How it went

I see her with the baby is her arms. Here you are, she says, and your hair is red! Yes oh... so cute, she is beautiful! And I hug them. I'm nervous but the excitement of being around them is far more intense than my own tension. It's a good feeling, I am not unconfortable. We sit on the couch and start talking about her pregnancy, the birth and how she is. You look great, I say, and I mean it. She is slim and fit, it makes me feel as I had a baby! She has a flat stomach and a milky breast which is just perfect. If I had been pregnant for 9 months (of course!) and breastfeding for three weeks I'd look like moby dick.

She asks about my life, my job and my partner. They met more than 10 years ago and I'm not sure she recalls him. I don't know how you've done it so far, she says. You've never lived together, it's amazing. Our paths have been very different. She moved to Milan several years ago and lived alone for a while and then with her husband. I know she thinks that I'm not as "complete" as she is but I'm fine with that, this thought doesn't ruin the meeting.

She brestfeeds the baby in a way that is very natural to me. Unlike me, she is definitely born to be a mom. It took me years to realise that I have maternal instinct but yet I'm not 100% confortable with a baby in my arms as I am with ... a puppy! Perhaps I should dedicate my life to animals instead of dreaming about babies. I take the baby for a while and I glimpse in the mirror. Am I ready? I look like a teenager with her dolly.

We are relaxed now, the conversation is easy even if the air is filled with unspoken words and emotions. It seems we haven't met for a short period of time but it's been 6 long years. It's time to go and she wants to walk with me to the underground station. Thank you, she says, I really wanted to see you because it's such a crucial moment to me and it seemed wrong not to reconnect. It seemed also wrong at my wedding and you know what? I cried when I got the flowers you sent me.

A close hug before I go. We don't cry but our eyes are far from being dry.

Out of the shadow... into the light

I've taken your suggestions and -hopefully- I'll see her next week. I'm not sure as I've just replied to her email to arrange a meeting next week. They're planning to go to the mountains with the baby (who, by the way, is beautiful!) so I'm not sure if we're going to make it. We will see. I'm ready to meet her now and the baby will smooth everything.

Now it's not just me who dreams about her. My mum too! Isn't it strange? And also, when I think of her (like earlier this morning) I get an email. This is one of the strangest things I've ever experienced. However, I also think women have powerful energies and ancient instinctual wisdom. The "heart beneath the heart",  the untouchable essence of what lies underneath is what makes us connected.

Silence, space and Mrs.Dalloway

It would have been a perfect afternoon to focus on writing. There's nobody around, it's a grey day and the space -usually filled with books, people, sounds- it is nearly empty. Instead, I constantly check my emails, speak on the phone, think about how I relaxed I am. Yes, I am "relaxing as it is", as my screen saver's statement says. I'm too relaxed, that's the problem... procastinating decisions and work commitments. I will be fine, I'll go through all I have to do in the next days. 

It's quiet to the extent I can hear my own thoughts. Ideas make noise, a soft pillow-like noise when one turns during sleep. It crossed my mind to call my shadow but I wasn't really serious about it. I could call her today, I thought after my vegan lunch, but I wasn't excited nor concerned. The idea fell flat while I was walking back to my office. Should I call her? I don't know, perhaps I could break the ice first, pick up the phone and ask how it is doing with her baby girl. Apparently she wrote on facebook that she is in love with her. I bet, she seems so cute!

My mum doesn't understand why I feel the urge to solve this emotional knot. She doesn't even think about all this as something that needs to be addressed as she knows how L. is and is much more skeptical than me. She doesn't think people could change, when friendship is over it's really over and that's it. However, she told me that if it's crucial to me, I should call/meet her. I still don't know what to do. By the way, after the baby was delivered I haven't dreamt of her anymore. I did have strange dreams though, I wish I had written them down.

I finished The Secret Life of Bees which I really enjoyed and just started The Hours. The movie based on the novel is simply amazing, I've seen it 4-5 times (perhaps even more). The book is written in a wonderful, marvelous, perfect English and the characters -three women who live in different times linked by Woolf's Mrs Dalloway- are so unique I don't even dare to describe. 

As Clarissa steps down from the vestibule her shoe make gritty contact with the red-brown, mica-studded stone of the first stair. She is fifty-two now, just fifty-two, and almost unnaturally good health. She feels every bit as good as she did that day in Wellfleet, at the age of eighteen, stepping out through the glass doors into a day very much like this one, fresh and almost painfully clear, rampant with growth. There were dragonflies zigzagging among the cattails. There was a grassy smell sharpened by pine sap. Richard came out behind her, put an hand on her shoulder, and said, "Why, hello, Mrs. Dalloway". (p.10)