To my surprise I find myself jumping, skipping, dancing and prancing on the streets, on the stones in Padova.

A 3 Euro ticket and 40 minutes on a quiet train have brought me here, I never knew, to this old Italian university town, to a friend of a friend of a friend who has opened their home and now is hosting me for this entire weekend. We have barely said hello, I just went out for a moment to buy something for dinner (some pasta and veggies, maybe) but after having found the supermarket I wanted to walk just a bit more and now suddenly, I am dancing, jumping up on the bollards with a smile on my face. I feel ecstatic. That is the only word with which I can name this emotion.

…

I was actually low just a moment ago. Standing in the luxuriously hot shower I felt that I don’t want to go anywhere and may I just curl up here and sleep forever. And I thought that it made sense; I have been sleeping outside and I have been carrying heavy stuff for some time, I have been strained physically and emotionally. It is very understandable.

But now I am here and the sun is setting and everyone is out filling the stone streets and square with chatter and footsteps, and I think about a friend who sent me a video of him singing for my birthday from the other side of the Earth (him knowing that on my birthday I was alone) and I enter a bookshop not because I will buy anything but just to smell the books and everything, everything is just good, great and lovely.

…

I spend just the sweetest weekend in Padova. I am fully pampered and I lean into it; we take walks around town and I get to ask all my Venice-questions (“What happens when it rains?”, “Why did they build a city on water?”, “What do they do when it floods?”) and I am shown the history of Padova, told about Galileo Galilei and the old student associations, we talk about birds, eat ice cream and in the evening we go dancing, showing off our moves in an otherwise still hip hop concert (the bar staff thank us for the show). We compare our rock collections. And I am allowed the space to be my weird, wonky queer self and am met with nothing but love.
I find myself smiling, constantly, heart ready to burst and I keep trying to keep pace with myself: breathe, breathe, breathe.

…

Another dash of luck and it turns out that my new friend, being into outdoors and hiking, has two tents to spare of which I buy one. On Sunday evening I lie awake and contemplate the tricky knot of emotions I carry: the vibrancy of this weekend that my heart is beginning to digest. I am still so, so happy. And again I am scared. Once more I am in the limbo: not knowing where I will be the next day, shifting my sense of time into the mode of one-step-at-a-time, one-day-at-a-time, one-night-at-a-time. Knowing that I have a tent now helps. A lot. Still, I can once again not imagine how someone, ever, could pick me up and give me a lift. It’s like starting from zero: leaving a place where I feel happy and safe just never, ever seems to get any easier.

At least I get to learn this.

And I am grateful. So, so grateful for the circumstances that let me meet my friend here. So grateful for the internet that lets me keep in touch with people who are far away from me, but close in heart.

Life is huge. I wonder what will happen.

Curled up underneath the blankets in the dark room, I feel like a seed deep down in the Earth. As if I am something very, very small and all around me is bustling with life: roots growing, insects marching, water sinking, worms digging, rhythms of steps of creatures from far up above and the vague sound of boiling and rumbles from far, far below. There is so much movement and I don’t even know what is inside of me, what forces I hold and what shapes I will take.

All is potential.

…

(This story told in pictures.)