Oh, England

My blogging has been woefully inadequate, and for that I must apologize. Life has been insane leading up to spring break, and I am getting on a plane to Italy tomorrow morning. I had a fantastic weekend in the countryside with my dear old dad last week... I want to blog about it more when I have more time. It was stunning, overwhelming, and somehow familiar all at once. The culture shock is also much more overwhelming in the countryside than in the city.

This is a photo I took from the top of Cadbury "castle" (old hill fortress that has been speculatively linked to Camelot). You are looking at Corton Ridge, and behind it is the village of Corton Denham... the village my family used to live in before they moved to Canada in the 1800s. The entire weekend was a trip back into family history, myth, and all the literature I loved growing up. I felt that I was taking a tromp through the Shire. Rolling fields, tiny villages, 19th century famrhouses, old gravestones with my family surname, a roaring fire in the pub... it is all a happy glow in my memory. I am blocking out the moments of terror I felt in the rental car my father was driving to get us there... barreling through the English countryside with no real idea of where you are going can be quite unnerving. After this past weekend, I also have to agree with Bill Bryson when he says that the British seem to take a quiet, intense, and ornery pride in doing everything differently than the whole rest of the world.

Now, my classes are to be set aside for a week as I spend my spring break in Tuscany. I am nervous and excited. I have traveled by myself before, but never to another country. On the other hand, I can't stop thinking about Italian food, Italian countryside, Italian architecture, and history... I've been waiting for this for a long time, and it's finally happening.

It will be grand. I'll update when I can, but I do not intend to take my laptop with me. I think it will be good for me to go without it for a week.