Monday November 20. A friend once told me the story of spending a semester in Spain. When she returned, she found a box of ginger snaps in her parents’ cupboard – the same box she had left seven months earlier, sitting in the exact same spot. This is how I feel today, having returned to the United States for the first time since I moved to Bulgaria in late April; the familiarity, the immutability is both reassuring and disappointing. The same thick morning fog engulfs the San Francisco Bay and I know that, despite its seeming resilience, it will give way to crisp sunshine by midday. It is still possible to bask in and reflect back the kindness of Berkleyites in Birkenstocks who order their fair trade non-fat lattes “para llavar” from the Mexican guy in Espresso Roma. Do not get me wrong – I write this the way Jewish people can joke about their Jewishness in ways that would not be kosher had they come from the mouth of a non-Jew; I am a sworn Berkleyite, in pose and in conviction, though my ear has gotten a bit unused to the occasional shrillness of casual greetings.
Tuesday 21. Once again, writing letters. Short notes like breaths. It makes me giddy.
Wednesday 22. Bloomingdale’s has opened in downtown San Francisco and Liz, in her inimitable mixture of frugality and generosity, has bought a two-for-the-price-of-one spa package. She wants to treat me to a massage and I’m still looking for a way to refuse her offer without hurting her feelings. I got my first professional massage at the far-from-tender age of 23 in Calistoga, a northern California spa town. Have you ever been confronted with a place setting that involved three forks, two spoons, two knives and maybe some utensils that you didn’t know how to name and wondered which one you should use when? Okay, that’s uncomfortable, but at least you can lean back on the rule of thumb advising you to start from the outside and work your way in, leaving what’s parallel and in front of you for the very last. Then, you can count on wine loosening the grip of manners.
I had neither Martha wisdom nor a drink to help me through my first massage. The dimmed lighting and the overstated discreetness seemed to call attention not diffuse it. My masseur took an exceptionally long time to explain to me that I should undress and slip under the white sheets while he waits outside. He then knocked and asked whether it was okay that he comes in. He asked me what type of massage I wanted, and all of a sudden I was too embarrassed to admit I didn’t know what types there were. What followed was an intricate dance around my body that involved a constant folding and rearranging of the white sheet, so that at any given point of time my breasts, bottom and pelvic area were to be covered in the crisp white sheet, while the masseuse knitted, threaded and rubbed the rest of my flesh.
I’ve sashayed though my share of luxury since then, be it dinner at Mark Meneau’s three-Michelin-star restaurant L’Esperance a Vezelay or manicure at the Claremont Spa. Still, I could never quite get comfortable being pampered that way. There is something disturbing about the servitude that surrounds you, something that makes me feel false. I could never quite master that manner of entitlement that the situation seems to call for. Maybe it’s those proletarian genes embedded in my DNA.
I still get massages. But my masseuse greets me and sends me off with a warm embrace; she hands my my clothes, so that I don’t step on the cold tile barefoot; she knows when the magazine goes to print and sends greetings to my boyfriend; and I love the fresh-laundry smell of her wrinkled multicolored sheets.
Thursday 23. I am staying at my friend Herb’s. He is cooking the Thanksgiving meal, adding a Pacific Coast twist to the stuffing recipe in the form of smoked oysters. Having agreed to grant him exclusive kitchen access (it didn’t really take much persuasion), I’ve settled on the couch with Sue Monk Kidd’s The Mermaid Chair. I’ve never been very partial to Thanksgiving or roasted turkey, but the mood’s infectious today. I savour Herb’s enthusiasm and the way the day stretches quietly, lazily; confident in its promise. And then it descends upon me, a sense of feeling perfectly content.
Friday 24. I wake up needing to call Svetlyo. That hasn’t changed either – the same longing and the phone’s utter inadequacy in ever conveying it.
For at least two years, international calling was a major line item in my household budget. Before I figured out to make unlimited calls at a flat rate, I spent more money on calling Bulgaria than I did on food and clothes, but I also needed to talk to him more than I needed food or clothes.
Sunday 26. Coming here has been like bungee jumping. A tinge of ambivalence is inherent even in the lifesaving moment, when the flight reaches its outer limit and what one has left behind tugs on her. But it is ultimately something I am delighted to experience. I give in to that tug with abandon.
