These days. I should be thinking of Halloween but I am not. I am thinking of time. The way that time exists within a pocket called perception, the way the Earth turns toward the sun and away from it simultaneously creating both day and night, yesterday and tomorrow. The way that Italy is seven hours ahead of me so that when I lie awake at night trying to sleep at eleven pm- It is morning of the next day in Rome and Florence and Venice. There is a Cathedral in Venice that is so magnificient you want to lie down to look at frescoes on the ceiling. But you do not. You crane your neck and look up and up and up for a long time and think about time. How old they are and how old Venice is and how old your mother is sleeping a day away. And you smile at the very, old woman sitting by the door with white hair as you leave and you say, Grazie when you leave as you drop a dollar in the collection box and you want to say more things but you do not speak Italian and she does not speak English. You know this because you tried to tell her how beautiful and how much you love the cathedral and how much you love your Mother and how much you love God also and you think she would understand all these things because she has white hair and she comes everyday with her rosary and sits by the door and works for God for free. So, you say what you can and leave with a sense of wonder at the all of it and a sense of loss that you can not speak Italian and you do not live in Venice because it is not your life. It is someone else's. so, you go wandering and discover the tiniest bar you have ever seen on the plaza by the cathedral. It is open already and it is packed. There is standing room only and outside there are wine barrels where you can put your tiny plate holding a tiny sandwich of meat and cheese and bread along with a tiny glass of wine even though it is six am and it doesn't matter because it's still last night where you came from. The two brothers who own the shop close at two pm to go sking because that is their life, not yours and the place is local for locals and you are fortunate to have found it. You know this very, well. So, you stand outside and you drink their wine and listen to the Cathedral bells and want to call your Mother to tell her about all of this. About the frescos and the old woman, and the brothers and their wine and the shop. About the old men all gathered, standing, telling stories and laughing and speaking in a language you don't understand that sounds like the most beautiful music but you can not because she is still in yesterday and you have stumbled into tomorrow.