October 13, 1991
Said goodbye to Patrick at two a.m. last night, in Paris, outside the Moroccan restaurant across the bridge where I’d spent three hours in a fog of cigarette smoke and animated conversation, drinking mint tea and trying to look as if I had any idea what anyone was saying. Said goodbye to Lobna this morning, on the sidewalk in front of her apartment in the 17th, in yet another scene that made me feel like I was living in a French movie. One short plane flight and one three-and-a-half-hour bus ride later, and here I am in a rented room in Señora Francisca Mesonero’s apartment on Calle Petunias in Salamanca, Spain, about to start a new life as a starving student. Class starts at 8:45 tomorrow morning.
Two weeks ago, Salamanca was a name on a map. I just can’t get over the way you can decide to do something and then the next thing you know, it’s really happening.
