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When you were 16, what did you think your life would look like? Does it look like that? Is that a good thing?

My best memory of my sixteenth year was the day of my birthday. We were in Venice, Italy and my parents, my little sister and I spent the day roaming the city, taking a gondola ride and that night we had the most delicious meal at a small Italian restaurant. I remember the restaurant well because it was empty, except for the female waiters and us, I remember feeling a little ill at ease because the waiters seemed at a loss as to what to do with us, we were there to eat so early. I thought at one point that the ladies were going to come over and feed us, they wanted to serve us so badly and keep occupied. If ever you eat out in Italy, don’t go until eight or nine at night; don’t go at seven, the waiters won’t know what to do with you. It was a fantastic meal, I know that. I remember the first course because it was a seafood salad served in a gorgeous seashell standing up on the plate. I know that it was sublime but that is all that I remember of the restaurant. I remember leaving the restaurant. On the way out as I was following my parents, I felt eyes following me and I turned around and there was a handsome Italian sailor smiling at me, my mother rained on my parade when she took my hand and pulled me with her in the opposite direction. I got a chance to smile and wave at him and he blew me a kiss. I remember what I was wearing, I was wearing red sandals and a very pretty white dress with a red belt around the waist, the neck line had beautiful embroidery all around it. I felt quite pretty that day. Overall I would rate it as one of my favorite birthday memories.

As to the question of what I dreamed of becoming when I grew up, I am pretty sure that I was still planning to go into medicine at that time. I had always wanted to be a surgeon, ever since I was a little girl and that hadn’t changed until the year where I developed an essential tremor in my hands, at sixteen. The same year that I took chemistry and hated it and the same year that I became ultra-rebellious. I stopped planning for a career in surgery and I felt a little unmoored for that whole year. I didn’t get back on track until my senior year of high school. I had a lot of anger during my junior year in high school for a lot of reasons.

I’ll get back to this story some other time, I have a headache right now and it has been plaguing me for two days now. This story needs to be told headache free. On a happy note, Venice is truly a city to visit. I absolutely loved it!