Most of the houses have beendug out from the ash, but the shapeof the mountain will neverbe the same in this lifetime: a jagged mouthwhere the peak blew off. The optical illusionis that the mountains never get closer or fartheruntil suddenly they rise up, icy...
Photo: Corrie Pappas My friend Alberto told me a ghost story once I’ll never forget. He works at the 12th-century Castello del Trebbio, outside of Florence. I wanted to find out more about the Pazzi family, who lived there in the 15th century. They were a banking...
of loadbearing supports and span-riseratios. Of harmonic proportionsand Pythagorean mysticism. I couldn’t marvel at the bright shops jutting from the Ponte Vecchiowithout a lecture on ancient architectureand the ongoing perils of gravity. I couldn’t wonder aloud how...
Photo: Luis García, CC BY-SA 3.0 ES, via Wikimedia Commons The square in Lavapiés quarter is a true crossroad, a slippery one, as a matter of fact. It’s a plaza that slides down or up, always depending on your point of view. It’s neither flat nor...
We enter a palace room for a second time, the one where stags holdsome of my ancestors’ names. So many mouths, some little flies. Camera catch the pitch of my smug.You try not to spout. My wet crest. The stags on a ceiling of gilded pens. So a lens under my chin makes...
On our last day in Lisbon, he wanted to find an Irish bar so that we could go and watch some rugby match that was on, but we were supposed to be learning to communicate, and like the therapist said, he was supposed to be listening to me and also hearing me. So when I...
