Picture taken by Monica ColonOh his smile! I wished I could have frozen the time to admire him forever. My hands were sweaty and my feet cold. I wanted to talk to him, but my lips could not stop smiling. The moment was awkward, and he continued walking toward the main door of the basilica. I saw him walk away from me. At that moment I knew the chances to finally meet and talk with my prince were almost impossible to happen. I was very disappointed and frustrated. I hated myself for being so shy. Suddenly, I had this impulsive feeling to run after him and tell him something… My friends found me. They were upset because I took my own route and left them behind. I apologized to them; nonetheless, I still wanted to leave them behind and run after my prince. After taking some pictures and walking around the basilica, we decided we were hungry. So, we left the church and walked away from the Vatican.
We ended up at Piazza del Poppolo and ate in “Babette Caffé & Ristorante,” an expensive restaurant but with excellent Italian food and wine. At that point, I did not care about my posture and eating manners. It was pointless pretending to be somewhat prince-like when my prince was not there. My friends noted my taciturn attitude and asked me what was wrong. I just smiled and said I was still amazed by the beauty of the Vatican and could not believe I was there. Nonetheless, my fake smile and deep sigh told the truth. My friends didn’t ask. They didn’t want my wandering and sadness to ruin their fun in Rome. I tried to keep up with their conversation about the romantic Rome during Christmas time. Suddenly, one of my friends asked me if I was homesick and missed my family. I nodded. That was a good excuse. I pretended to be sad by the fact it was Christmas, and my family was on the other side of the world.
I realized then how sad it was to actually spend my time and energy thinking about someone and be so obsessed about him to the point I forgot about my family; the people who always have been and will be there for me when I need them. In my head, I had created a fictitious person whom I thought was interested in me when in the real world, he probably had not even noticed me at all. How sad it was that moment of realization about my lack and need of love for someone that only existed in my head. It was sadder to realize that I had spent almost a whole paycheck on this trip and flown for about ten hours to understand I needed love. I had to stop thinking about that; otherwise, my whole trip would have been ruined by my pathetic thoughts. Therefore, I decided to keep having fun and visit the rest of la romantica Roma with my friends.
On our last two days in Rome, we visited Il Pantheon, Il Museo Vaticano, Piazza di fiori, where we ate a wonderfully and gloriously delicious gelato, and finally, Piazza di Spagna, Trastevere, and Villa Borghese Park, which was the last place we visited before we left Rome. We walked for hours admiring the tranquility and freshness of the park inside a very busy city. We felt as though Rome was giving us a break from the other tourists and the amazing buildings that have been touched by so many people during so many centuries. This park was the good-bys and the come-back-soon from this dreamy city. At that point, I was resigned to keep on my journey to Spain. I had to leave my prince behind with Rome and just keep this amazing adventure in my journal as a simple nice Europe-trip story.
At the Fiumicino Airport, my friends and I were waiting to depart to Madrid. We were going to spend New Year’s Eve there. We could not be more excited about that. After two hours waiting, we finally boarded the plane and found our seats, one in each row. I wished my friends to have a nice trip and sat down on the seat next to the window. I pulled out my book, “Love in Times of Cholera” by Garcia Marquez- one of my favorite authors, and started to read where I had left off: “To him she seemed so beautiful, so seductive, so different from ordinary people, that he could not understand why no one was as disturbed as he…” I was interrupted by this person who was putting his luggage in the overhead compartment. I could not see his face till he sat down. I closed the book, sat up straight, and fixed my glasses. It was my prince! It was him sitting next to me. Good heavens! My heart started beating like crazy and my blood stopped flowing to my legs as they froze. NO! This time I was not going to act like an idiot! Destiny, or rather, sublime Destiny had brought my prince back to me to give me a last chance to hide my shyness and act… “cool.” Dear Lord! What is cool anyway? Would that help catch his attention? “Sagrado Corazón, ¿que hago?” I thought. I sighed heavily and reopened my book to pretend to be reading again: “but he did not dare approach her for fear of destroying the spell.”
We ended up at Piazza del Poppolo and ate in “Babette Caffé & Ristorante,” an expensive restaurant but with excellent Italian food and wine. At that point, I did not care about my posture and eating manners. It was pointless pretending to be somewhat prince-like when my prince was not there. My friends noted my taciturn attitude and asked me what was wrong. I just smiled and said I was still amazed by the beauty of the Vatican and could not believe I was there. Nonetheless, my fake smile and deep sigh told the truth. My friends didn’t ask. They didn’t want my wandering and sadness to ruin their fun in Rome. I tried to keep up with their conversation about the romantic Rome during Christmas time. Suddenly, one of my friends asked me if I was homesick and missed my family. I nodded. That was a good excuse. I pretended to be sad by the fact it was Christmas, and my family was on the other side of the world.
I realized then how sad it was to actually spend my time and energy thinking about someone and be so obsessed about him to the point I forgot about my family; the people who always have been and will be there for me when I need them. In my head, I had created a fictitious person whom I thought was interested in me when in the real world, he probably had not even noticed me at all. How sad it was that moment of realization about my lack and need of love for someone that only existed in my head. It was sadder to realize that I had spent almost a whole paycheck on this trip and flown for about ten hours to understand I needed love. I had to stop thinking about that; otherwise, my whole trip would have been ruined by my pathetic thoughts. Therefore, I decided to keep having fun and visit the rest of la romantica Roma with my friends.
On our last two days in Rome, we visited Il Pantheon, Il Museo Vaticano, Piazza di fiori, where we ate a wonderfully and gloriously delicious gelato, and finally, Piazza di Spagna, Trastevere, and Villa Borghese Park, which was the last place we visited before we left Rome. We walked for hours admiring the tranquility and freshness of the park inside a very busy city. We felt as though Rome was giving us a break from the other tourists and the amazing buildings that have been touched by so many people during so many centuries. This park was the good-bys and the come-back-soon from this dreamy city. At that point, I was resigned to keep on my journey to Spain. I had to leave my prince behind with Rome and just keep this amazing adventure in my journal as a simple nice Europe-trip story.
At the Fiumicino Airport, my friends and I were waiting to depart to Madrid. We were going to spend New Year’s Eve there. We could not be more excited about that. After two hours waiting, we finally boarded the plane and found our seats, one in each row. I wished my friends to have a nice trip and sat down on the seat next to the window. I pulled out my book, “Love in Times of Cholera” by Garcia Marquez- one of my favorite authors, and started to read where I had left off: “To him she seemed so beautiful, so seductive, so different from ordinary people, that he could not understand why no one was as disturbed as he…” I was interrupted by this person who was putting his luggage in the overhead compartment. I could not see his face till he sat down. I closed the book, sat up straight, and fixed my glasses. It was my prince! It was him sitting next to me. Good heavens! My heart started beating like crazy and my blood stopped flowing to my legs as they froze. NO! This time I was not going to act like an idiot! Destiny, or rather, sublime Destiny had brought my prince back to me to give me a last chance to hide my shyness and act… “cool.” Dear Lord! What is cool anyway? Would that help catch his attention? “Sagrado Corazón, ¿que hago?” I thought. I sighed heavily and reopened my book to pretend to be reading again: “but he did not dare approach her for fear of destroying the spell.”
“¿Pero lees García Marquez?” My prince asked with his tender, Spaniard, and masculine voice.
“Santo Dios del Cielo, he is asking me something. I need to respond now! Say something for crying out loud! Be cool though! Cool? Gosh! Stop talking to yourself and answer him the damned question!”
“Si, García Marquez es mi escritor favorito.” I told him as serene as I could ever have possibly been considering that he was so close to me.
“¡Vaya, que bien!” He replied as he took out his earphones to listen to his music.
I thought, “Great! This is just perfect! He’s going to listen to his music, and this is the end of the conversation.” Somehow, I felt relieved that he was not going to continue asking me questions, but at the same time, I really wanted him to keep talking to me so that I could continue admiring his prince-like face and voice with a seductive Spanish accent. I kept reading without actually paying attention to the story. My eyes were just staring at the page while my mind was set up on wanting him to keep asking me questions. The plane took off.
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