Caput Mundi

I walk daily, around the center of Rome, ducking beneath the curved arches of renaissance palazzi and cobbled alleyways teeming with shaded cafés and slices of history disguised as crowded shops and cozy restaurants. I’ve gotten lost in Rome...not lost in the damaging sense- not lost in where I can’t find my way home. I’ve become rapt by this captivating city in the sense that I don't want to turn around and head home. I am lost in the enchanted sense- like Alice down her rabbit hole. This city- the eternal city, Caput Mundi- and the little life that is slowly forming around me- is my castle in the sky. Maybe I’m too much of a romantic- or a dreamer- and I’m simply refusing to look around and see the world as it really is. Or maybe I just got tired of it. Because in Italy—in my Italy- my fantasy world- there is no economic crisis, there is no hunger, no loss, no death and no suffering. The world isn’t speeding towards it's own destruction, there is no war- and with no war- there’s no hate, no anger and no unfulfilled desire or need. I fell in love with Italy almost ten years ago when I stepped off a plane in Florence- and since then, along many roads and paths- I am always lead back to Italy- in one way or another- whether it is in my mind or in my heart. And now I’m here, in body- and this is my life. 

Some days, it’s as if I’m waiting for the bottom to fall out- or I'm waiting for reality to set in. And so I take my camera and try to capture it all before it ends- as all good things do- and as all stories end and glittering fantasies eventually lose their shimmer and turn into the darker and subtler realities.

It’s been two months now- and although I keep looking over my shoulder for trouble- or fate- or duty to come knocking - I’m still here. I’m living a life of hedonistic pleasures that even Cleopatra would envy. And while I wonder when and how it will all end- I’m doing the best I can to bask under the Roman skies that shroud me in their light every morning and grant me the sweetness of dreams that each star filled night brings. 

Enjoy the pics. ;)