Meeting San Telmo

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I arrived at my new place around 11:30 today and I love it. Everyone seems friendly. There is Julia who greeted. I was suppose to share a room with Ed and Lee but was put with Barbara instead. Lee seemed a bit disappointed. I also met the German (I think) couple who are in the room on the street.

The people are friendly but I am feeling quiet. Its funny knowing who I am...loud and full of life...perhaps a little too typically American and here I am just the opposite. I feel like I am playing a trick on them and will pull out all the stops when they are least expecting it. I will blow in, crushing open the doors and leaving them tossled and frantic. (I love the idea of leaving people frantic.)

After I read a little I decided to meet the neighborhood. Today is Sunday and Sunday in San Telmo means the antique fair. The streets around Plaza Dorrego are buzzing with tourists and the streets around the plaza are crammed with someones once love things. This place is like I always imagined a flea market should be. Stalls filled with old glass seltzer bottles, linens, jewerly, anything metallic, books, records and to my surprise many old photographs. I dont think I love anything more than old photos, or should I say photos without a home and someone to love them. (Many of you know about my obessesion with finding photographs on the street.)

I want nothing more then to gather all of the orphaned photos in the world and give them a purpose again. Homeless photos are memories that someone has taken the liberty of deciding arent worth having around. These unwanted photos remind me of our rejection of history and civilizations constent flux. Purhaps one day I will be canonized the patron saint of old photographs. The first noncatholic saint. If I became the patron saint of lost photos you would see pictures of a likeness of me. My face would be softer and glowing. My eyes would be sad and down cast, yet I would be at peace..... Not to mention I would not have cowlick in my pictures, thusly my bangs would swoop effortlessly to the right of my face....and my hair would be a little wavier as well. While we are at it my lips would be fuller and red. I would be taller and although you would not see it I would not have the annoying mole on my back that catches everything.....Surrounding me would be ancient photos that for fear of them crumbling would pick up delicately. These photos would be my lambs - the defenseless that I would save.



(Right now I am sitting in a restaurant and the woman in front of me looks like Rebecca, Uncle Jessies wife from Full House. This look alike reminds me that yes, we do live in a "full house"...this world of ours.)


One more thing about the antique fair. The smell. At home antiques smell musty and unpleasant. You really have to ignore the smell of antique because seriously, who wants stinky musty things in there house? They may look great but they stink. But here...although this is an outdoor maret the antiques smell almost sickeningly sweet. As though they were held to an old womans breast for too long. The smell makes them all so welcoming. It make me want to hug my great grandma. To smell her sweet powdered body and be comforted.

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