stormdog | Entries tagged with europe

I wanted to go for a ride but my ears get cold at this temperature. Just now, I looked in my bike stuff I brought up from Kenosha and I found one, but not the other, of the ear-cover flaps I'd forgotten about that came with my bike helmet. I looked through everything and couldn't find it the other one, and it felt symbolic of the many things, physical and otherwise, I've lost since moving to Europe and it made me tear up.

I'm having some trouble with this sort of thing in the last few days. Yesterday, I played some of the Final Fantasy VII remake for the first time and loved how faithful the recreation was in certain parts. But it also reminded me strongly of playing that game for the first time at home with my family in Kenosha, and that made me cry too.

Things are reminding me of times when I was fundamentally happy and satisfied with my life. I haven't been, since Europe and Covid, and it's hard to be reminded.

I'm so grateful for Miriam's understanding, reassuring presence.

Living in Europe, I've thought about whether I would actually like to see Greek and Roman ruins. I finally concluded that I really don't think I would.

It's different from seeing crumbling buildings in modern-day cities in that it's not a significant part of people's lived experiences. It's not contributing to exploitation of people who live in them in the same way. People aren't living in poverty in the Coliseum of Rome or squatting in the palace of Knossos. It would be a lot more like seeing Palenque, as I did on an undergraduate trip to Mexico.

At the time, I loved Palenque, despite it's part in a colonially-based tourist system that is also exploitive. But at this point in my life, I just don't really want to see things in ruins. I'd much rather read a book about the engineering and functioning of the aqueducts (here's a nifty one with full text available via Hathi Trust! https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015032881370 ) than see them falling down and clogged with debris.

This is another way that thinking deeply about human geography in grad school fundamentally changed a number of things about myself. I don't want to see dead things anymore. I want to see life.

Current Mood: okay
Crossposts: https://stormdog.livejournal.com/1392164.html

At this point, it seems entirely possible, even likely, that Miriam's term as a post-doc will end and we'll leave the country before getting vaccinated. The Netherlands' Covid response has been one of the worst in Europe. Still far better than the US overall, though vaccination rollout is something of an exception to that. At least here, the percentage of conspiracy theorists who are far enough disconnected from reality to not want the vaccine is far lower, though there are still plenty of people who can't seem to figure out how masks work or whey they are important.

But we are worried about being on an 8 hour flight without being vaccinated.

Runner up to that worry is the annoyance that during what may well be the only extended span of time I'll live in Europe in my life, I have seen essentially *nothing*. I haven't looked into visiting

cmcmk in England. No Eiffel Tower or Neuschwanstein Castle. No Classical Greek or Roman architecture. Not even the damn Rijksmuseum or Anne Frank house right here in Amsterdam.

I suppose that's life sometimes.

Current Mood: annoyed
Crossposts: https://stormdog.livejournal.com/1391936.html

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
			1	2	3	4
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29	30	31

MeghanIsMe

Entries tagged with europe

(no subject)

Greek and Roman Ruins

Living in Europe in the Time of Covid

Profile

January 2025

Syndicate

Most Popular Tags

Page Summary

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags