The end of a Sabbatical

Fifth time back, but still love pictures in front of the Colosseum

It was about June last year when we were discussing the concept of this entire plan.

“A year? You want to take a year off?”
“At least.” he said.

Where is this coming from? I said more to myself than to him because I knew his answer would be, I don’t know. He is not the introspective type. But despite where it came from, the pebble was rolling and quickly picking up weight on the way down. By July, it was a boulder and there was no stopping it.

I was hesitant. I was very hesitant. Italy felt more and more like home. I finally lived in an apartment of my own furnishings and decoration. I had a job where I felt needed. And though it had been a hard year for a variety of reasons, I was more in the mindset of keep your head down, and work harder. I had been doing that for months.

Most of the time, when there's a will, there is a way. But sometimes willing it, is just not enough. I couldn’t change all of my circumstances by willing them. So I finally agreed to stop the current tide and start something new. Who knew, maybe it would create a different, welcomed ripple in our future.

Our emptied apartment in Rome

So in Summer 2015 we told our work places that we were leaving Rome. We gave up our apartment, sold our car and furniture, packed up most of our possessions, threw out the rest, closed our bank accounts, shipped 400 kilos of stuff to North America, put it in a U-haul towed it 10 hours to Montreal to set up a new condo that we had bought in pre-construction, bought new furniture, unpacked the 400 kilos of stuff and probably another 100 kilos of my childhood things. Stopped everything and went to Vancouver, then came back to Montreal, then back to Baltimore. Went onto Central America: Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, then went back to Baltimore, collected my cat, drove back up to Montreal, finished setting up our condo, drove back to Baltimore, dropped off my cat, flew to Haiti, attended a wedding, then went down to South America: Cartagena, Bogota, Buenos Aires, Colonia, Santiago, Valparaiso, Vina del Mar, Mendoza, Santiago, Lima, Pisco, Paracas, Huacachina, Lima, Cusco, Aguas Calientes, Machu Pichu, Cusco, Lima, ended the trip with a week in Charleston, SC. Drove 10 hours back to Baltimore, picked up my kitty, drove another 10 hours back to Montreal, put up the last frames and touches on the apartment, and then undid it all to pack for Rome and start a shipment to go back to Italy.

Unpacking the shipments

Which is where we are now. 9 months later, it is all over. We went full circle and are back in Rome once more. Mind you, that was not the intention. The intention, as aforementioned, was to do something new after this sabbatical.

But fate had stepped in to say what our next step should be. While we were still on our travels, my husband got a call for a job in Rome and it was a hard one to turn down. We discussed it at length and, as I do, I thought about it even longer. But the answer was ultimately, yes.

When you decide to take a year off, you think that you have so much time. Surely, a sabbatical would allow you to accomplish everything you wished you had time to do: write a book, learn Spanish, visit all of Central and South America, catch up with old friends, spend time with family, find a miracle vet to cure my cat’s cancer, discover a new home, uncover my calling, reorganize everything I have ever owned and still have time to do yoga, a couple marathons and maybe learn croquet. (Just kidding about the croquet part, but you get the point). It doesn’t work that way. I made headway in a little of all of the above, but, as you can imagine, I did not complete any of the above.

I am not exactly fluent, but 4 weeks of Spanish is a good start

I will admit that I hoped it would be the eat-pray-love year that would turn my entire life around and lead us to a whole new reality: a new city, a new job, a new career, a new calling... a type of prize for having taken a leap of faith and trusting in life and fate. But maybe fate handing us back our old life is the prize. And maybe it is not our old life at all, but the newness we were craving. I hope so.

So despite everything that we tried to do, I am back in Rome for the fifth time. And the truth is, I am happy about it. I have proven that no matter what I do,  Rome will never be out of my system.

All roads lead to Rome. I couldn’t put it better myself.

I keep throwing coins in the Trevi Fountain. That must be the problem!