one day i'll live in the village.
and i'll ride my bike everywhere. my bike will have a wire basket. (the west village calls for a bike, not a vespa).
there are cobblestone streets.
and the most beautiful stoops.
"One Day---" Dream
25 before 25
Inspired by the amazing Carolyn over at My Thirty Before 30 Journey, I decided to make my own list. I said I needed a change? Well, it's in my hands to make it happen. My half birthday is April 4, so I have a year and a half to begin these--to make them a priority. I've lost sight of how much fun goals can be (I say this now, we'll see how I feel three months, six months, a year from now {though I have a feeling I'm going to love these--how hard some of them are--how much of a challenge they'll present})
1. take a trip abroad
2. read 25 new books
3. fall in love with running
4. give up soda and coffee (and yes, that mean's saying goodbye to starbucks)
5. figure out how to get some swimming into my life
6. host a dinner party
7. finally start a book club (stop talking about it and just do it)
8. get a job that i truly love (even if it's only temporary)
9. see the elephants walk through manhattan
10. see the yankees play in the new stadium
11. explore and document different nyc neighborhoods
12. write a little. every day. stretch those creative muscles.
13. choose 15 of shakespeare's great female monologues. disect them. figure them out.
14. speak a little poetry--a little shakespeare out loud every day
15. improve my spanish speaking skills
16. stop buying tabloid magazines
17. unleash my inner fashion mavin
18. lower my cholesterol
19. figure out what my happy weight is
20. eat at least five fruits and veggies each day
21. treat my body with the respect it deserves
22. get my finances in order
23. become a real--working--professional actor
24. say goodbye to ned. for good.
25. fall in love
What would you put on your list? Do you all have any suggestions?
a fire red vespa. and a dream.
There's a fire red vespa that sits on the corner of 67th and Columbus. I want it. I want to steal it. I won't. But I want to. And this is not an invitation for you to do so either.
But sometimes, in my darkest moments, I dream up ways to surreptitiously flip the kick stand and peel off through the park, hair flying in every direction under the matching red helmet I just happened to have in my bag that morning.
However, if I had been riding my vespa last night instead of walking, would I have missed the gentleman in a suit stealing the tree-sized flowers from the Plaza Hotel's dumpster? Or the young boy practicing racquetball against the giant marble wall outside his doorman-guarded building?
Maybe New York is best seen on foot.
Not to worry, I'll get my vespa when I move to Rome. And all will be well in the world.
I'm desperate to live in Rome.
Just for a little while anyway.
I'd wake up early every morning. With the sun. Or maybe even before it. I'd sip coffee at the cafe around the corner. And I'd go to church every day. Be the good Catholic I've always known I could be. I'd study the architecture. And listen to opera. I'd eat gelato every afternoon. And pasta every evening. I'd never eat alone. Or with anyone I knew. Always strangers. I'd eat cookies all throughout the day. And drink wine. So much wine. Red, not white. I'd parade around the streets in sandals and barely-there-skirts. I'd chop all my hair off in the style of the latest Italian movie star. And play futbol in the streets with the young boys before their mothers called them home for dinner. The people of my piazza would soon recognize the cadence of my gait or the peel of my fire-engine-red vespa. And I'd write. All day long, I'd write. I'd kiss the Italian air with my words. And then I'd be loved. By my perfect Italian lover.
Please, oh please, won't someone give me a reason to go to Rome?
PS: we all know when it comes to travel guides it doesn't get better than Rick Steves...but man, oh man, can he write...this is his delightful, little article on my much dreamed of city