Cat good, alles good!

Happy 2020!
 We have already crossed the threshold of the longest day of the year and light will come into us from now on. I have entered MY new year already and all the good change is underway, slowly rebuilding good habits adding new ones and working on modifying those that don't contribute. 
Before works in the house start, I don't want to leave any part out of the journey. The road trip was the very beginning of this new stage. 

Amsterdam-Brussels expedition

On our van trip from Amsterdam to Barcelona my main concern has been the cat to the point that I started going on stress mode shortly before departure. And he positively surprised me. I am so proud of him...

First leg:
Amsterdam-Brussels. 
Short trip and overnight stay at Antonio's, who lives in his lovely "cuchitril" right behind the Grand Place. Try finding a parking spot there. But I had worried enough. Rob used his gratefulness and positive energy to manifest a spot. 
So, luckily there was street works going on at the corner of Antonio's and we could park amply there. One fewer worry. Here we went on to unpack the many cat things (toilet, food set, travel bag) and climb the many stairs with furry in the carrier.

Bonzai was relaxed and supportive all through the trip. I think I was more stressed than him. Once at Antonio's he explored the space, played and climbed on the wooden beams and spent a while giving some attention to each of us,  he wasn't even taken aback from our coughing Bego.

Cat Paradise Attic, lots of climbing and scratching spots. They were very enjoyed by Bonzi.

Selvie takes a selfie of cat and legal pet 

Morning awakening candid picture. Coffee galore for the road

Next leg: Brussels - Cuisery

Welcome to chapter 5 (or end of chapter 4)

Every year before Christmas a deep downer takes over me coming from the pressure of "having to" so much. 

Once liberated of "having to give" some pre-Xmas presents have already arrived.

My sister always says: "volta, volta pel món que acabaràs al Born". A very Catalan saying that reminds me of the message in Siddharta. Go around the world to find all you need where it all started. 

I BOUGHT A HOUSE 

This is a major stepping stone since I would have never imagined me owning a house in Barcelona, my number #2 city, no less. And in my favourite area of the city. Quiet, surrounded by nature, a small community and such an interesting story and background of neighbour activism. So grateful to become part!

My work in progress, meet the sunroof :-)

And grateful of the gifts that are coming with it. Number one and most important one... (drum roll)...
Jay B, yes, the one and only, has surfaced and promised he'll rock by and give me a hand. He's been hiding for the last five years, so I am sure we have a lot of catching up to do. 
I am stoked. He is some sort of a wise man and life protector to me. Or to each other, I am sure I did save his life in a way when I saw his light when we were kids. He changed the course later in my life when I found out I had survived an accident, details: https://selveta.blogspot.com/2017/11/all-souls.html. 
And on this important stepping stone, I can do with his support. Exciting, no less!

The best things in life aren't things. 

Present number two: the universe has gifted me a companion for this journey, in the physical and spiritual sense of the word. Some months ago our paths crossed in a short retreat in Amsterdam (Amsterdammers, if you are in need of some connection and peace of mind,  I recommend you reach out to Erik, here is a link:
https://onehumanretreats.com/meet-the-founder/), Robbie, expressed his love for my city of birth. 
So I reached out to him and invited him to help build my little dream. He said a big "fuck yeah" and we are going to take this road trip together from the km0. Inspiring brave man, who is not going to conform to what they expect from him, finding his own truth.
Because we've already stripped down to vulnerability, we surely have a bit to learn from each other. Personally, I can't wait to learn what his enthusiasm and energy will bring. If you want to follow, he will probably offer more images to this journey than verbal me.
 Insta: @spiritual_robbie_nld

Since this means so much to me, I have decided to keep a record of this journey in my blog. 

Coming on: girlfriend landing, serious wellness session followed by the inevitable annoying packing up... 
I am so ready.

I'll live just turning pages

I see my last entry is NZ inspired. Interesting that NZ, or more accurately, the Southern Hemisphere inspires me to report, share, recreate. 

Six60. 

It has a lot of meaning to me, as it was my soundtrack during my days co-living on Snell's Beach aka "Heaven" in a time of needing an island of peace after the hardships of seeing your own will challenged when practising the vulnerable and noble art of living called teaching.

After my teaching week I would move to Heaven for the weekend near Warkworth to, like the song says: "only to be" with my homies, two Kiwi girls, the beach and the silence.

There we would indulge in super foods and endless walks and spotting oysters, even got to go to a concert of Avalanche City.
A special mention to some certain pyramid of energy that developed just there. The same one that created, ended and destroyed my year of Progressive Grey. Pure serendipity but first ever encounter with forces beyond myself. 

I do remember, too, sleeping in a guest room in this heavenly house by the beach on the foam mattress of my camper and waking up covered in sea dampness. 

HEAVEN, our view from the terrace, all I remember is talks about happiness. Best enjoyed with NZ white wine and Six60 sounding from the living room. Soundtrack: "Forever". Because some moments should play on loop for life. 

"Ain't it good to be alive"

So I recently attended my first concert of Six60 in Europe. I missed them when they played in Whangarei back in 2015, so I was almost in debt. I couldn't forgive myself that they played back then quite next to my place in Onerahi (another bit of heaven, but with a cat), so off I went. 

I seemed to be the only non-Kiwi among so many brews. And it went as it does in NZ. 
I must say, if you haven't lived in NZ, you have missed some life experience of humanity at its best side (most of the time and in contrast to some other places in the world).

I showed up alone, knowing the band is not a big thing in Europe. I was spotted by the Kiwis, at that point, lucky me. 
I was on the phone trying to send a some documents for a quotation (for my wee tiny bit of heaven to come).
I can't be grateful enough to the Kiwi who tapped my shoulder and said: "you seem busy, aye!", I explained I was trying to send some documents before the band came out as I didn't know anyone in the room. 
So, off he went and introduced me to all his brews and cuzzes. Then he added: "now you know somebody".
Lucky me and positively surprised to be accompanied for the night by a bunch of big Pasifika men, in my view, the highest expression of male beauty. So I had a tiny piece of heaven then and there. But aside of the greatness of a Polinesian bodybuild, they were, most importantly, beautiul inside. 

For a bit I really felt in NZ. The crowd gathered at the bar, sharing drinks in a vibe of community only comparable to the real Aotearoa. Laughs, but not the loud European ones, the melodic voice of Matiu and the feel of being with the whanau. 

Such a contrast to what I am used to, some sort of harmony reigned, a kind of "sweet as" feel. 
People came with kids, partners and lots of friends. Not a glass was thrown on the floor, no eyes met without a smile.

TUMEKE

AROHA
I sang along to Kia Mau Ki To Ukaipo, because, hell, I had been practising my Te Reo the whole week on the bike, at home and in the shower and wanted to pay my respects to the Maori culture.

 And cried. Because, as usual, I miss being on the right side of the world, down under, while on the wrong side, here, up above.

A post concert snapshot of what connection through music does to you.

I went through part of the soundtrack of my life Down Down Under and left silently after intruding for a short space of time into a piece of Kiwiana. 

If you haven't experienced New Zealand Roots music, your soul is missing a beat. Little is known about NZ and less about the musical abundance that have such a personal, distinctive flair.

And on my way back, on the ferry, still wiping tears, I had to accept I might not be trying hard enough, maybe "This wasn't meant for me". Am I right where I'm supposed to be?

I'll live just turning pages
well, I know it is worth the ride
Ain't it good to be alive.

Revelations from the Luminate tent

Winter 2017, Golden Bay. NZ. 

I had signed up to volunteer for a team of healers to find my call. As a healer myself I regret not really believing in less empirical or more spiritual forms of healing in order to make it an extra salary of something different and less physically demanding. 
 What I encountered there was the very face of my esceptic nature and a lot more vanity around than I could handle. 
If days were hard to ignore, nights were the worst. I'd sleep in a tent, and mind you, to have a bit of insulation I had bought an air mattress. I was sleeping in a second hand bag, old school made of wool, all my clothing on top, a blanket from a neighbour and the cape of the tarot reading witch who slept in a caravan. Still, the temperature would drop to under 5 degrees and I couldn't handle the cold, that was numbing my legs. I had pitched next to a bunch of Kiwis, who seemed nice enough. I had made friends with a guy in his 40s, with whom i could take walks in the woods instead of taking drugs, dancing to electro ear-raping noise or spending the night howling (must have been the drugs, people howled all night). During the day I would be, as usual, the responsible adult covering shifts for my "I'm so high this is awesome" co-volunteers, running around to make sure everyone had coffee and slowly dreading a vibe everyone loved but me. 
Moved from the Kiwis when a German pitched two days later in the middle of our tents with his car and his smelly joint smoking self. I had to go. 
I moved to the spot where the sun would hit last, to suffer the least during the night, when I would get muscle cramps and feel rusty, in pain, uneasy. I cried so many nights, while the vanity-ridden crowd howled and all I wanted was that it all ended.

Quan penses que el viatge ha valgut la pena, per aprendre,
la nit escup gel i  tremolor.

And when the noise, the smells and the sensations were unbearable, I would take my notebook and write mantras like:

What doesn't make you better doesn't serve you.
Aquest es llença, no es recicla.
Indiference will be your condemnation.

Damn! I really couldn't wait for it to end...

I was approached by many people daily, since I was there, arranging appointments for the healers, and the common question was: how are you enjoying this festival? My answer was: I can't wait for it to end. 
Nobody understood. 
In the meantime I attended a lot of workshops and made great contacts in the hopes to build an Earthship to raise a commune.  

Time went and possibilities dropped, contacts faded. 
I realise where I am now and how much distance you take from dreams, when you are struggling with reality. 

Sydney

Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney, Sydney...
your name like a person, like it is alive.
And I feel for you like Neruda did in his poem 20. I don't love you any more, but when I loved you, my face searched every night the harbour sunset to tell you, each night, before the stars started to tremble above the harbour bridge, before the moon painted Diamond Bay silver, down the hill on Clairvaux road: this is the life I want.
I don't love you any more, true, but maybe I still love you. Love is so short, forgetting eternal.
Eternity. The word that shone on the bridge in 2000, at the change of millennial. I repeated that to myself: ETERNITY. This is where I want to be, each day, every day. Forever.

I landed in Australia in 1998, after a more than a 24 hour flight, sitting with eager people, checking facts, getting excited each mile.
I moved in Vicar Street, coackroach paradise, memory lane. My days were lazy, dragging on after alcohol abuse, party, lust in easy prays and poor sleep from loud roommates. I couldn't drag myself to uni, all I wanted was to go down the beach, feel the sand soft like flour. Run, drink pineaple with ginger, run some more. Swim. Love. Dance.
I found the love twice in Sydney, the life changing one. And I chose Sydney above them each time. But you are there, and I am here and I would choose you every time above anything, anyone.
I came back in 99, in 2000, in 2002 and in 2010 I had decided to stay. But I wasn't a good fit, you had better plans than me.
If I have been able to accept my life without you, everything else doesn't matter much.

Matrimoni

In the wake of a hope for a situation in my country of origin, any post of personal nature has been substituted by reflections on identity. 
I miss the emotional writer. I write constantly, and I don't seem to be able to publish one final cut. 

This post is per request. I started it one year ago and found it on the drafts. I hope I can convey the same that made my friend laugh about it. She asked me to write something about it.

This post is inspired by a friend of mine, Sílvia, who found hilarious a serious point of view I made about getting married.

Situation: I was hosting a heterosexual couple in the attic upstairs. The attic has a toilet attached, but the space is so little that you can really hear and smell what the other is doing there. I let them know that the door is only for decoration, but they will maybe have to tell each other to leave when it's time to do nr 2. 
They look understanding and with a broad smile tell me that they have known each other for ages. 
- "In fact, we are getting married next month!" they say, silly smile to each other, broad eyes towards me. I am all for enthusiasm for a new love, but marriage is an optional transaction to register it, an inexplicable excitement to sign a contract when the love has been there all along...

So I asked them out of curiosity if there were so long together why they had the need to get married. I understand gays doing it to make a statement on equality, but, isn't being happily together enough? What do they expect to change?

Their smile faded. They said: "guess it is an important stepping stone in our relationship" I said "I guess in the US you still do make a big deal out of proms, dating, the whole engagement stuff and marrying and it is has a social weight". Should be good to keep a consumers' economy going, it generates revenue. I didn't add the latter, but I thought so, I have always thought that the nuclear family is a Judeochristian invention with marriage as a pillar to create an economy based on blood ties instead of promoting a widen community, a whanau. 
I guess it works because it is easier to trust the people you create. 

I then had a time to ponder on it. And had Sílvia to be my interlocutor. I never understood forced commitment. My longest relationship was strongly based on individual freedom and communal sharing. And I am not talking about open relationships, here. I feel polyamory is the future of loving, balanced relationships and living arrangements. I am able to love two people with the same intensity, but only able to go to bed with one. Maybe catholic upbringing, but my good poly friend Mama J told me that I shouldn't be ashamed of being monogamous and heterosexual. It is an option like any other. 

I often wonder if marrying comes from a heteropatriarcal need of control and hence keeping the women as a possession rather than a companion or from a realistic need of control from the matriarchy to make sure the male doesn't sleep around as a warrant to the security of potential offsprings in the economy system or, a rational approach from a more biological drive that says out loud you want to perpetuate the species. Or a combination of all, or none. A statement for sure, nevertheless.

I don't criticise the contract, I just don't understand the hype. I would use the contract at any point for visa reasons, tax rebates or to make a close person your chaperon, to give legal powers on my patrimony (patrimony-matrimony???). But then it would have to be a right for all, and not only for couples, ceremony optional. What surprises me is that the Judeochristian background of exclusivity by right of sex has prevailed. 

However. And that was the silver lining of my reflection to Sílvia, maybe for some people it is a ceremony of leaving behind past sufferings, leaving a past behind and starting afresh with a (temporary or permanent) suitable partner, like a public "mise en scène" of a change of life, a public presentation of the 2.0 version. The ceremony is usually not of my taste, but I totally understand the intention. 

I sometimes hit myself in the head to try to understand what is that drives people to lock themselves in 4 walls to a coordinated co-living in Zweisamkeit. I did suffer a dip when trying to embrace it, because it seems a goal on itself for others, like the ultimate goal. Frustrated because I don't understand the dynamics and it turns into a big question mark in my head in loop until it makes no sense.

As an example, it comes to mind the very first time a guy asked me out, after 5 years of hanging out as friends, days after our first kiss. I didn't understand what he meant when he said: "do you want to go out with me?" "we are neighbours, we see each other everyday, we walk to class together, we play football together we can talk for hours and we've kissed, so if I say yes, what changes? Do I have to hold your hand? Go out only with you now and then to a stroll or to the cinema? pretend to be jealous if you look at other girls? Or make extra time to kiss some more?" 
We actually ended up having a physical fight. I kicked him in the balls, he hunched, I remember how he ran to his parents' house cursing at me. End of our affair. 
It took a while until we talked to each other again. 

I have been popped the  marriage question twice, and the one question that came right after, each time, was: 
What for?
I loved the honesty of one of them: "I want that it becomes illegal for you to sleep with other men", we were in a car, I was driving, and I almost cause an accident. Note he had been sleeping around, and I knew it, so hence the shock. The other, on his very knees, didn't come up with such a good answer to "what for?", he actually thought he was doing me a favour in a quite literal attempt to magically convert me into a breeder, his own agenda, not mine. 
There was a third time, historically and histrionically in love for 10 years and reunited, when the prospect of getting a resident visa became unclear, he said: "if you can't get one, we marry and that's it". 
-"cool", I said. 
Two weeks later I was running away with all my possessions, as I saw I was getting to the core of a rotten apple. But that is another chapter of the progressive grey/progressive pink book. I still don't know what title works better.

Last Christmas I had a deep conversation with my sister about the unquestionable nature of tradition. We question it, it is a convention that has no logical explanation, but people follow like gospel. We thought we maybe we were programmed in a different way.