A kaleidoscope of beautiful thoughts swirl around my morning mind. Soaking in the mood of pleasantness created by the smell of coffee, flowers and the way air feels when darkness is extinguished by the first streaks of light.
I have been lucky enough to visit some beautiful places this past year. One of the best parts of traveling is reliving the feelings imprinted from certain moments. Often in the mornings, I relive such experiences with not one detail escaped. When the world of slumber is not too distant, certain smells, or the way light hits a leaf can have the power to transcend space and time.
So it is in the summertime when school is out and I have no particular place to be, one of my favorite hobbies is loitering. Loitering outside in remote corners of the island, on cliff sides with goats, empty beaches with crabs, or in cafes drinking unnecessary amounts of coffee. Catching snippets of others conversations, laughing to myself in silent amusement. Like the couple who were so delighted by their baked to perfection ginger cookie that they just had to have another.
Or a conversation I had with an Astrobiologist(Never knew such a field of study existed) about growing vegetables in space, the way dust is dispersed throughout our galaxy and the human threshold for sanity in isolated conditions. It has been concluded that 8 months time is about how long it takes for otherwise sane individuals to digress into “Lord of the Flies” type behavior patterns.
I just finished reading a book called "I Served the King of England" by Bohumil Hrabal, highly recommended! One of my favorite passages:
“He had an aristocratic habit of spending practically everything he earned, and now and then he would treat himself the way our guests did, but he'd always have so much money left over that he'd arouse the innkeeper of the emptiest inn in the village and order him to go wake up some musicians to play for him.
Then Zdenek would go from door to door and invite the sleepers to come down to the inn to drink to his health, and then the music played and there was dancing till dawn, and when they'd drain the innkeeper's bottles and barrels dry, Zdenek would wake up the owner of the grocery store, buy a whole basketful of jars, and pass them out as gifts to all the old women and men. He paid not only for everything they drank in the pub, but for all the jams and jellies and everything he'd given away. Then, when he finally spent everything, he'd laugh and was satisfied. At that point, his favorite trick was to pat his pockets looking for matches, then he'd borrow twenty hellers from someone, buy matches , and light his cigarette. Then we'd drive off with the musicians still playing for us, and if there was time, Zdenek would buy up all the flowers in the flower shop and scatter carnations, roses, and chrysanthemums.
The musicians would follow us to the edge of the village, and the automobile, garlanded with flowers, would take us back to the Hotel Tichota, because that day, or rather that night was our day off.”
