Tuesday, January 3, 2012

a Fine Plan

Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in 2004.  Love it or hate it, if you live on this planet you know what it is... if you're really old and/or not quite computer-saavy you may call it "spacebook"... but you know what it is.


I started on Facebook after I lost my job back in 2009.  I used it like most people did, connecting with family flung far and wide as well as reconnecting with people from my past ... even deep past.  I had fun with it.  After my "I must learn French" epiphany, I used it to connect with people in France so that I could use it as a learning tool as well as meeting new people.  The people I met on Facebook were instrumental in the direction my life took and though I have not yet met a lot of them, I consider them very dear and treasured friends.


Some promo pieces I did
for Atelier Cent Trieze
in Pertuis, France
I first met the people at Atelier Cent Treize (a sculpture and drawing workshop in Pertuis, France) due in part to my interest in a past passion for clay and sculpture. It was through them I was extended an invitation to visit and use of an apartment at the back of the workshop. I think that's what first got me seriously considering visiting Europe. I figured... why not? I was thinking of leaving Chicago (really... the winters just wear you out) so I devised "Plan B" (Plan A being find a job that doesn't take 4 hours of commuting a day, pays a living wage AND offers affordable health insurance. As you can see, both plans appear to be equally unattainable). So I went for the more pleasurable one.


Plan B: (pure genius) I could fly to Paris, travel by train visiting various Facebook friends in France and end up in southern Italy visiting family.  With luck, this would take me from autumn to spring.  Depending on where destiny may lead while in Europe, I'd come home to New York and settle somewhere on the east end of Long Island (totally bypassing winter as I knew it).  This would please friends and family who have been after me to return to the homeland since I left Manhattan for Chicago... and I wouldn't feel so bad about settling back east if I at least had a little European adventure.


OK, so there are a few flaws to this plan.  The biggest one was funding it... even though I could afford it at the time, could I afford it by the time all the preparations were done?  OK, that was a big problem... let's just leave that to destiny... if I were going to "create something that still does not exist" through pure faith... well, that should work itself out, right?  I'll just put one foot in front of the other and plan as if this was actually going to happen.  OK, so next flaw... I can only stay on an American visa for 3 months. How can I stay longer? This glitch is followed by the fact that my birth certificate says Concetta and I have been using Tina since I was born, including all legal documents and taxes.  I would need a legal name change before I could apply for a passport.  Oh yea, and I need to be able to earn some kind of income while I was traveling. Something I could do on the internet probably.


I had no idea how any of these things would work itself out. I just believed that it would and acted as if this was NOT the plan of a crazy woman. Most people had problems wrapping their brain around my plan.  Kind of like an "I Love Lucy" episode... maybe I'd make money stomping grapes in Italy. 


The "tsk, tsks" screamed almost audibly from people's shaking heads when I told them my plan. They mostly just smiled politely...but I could hear their brains rattling in disbelief. I didn't care. I believed. I believed I could create my own reality. I believed enough to draw into existence one Monsieur le Marquis du Galipot. He rode in with the dawn on a white horse, chain mail gleaming in the sun over his kilt; sword at the ready to battle my demons.  My knight, my highlander, my archangel, my protector.  Yikes.... maybe it's true... I have bats in my belfry... I've gone berserk, bonkers, cracked, crazy, delerious, demented ... she's mad as a friggin hatter!  Oh... get real... I just fell in love.  Madly, deeply, truly.

1 comment:

  1. Well. things happen and why shoudn't they?

    People develope sentimental feelings, and all I've been able to do is to arrange for Tina Concetta Marzocca to be legally declared as my unilateral heir.
    Dutch lawyers (request details via tmarzocc@gmail.com)

    All I reqest is that people respect my decisions "

    ReplyDelete

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