 BC to be precise. I love this place. I love the people. I love the history. Now I just need to figure out a way to navigate the bureaucracy and find a way to stay here. To continue doing what I love in the most incredible city on Earth.