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Wednesday, April 5th, - Start some Spain here
I know, I know...

	I know I owe you all lots of entries about my trip to Spain. Well, "owe" might not be exactly the right word, but I have promised them, and I do intend to deliver. However, life hit me full on in the face upon my return (beginning in the car ride home, after being awake and travelling for close to 24 hours; I cannot cope at that level of exhaustion, especially considering my stomach was swollen from being so ill . . . ) and I am dealing with the culture shock, life changes, and back log. Luckily, I have lots of notes, so when the time comes, I'll have something to type from . . . Ok, ok, a rough poem/notes from my first day in Barcelona: Warren-like streets too narrow to consider cars once uneven cobblestones worn down in smooth waves from centuries of use. I lean my cheek against the worn grooves of the pillars of the cathedral trying to soak in the age what these stones have seen and instead keep looking up eyes to the clerestory, just like it was meant to do. In Placa Rei I sit on a fan of stone steps that lead up to where Ferdinand and Isabella heard first about the new world. Earlier a living statue on La Ramblas, all muted silver-grey, stood on a box that said, "Christopher Columbus." I'm drawn the other way, of course, wandering down streets so narrow the sun hardly shines, whispers of stones suggest things long dead, but from balconies overhead green cascades from each, so few without a sign of life, flowers. Earlier, I saw a young mother and her son come out of a door so roughly hewn it may have been centuries old, looking more like a wall betrayed only by the old iron lock with a keyhole shaped keyhole. A man strikes up his guitar, not flamenco, though perhaps, what do I know? Spanish chords and melodies echoing off the old Roman walls around me as a happy dog chases pigeons with such zest that everyone is united in their matched response to his delight. . . Sunday in Barcelona.
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