29 August 2012

It was bound to happen eventually, but today was the first lonely day I’ve had since getting to Georgia. I blame a multitude of factors, but am choosing to focus on the rain. The world that is my village shuts down when it rains, confining everyone to games of dominoes and backgammon around the patio table, watching the rain funnel down in droves and collectively (I am assuming) wishing the house was located somewhere that rain did not obliterate hopes of leaving a house which is unable to sustain electricity during such an event. It is our final day with family visitors from Tbilisi, an extremely happy group of people who are nice to be around, even if they lessen the conversation that people translate to English. I can feel some of my Georgian improving as I am able to pick up on more and more words and phrases, but nothing that can be considered key enough to have any idea what is being discussed. I am certainly not complaining, it is nice to sit back and not be the subject of the conversation for the first time since my arrival, I merely get to play observer and any interjection I am able to make is treated with an outburst of excitement and happiness, as my host family and neighbors and friends (and Georgians in general, from what I can tell) get extremely excited when they hear my try to speak Georgian, mangle it as I am sure I do.

The night comes to a rather quick close, and without warning the chilly grey that was this Wednesday dissolves into a slightly colder and darker grey, the hours of the afternoon slipping away with each new cup of coffee or glass of wine as I watch the family sitcom unfold in front of me with as much understanding of watching 70’s cable on mute, and I have enjoyed every minute. It is a slower walk up the stairs, each stair a more contemplative thought than is typically the case as I wander through my thoughts and reflections of where I am and the places and people I have temporarily left to be in this new country. It s shocking and sudden when nostalgia decides to wash over you, the dam of memories that had been cresting throughout the day finally cracking and transporting me away from the now dry landing outside my bedroom door. I look up into the sky, as was so often my habit when coming home from a long day of work, and let out an audible gasp, echoing into the shadow of a night that is coming to a close. The stars here are something that I have never seen, bountiful beyond comparison than anything the darkness of Connecticut has to offer. Lying on my back, galaxies swarm above me, almost visibly churning, and the memories of a back porch, my front yard, or an Ellington back yard fill the contours of my mind like a key turning the tumblers of a lock, as the frame of the night sky offers boundaries too small to fit every star at once, and so they endlessly push and shove to get to the front, each turn offering a new and brighter twinkle. I have travelled far enough into the mountain peaks that the stars seem nearly within reach, and as the cosmos dance across the fingertips of my outstretched hand, I take my time in deciding which star to pluck from the heavens that typically seem so out of reach, which celestial offering will serve as the ultimate souvenir for this trip. It is the first time I can remember not getting lost in the boundlessness of a night sky, of feeling small and inconsequential against infinity, but instead amplified by it, the ability to have gotten so close escalating me to a higher appreciation or understanding.

Slowly my hand comes to a rest beside me, and I shuffle myself to a standing position and off to bed. It is strange to sit amidst such wonder and miss the rock perched in the hilltops overlooking the Wilkes Barre valley. The only difference in the two is the proximity, the ability to sit on a rock in Pennsylvania and stare out above the world I had come to live in, to eventually ride back down the mountain and sleep along side everyone. Here, however, the heights I have reached seem unconquerable, the majesty of the view I just got lost in ultimately not able to be instantly traded for a bar stool at Beer Boys or table at Tulley’s. If I am to be as high up into nothing (or everything?) as Nietzche’s ubermensch, I had better come up with a really good story to tell everyone when I come back down.