Looking for Something That’s Already Found Us

“We're reaching for death

On the end of a candle
We're trying for something
That's already found us” (Jim Morrison – Freedom Exists)

I’ve traveled a bit to find my heart. I traveled from country to country, continent to another continent, one mountain peak after another, just in search of that one place – twin to my heart.

With every trip, I hope that I will hear back that echo that my heart puts out into the world. Sometimes I think I hear it, and it quickly fades away. I cannot positively tell you that I have ever heard the true one, the one I have looked for since the day I was born.

This past month I went back to that beginning place we all have: the one we are born in. I can only picture that first day when I came into the world: atop of a hill in my home town, at the top floor of a maternity hospital, the first child of very young parents – however many hopes and dreams they were building upon that little bundle of flesh! It was a snow-day, I am told, cold and surprising in the middle of April. Sometimes I think: quite like myself.

Every time I go back I wonder: am I truly home? Or am I visiting? And I can never truly answer that question for myself. God only knows what is in my heart when I go back. Most times I think that if it were not for people related to me being still alive and still there, I would never go back – not even every 10 years to visit. I never understood people who are born and raised in America that want to visit far away countries just because their ancestors come from there … I find no interest anymore in my own country. That is until I actually go back.

This year, I was blessed enough to go with my sister. The bond we have had through the years transported us back straight in the middle of our childhood: going to the same schools together, eating from both ends of the same loaf while walking around the city and hopping around pot holes while chased by stray dogs, eating street food, stopping for a cold beer when we got tired, or a latte at the new fancy mall which also harbors a Starbucks nowadays.

Once I was there, my heart was beating in unison with everything else around me. Every barking dog, every honking (for no reason at all) car, every speeding tram, the churches, the cobblestone streets, every person who opened our doors to visit us – they bore such familiarity that all of a sudden not only my heart, but my whole body just melted in the fabric of my home town and home life … The smells were familiar, the tastes of every food – so different than mine at my own house now, although I cook by the same recipes – everything was like an extension of my own body. I, once again, belonged.

We wandered around old streets where we used to live, or went to school. We shopped till my toes were the size of walnuts. We crisscrossed the entire downtown and spent hours in book stores and cafes … We ate, we laughed, we remembered where we came from and how incredulous our lives’ journeys have been – how different and yet how much the same in many ways – driven by the same principles we were shaped in. America and Canada were in the rear-view mirror and we were once again … home.

Then, there were the parents – the main reason we ever go back, really. They are not old by age (they never have been! They are still the young parents of my birth, in my head), but they are aged beyond their years, with heavy decaying health burdens to bear. We fight, almost every time we go there. We argue, we criticize our mutual choices, and we hug, and we laugh, and at the end of a teary and sobbing argument, we love each other. At the end of every tiresome and restless and commotion-full, overly dramatic day, when I look into their eyes, it’s like I look into a mirror. They make me crazy and angry and they also give me an identity. It makes me happy that somehow I know where this crazy, unruly heart of mine comes from.

This year, more than ever, seeing them was both a desperate cry for gratitude of being with them for a few days (who knows when the last visit will ever be?!) and a scream for help! I want to do more. I want to turn back time to the day when my dad was young and playing badminton with us, or hiking mountains for mushrooms, and mom was happy jumping waves with us at the beach. Happy and smiling, with big dimples and blue eyes. They are tired and curmudgeonly now. Their lives lost to many hard and what they consider lonely years.

I am still not sure where my heart belongs. Being of Gypsy blood it is probably my curse to keep looking. I am still lured by many corners of the world, and by meeting and knowing other people … But just now, this month, I found one thing for sure: I may not know where my heart belongs where it will end up, but I know where its roots are. I know the place that it stubbornly hangs on to, the earth where its roots stubbornly spread, beyond extrication … I know where my heart’s foundation is – and that’s enough for now.

Seafood street food

The Pope was visiting my home town of Iasi right as we were visiting

Old Communist crumbling mess of a block. I cannot believe, each time, that these structures are still standing today. 

More Communist "beauties" lines up on the shore of a very much redesigned Bahlui bench. The river looks so posh nowadays - a far cry from the dirty, smelly mess that it was back in my childhood - no concrete edges then, either ... 

My parents' kitchen has a microwave, two ice-free refrigerators and many other utilities of the modern era. However, they still grind their veggies and meats by hand, with a manual grinder. 

We celebrated The Ascension when we were there. It is almost like a Second Easter for us. 

The entrance to one of the many blocks my sister and I grew up in

Our high school 

I was blown away how long Romania has come in the matters of making recycling available. Much, much, much more modern than anywhere else I have lived in The States. 

Our elementary school. 

A "simigerie" which is a bakery that makes these fresh hard pretzel-like wonders covered in poppy seeds. My friend who is Turkish calls these "simit" - and now I know where the word for the place comes from. Most likely the same root. 

My home town of Iasi seen from above - you can see the Palace of Culture somewhere in the center of this picture

Almost perfect example (minus the pizza) of a Romanian appetizer platter: meat, cheese, fat back and more meat ... 

With my sister in front of The Palace of Culture - downtown Iasi

"Tochitura modoveneasca" - one of the most traditional Romanian dishes: slow cooked pork meat, fried egg, a big chunk of aged cheese and "mamaliga" (a type of polenta). 

The utra-urbanized Iasi (the power lines are in my parents' yard) in the sunset

An attempt to copy the Western World - an English named B&B

This was the year of the snails ... 

Sights around downtown Iasi.

Click the picture to view the entire album from this trip