Ex-pat nightmares

I find reading about Europe now to be a bit insufferable, because I don't think I'll ever be able to really live there at this point and just want to block it out. It's funny how a dream can eventually turn into a nightmare you just want to completely avoid. I learned Italian and everything, in pursuit of my obsession with relocating to Europe, but it was all in vain. Citizenship is impossible. I know I'll never manage to get the correct documents gathered, to prove my bloodline is all Italian, and ...Christ ...it sure is depressing. It's weird to think I am essentially fluent in a language I can't really use. Like I could literally drop down in the middle of Rome right now and be totally fine, but I can't do it. It's impossible by law. And I just don't feel like breaking the law cause, in this modern age, what could I really do without the law on my side? Can't work, can't rent, and therefore can't eat. The ex pat dream, like everything else, is only reserved for the independently wealthy or those who can somehow obtain duel citizenship.

The duel citizenship thing especially pisses me off at this point, since it's all about documentation and specific little years. And most of the documents that are the hard ones to get are, strangely enough, all documents that the Italians themselves have probably lost. For example, I know for a fact that I can get every document that was pressed in the US-- but I'm not so sure I can get the ones that were pressed in Italy, in the late 1800s. For starters I don't know the town and even if I did, the Italians probably lost them (I've heard this story many times). This is really annoying because, basically, I'm sitting here with American documents that say Italian names and all that, but the modern Italians still don't believe me, that the ancestor was Italian, unless I can find proof in their country. Isn't it a bit ridiculous?

If you don't think that is absurd, how about the other thing I found out, which is this: When I first started talking about all this dual citizenship stuff, an aunt in the family mentioned to me how she knew an old uncle who had, years ago, already collected all the necessary information, from her particular side of the family. She gave me a copy of the big book he'd put it all in and I looked it over. My aunt (still unaware) would actually be able to get citizenship through the documents this guy collected. But not me, because I'm from the wrong side, by way of a female. I'm not going to go in depth but basically how it works is that the Italian government doesn't allow you to claim citizenship by a female line. Apparently it's not considered real. Imagine that? Females are the ones who fuckinh give birth but somehow it isn't real to claim it this way. So I can't get it. Amazing no? Fucking Italians. Fuck them and their old ways. The only reason I wanted to live their was just because of escape anyways. Had nothing to do with them! Noting at all (so i tell myself).

Like, I think a lot of people in my life rreally believe that I saw something “particular” in Italy, but I don’t think i ever really did, looking back. All i ever really saw was a country that looked like a decently far enough place to escape to. Italy is fairly mysterious for most Americans, certainly the poor assholes i grew up with, and essentially all i wanted was to vanish into acloud of darkness and mystery, for those assholes. In the end, I know that was literally all it had to do with, mostly because, these days, i realize that i don’t mind one bit living “here or there”. I just want to live very far away from all the “original people” i knew years and years ago. Like Jen for example. I hate the thought that I Live only 30 minutes from her house. I hate the thought that Jen knows where I live, and that I have a country in common with her, and probably always will. Talking in Italian, and possibly living in the country, offered me an escape from shit like that. I never wanted to have to think i was sharing anything with any of the assholes i have known. My idea for Italy was that i’d only make a few friends there (as all friends eventually ruin all things for you) and i would live in tranquility, just working some crappy job and writing all night. It would have...and still could be...bliss. I mean, duel citizenship isn’t necessarily totally ruled out yet.It just seems highly unlikely.

Don’t you think it’d be so fun to escape without a trace, tho, in the eyes of everyone who once knew you, especially who you don’t like anymore? I simply adore the idea of totally slipping out of everyones sight, and tehm not having any real idea what happened to me. “Did he go to Italy? I think they said he moved there but...has anyone heard from him? Is he on Facebook?”

I will be on Facebook, maybe, but only for my new Italian frriends, and under a new name. So no one will be able to track me down. I’ll just be lost to them. They’ll never know when i died, or where. Absolutely nothing. Stupid fucking pricks they all were, Jen especially. She’d be 70 years old wondering if i was still around somewhere. She’d have no idea i died 30 years earlier, when we hit our 40s. A train crash in Florence! I’m buried in an unknown grave.

Ya i don’t know. What was i saying at first? Oh yeah...thinking of Europe now man...it just pisses me off, cause I know i’m trapped here. Trapped as a poor boy in the USA...forced to play my hand here, like all the rest of you shits.