There are some who say, once you leave a person or a place you can never really return home. I am not one of those people. Home is a matter of the heart's perspective. It seems it is a bit like saying one can only find God in a church. Love is limitless.
I truly feel blessed to have grown up outside of this country. My life has been filled with a tapestry of experiences most are never offered and for that I'm incredibly appreciative. Still, I have known twinges of jealousy when I witness other people run into their childhood friends at the most random places. I will never know the taste of that reunion. Finding Julia allowed me to find home.
The day my sweetheart, John told me he was taking me Italy, I knew I had to find her, Julia, my other halfie. It is what we always called one another. I was on a mission. I sent out emails to every Julia and Rosa Colacino I could find. We had lost touch with each other right after high school, my family moving back to the US and hers, moving back to her father's home country of Italy. I intuitively knew she was still there. After about a week of sending out emails to every Colacino I could find, my mother stopped by one morning and said "you'll hear from her soon." She told me she had dreamed of Julia's father, Antonio and that in her dream he had said he would put us back together. The next day I was overwhelmed to find an email from my beloved, long lost friend. She signed it "love your other halfie." It had been 30 years since we had seen each other, 20 since we had spoken but she remembered!
We spent the first week in Rome exploring her beauty and her magic. Our hotel, the Albergo Del Senato, sat an arm's length away from the Pantheon. We filled ourselves with hours of exploration that opened our eyes and our hearts to the splendor that is Italy. My sight often veiled with tears and my heart silenced; filled with humbled reverence as we literally breathed in the art, history, culture and beauty of the eternal city.
After Rome was Pozzuoli. Pozzuoli is right outside of Naples and the former home of the beautiful Sophia Loren. On the train to Naples; the train to Julia, my mind was flooded with "what ifs" . . . "What if she didn't like me now?" " What if we were so different now that the time we had delegated to one another was filled with the kind of silence that leaves you wanting to fill the void but every spoken sound leaves you emptier?" Deep inside I knew I didn't have to worry but still I did. Moments before the train stopped, I received a text message from Julia "synchronize your hankies." I smiled. My stomach filled with frenzied butterflies. I stepped off of the train and into the smile of my childhood friend. "My buddy, my friend" she said in this adorable Australian accent that is laced with the song of Italy. She said this often during my time with her and each time she would wrap her arms around me, kiss me and leave me bathed in unconditional love.
The truth is from the moment I laid eyes on her; I saw her, I felt her and I knew that the path of our souls had never been broken. I marveled at the flashes of memories we shared, often coming simultaneously for no apparent reason and I marveled at how she still pursed her lips right before she found laughter. I admired quietly the depth of her love; not only for her family but her love of life. Julia is an atheist (my first) and so I remained silent, respectful and observant of her path; recognizing that love doesn't need a doctrine to be present in our hearts. Julia is the embodiment of kindness and her light and smile seemed to touch all those who walked in her proximity.
We moved through the liquidity of time. Time that could not contain our joy . . . it never could. I always say we fall in love when we feel like we are seen and loved despite ourselves. The key to love, being clear vision. In order to have clear vision we must be able to see with our eyes closed and our hearts open. Falling in love is not bound to the romantic heart and we often lose so much of life because we idolize this kind of love and in the process we fail to see the beauty of all love's faces.
As I write this, I find myself struggling to adequately describe the depths of the days Julia and I shared. In Naples, we laughed and ate the world's best pizza. In Pompeii, we marveled at a world frozen in time. Along the Amalfi Coast, we lived each moment in the moment, trapped in the dressings of sheer joy. The profound and the divine are often found in the simple. We were as children and we remain synchronized. Time isn't linear and yet in these physical shells our souls chose to inhabit, we are on the most primal of levels bound to its limitations.
I have carried Julia in my heart since I was seven. Proximity and time could not wear that love thin. The cords binding us are stronger than this or now or even tomorrow because they are love.
Julia is driving down the Amalfi coast, singing Coldplay. I am silent, soulful and content. I'm trying to soak in every note, sound, sight and smell. My heart is so full it starts to escape through my eyes. Julia turns, looks at me, grabs my hand, and I see my tears and my joy mirrored in her beautiful face. We both say nothing, knowing words cannot know the sound our hearts make.
There are some who say, once you leave a person or a place you can never really return home. I am not one of those people. Home is a matter of the heart's perspective. Reunited with Julia and with myself, I found my home and my heart reborn in Italy.