Chapter 3

Day 14, San Sebastian.  Level of Spanish: A rollercoaster of a week has made me a little more aware of the mysteries of the language but, as the case tends to be with many other things in life, the more I learn the less I know. The school is not delivering what it promised me and I’m spending most of my free time either asleep or drinking beer on the beach, speaking English. In this town it is a waste of time to go out and try to mix with the locals. People live their lives within their own sections of the layercake, existing together in the polished baker’s window display but carefully avoiding blending in with the levels up and below. The barstaff greet us, and explain their offerings, in English.

Up to my room I can hear the cheerful chatter from the bars lining the streets six floors down. The last half hour of the day that doesn’t seem to be a day at all, it appears that Monday is just a stopgap for people to prepare themselves for the week ahead. The women’s laughter, the children’s yelps and the steady conversation of the men are spun into a gently pulsing backround noise while I wind in the net to inspect the results of the last week’s trawl. Most of it is squirming bycatch I wouldn’t feed to my worst enemy’s cat but there are some accidental gems to be appreciated.

I returned to Bilbao for the weekend to feel at home again. I sat on the streets, listened to the haunting rhythms and drank with the beautiful, dangerous people in the midst of their indefinite sadness and impenetrable barriers and smiled at life I couldn’t even begin to understand. I stumbled upon their sharp edges and suffered some minor scratches. I felt at home, wrapped myself in the mutual Northern stubbornness. The gardener had got lost deep in his own maze and could no longer tell reflection from reality, not seeing the fragments of his own beautiful mind slowly floating to the ground amongst the ash. Out of the four languages, none could patch up the hole it burned on its way down.

I cherish the newly familiar words and the ones to be discovered. 

It is time to start looking forward to another place to be called home.