Wednesday July 1st
It is good to return here to solid ground. To have a room with walls to lean against, to shelter from a storm, to feel, for a moment, alone after shared spaces of different kinds. To pack, unpack, repack time and experience. A bit nostalgic. To sleep well and long. To meet familiar faces and spend deep, calm time with them, everyone with room to be independent. The village tends to go to sleep together in the worrying heat of these latest afternoons. Individual beds wake up again around the same time, either to come together for something partly communal — sewing, swimming, cooking, writing, walking, working, gardening etc. — or to be, do, work or plan and organise alone. It is comforting to know there is always a hum in the background, for someone who likes to be at once together and alone. Note: they live and work here in Topolò, I drop in, pass by. To me special and different, for them perhaps simply ordinary.
Last time I was here the echoing hollow of the woodpecker’s knock was my favourite sound. It would cut through the silence of early spring in an insistent, direct but friendly way. Now he has moved more to the background — bright, chirping sounds, the constant rush of the river and the rustle of heavy, swaying, summer leaves take up much more space than him, filling up the empty hollow of before. We all waited for a strong wind to come blow the sweltering heat somewhat aside for time to be able to work, to weed and be outside in a more comfortable way. The sweet smell of ripening figs interrupts the sweep of the broom as I clear away the fallen leaves blown in from the storm.
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If you click on the sliding, orange icon with my name on it at the bottom of the Robida website at a time when I happen to be in Topolò, you will land on a biography written with the help of a dear friend. Amongst other traits, you will find that I am an avid list maker and that I also pretend to be a cowboy. Horses aside, there is something that I love about both the swag and the freedom a cowboy supposedly has, and I smile at the ridiculousness of me trying to emulate something as cringe and inappropriate as a cowboy. Lists are another thing.
One morning Vida and I were quietly drinking green tea while working side by side at their round table. She glanced over to see me editing said bio and was quick to say “I am bad at writing bios, but I am good at life.” I found this an interesting juxtaposition — the fact that a biography diffuses life to a mere sentence or two whereas taking care of a good life seems to me something rather large to accomplish. I was curious to know her method; does she make sure to make well thought through decisions, keep certain rituals, find examples, does she enjoy guilty pleasures, does she move and take care of her body in a certain way, does she reach to others for advice?
She brushed off this comment as though it was the most normal thing to say but I insisted on asking how she got there. Her answer was plain and simple: “I just don’t dwell too much on things that make me feel bad, also, of course, seeing this as a fault.” I am not sure if I am convinced. She seems to me to be someone who pays attention to detail and to the underlying roots of many different things. Perhaps she has a way of allowing what she needs to go in one ear and out the other, not holding grudges, maybe just keeping the good remnants of her experiences close. Superficial in a positive sense; one that can take care of her needs. Who am I to know — to each their very own, specific emotional landscape to unfold. I learn a little, from her.
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Aljaž caught me out on the cowboy thing, possibly later that same afternoon. He asked whether I had actually ever seen any of the classic Western films to which my blushed cheeks probably gave the answer. We watched one and then another. Elena R. got surprisingly hooked too. The opening scene of Once Upon a Time in the West (Sergio Leone, 1968) made a lasting imprint and hung around in my imagination for a good while, close to the place where the cowboy fantasies reside. In the weeks that followed, several people had to endure me explaining its details at length, as I tend to do.
The scene is about fourteen minutes long and moves through very slow footsteps yet is full of suspense. The floors and doors of a sleepy train station creak with every move; whizzing desert winds, desolate chirping birds, close ups of worn out faces and dusty pores, eyes moving from under their wide brimmed hats glance over at each incoming sound. The characters all display a patience that is impressively calm and inventive, yet at the same time tense with anticipation of what could come barreling around the corner. Stance: one bootleg always forward, one hand to the hip. One man cracks his pending knuckles, another seeks to resolve the irritation behind a buzzing fly that lands on his twitching cheeks while a third allows the constant drip, drip, drip of a leak to slowly fill the rim of his hat with just enough water to tip towards his lips and quench his thirst with a sip. Sensory interruptions to their waiting are the only sounds that break apart the silence. That is, until the steaming arrival of a train and its lone passenger, introducing the eerie sound of Harmonica’s tune — a melody that sounds on repeat throughout the entire film. And then, of course, the gunshots begin.
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Something I enjoy doing compulsively is to make lists. I do it to create order out of chaos and to diffuse different threads of thought into some sort of comprehensive overview. In times of overwhelm, I know it helps me to calm down, understand where I stand and where I am heading. I do lists to figure out what I need for a meal, a day, a period of time. To remember things, notice and to take note. They can refer to very mundane, direct and practical matters, or longer, deeper stretches.
We discussed this together, Vida, Elena R. and I — the way that lists state the obvious, the thing, the “what” and not so much the “why”. Sometimes I also write like this; simply summing up the parts without really going underneath. I did it just before, by summing up the opening scene of a film, just because I enjoyed doing so. I don’t mind this, and aesthetically, I like the way lists look and also how they sound when spoken out loud.
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Over time I’ve noticed how spaces tend to shrink and swell. Last year I lived in a big and magical building in Amsterdam with endless ceilings and seventeen other people, young and older. When I arrived there, beautiful as it was, I remember finding echoes in the hallways and feeling quite small sitting in the corner of the sofa with a ceiling above me that would not stop. Slowly, as I got to know the sounds, people and have my own experiences, the building started to become comforting — a place I could inhabit with a more fitting size. It started to feel more like an envelope than a frame. This sensation of a place drawing nearer repeats over time, with each new place I inhabit, with each path towards a riverbed or up a hill that I repeat. It has also happened in Topolò — once confused by the many options to find a pool by the river, now found clearer.
As someone who often struggles to find orientation — whether in a literal or existential sense — lists offer a framework for dreams to project outwards. While what is around the corner remains unknown, once put in place these landmarks for needs and desires offer a space for details to develop. As the list unfolds and adapts, understanding finds room to develop, remembering details along the way. It can be as simple as an undefined cowboy fantasy unfolding over time into horseback trips, film screenings and car rides — expansive experiences that would have never happened, had I not put cowboy somewhere on a list in my head.
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“I perceive value, I confer value, I create value, I even create — or guarantee — existence. Hence, my compulsion to make “lists.” The things (Beethoven’s music, movies, business firms) won’t exist unless I signify my interest in them by at least noting down their names. Nothing exists unless I maintain it (by my interest, or my potential interest). This is an ultimate, mostly subliminal anxiety. Hence, I must remain always, both in principle + actively, interested in everything. Taking all of knowledge as my province.” (Susan Sontag, 1976)
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I am curious what Vida, Aljaž and Elena R. think of all of this, after the conversations and giggles we shared together not so long ago. Perhaps they, or anyone else called to, will write back!
