I am underwater.. I need to come up for air but I decide to try to do the full length of the swimming pool thinking maybe it will help me wake up. I don’t know why I am so tired, it seems like I should be used to international travel – I have lived in Italy for over a decade. I shoot up from the chlorine filled water just as my lungs are about to explode. I cross my arms and lie them flat against the warm stone border of the pool resting my head on top. The sun is beating down on the cheek that is facing it. I think about my trip. About my mom. About how lucky we were that she finally recovered, the days and nights I spent worrying that she might not have. I think about the last day of my trip, organizing my mothers medicines, her rehabilitation classes, her discharge from the hospital. How I was able to get her settled in at home and fly out the next day. Denver – Atlanta, then Atlanta to Milan, driving straight to the South of France where I write this from. 29 hours of travel. 4 days of trying to get over the jet lag. I lift my head off my arms and go for another full length of our small pool..I don’t manage to get to the end before I get ambushed by my 4 and 6 year-old. Laughing and playing like crazy, they latch on to my neck and I pull them through the water.
Just another typical summer day..
italy with grace 