The Heart of The Heel, Part II: Recycling Life Thematics

Then, as life will often have it, love entered, and the most crucial pivot of all landed her due north of her dreamed-of destination, in the heart of the heel. And just like that - the house expands. The work of being at home is now a lifelong project that involves the ongoing practice of take-off, landing, longing, and embracing the air space in between that allows for, and demands, a durable infrastructure of love.

Family, Home, Italy, Love, Puglia, Sense of Place, Tours, Travel, Writingandee sorensonMarch 15, 2019Traveling Nativehome, redlands, puglia, italy, writing, africa, love, familyComment

The Heart (and The Tart) of The Heel, Part I: Evoking The Magic of Puglia

While probing the Pugliese playground with her two young, sunlit daughters in tow, Hilaree evokes the magic, the color, and very often, the humor of her adoptive habitat on the Italian Adriatic through her photography and storytelling, and the through the turning of local fruits and fixings into art: @tartoftheheel.

Family, Art, Italy, Love, Puglia, Sense of Place, Travel, Tours, Writingandee sorensonMarch 5, 2019Traveling Nativetravel, italy, puglia, art, photography, baking, expatsComment

One Light

One light, two lights
Two bright
Oh light, how bright
Makes light more light

Family, Garfagnana, Italy, Writing, Tuscany, Loveandee sorensonMarch 4, 2019Traveling Nativepoetry, writing, light, italy, MovementComment

The Wanting Space (Revised)

Miles of trekking above the timberline to stockpile a vision

Tuned me in to the fertile valley of the deep,

Seasoned the endurance of my heart space,

And led me to this blooming meadow

Italy, Sense of Place, Travel, Writingandee sorensonFebruary 16, 2019Traveling Nativewriting, wanting, love, florence, italy, travel, poetry, homeComment

Bending into Blue: Epilogue to The Edge of Somewhere Deep

At a familiar rest stop on the runway facing the rainbow:

That colored airway that frolics from the edge

and bends across the the gorge of somewhere deep,

I sat with my travels.

On my lap, a stack of maps and notes

About take off and landing

And the sensation of buoyancy

That memorializes flight.

andee sorensonJanuary 25, 2019Traveling NativeComment

Oxygen to Embers, Revisited

With what little you offer

I restore years of wandering

Neither are you oxygen nor ember

But your hollow outline, poses my muse

From some desolate shore you keep me tethered

While I work into the night, arranging lightwood and tinder

With the sole purpose of allowing space

To host heat to become fire

andee sorensonNovember 13, 2018Traveling NativeComment

Ognissanti

I'm not ready for immersion but the feeling of these damp steps beneath me will become a perennial part of my being. I lift heavy hands to mouth thinking only about breaking suddenly into from veganism to vegetarianism. I taste nothing new. The sensation of being relinquished and forgotten here, deep in the fall, will stay with me for years.

Home, Italy, Tuscany, Sense of Place, Travel, Writing, Sienaandee sorensonNovember 1, 2018italy, siena, sense of place, home, arrivalComment

Translucence (Revisited)

In my translucence

I gather kindling,

clean the fireplace,

and sweep the hearth

of a fire that needs no nurturing.

andee sorensonMay 12, 2018Traveling NativeComment

Envelope

I don’t want to kiss you

But the memory of a kiss lights our outline.

We are newborn friends with matching hips

And I feel your ascending exterior as we continue to turn.

Rounding each corner becomes better than the kiss

It becomes the kiss,

The opening of doors:

One at the cheek

One at the belly

andee sorensonMay 5, 2018Traveling NativeComment

Arrival Day, Tasting Puglia

The luminous atmosphere of that first evening of arrival would foreshadow our time together in coming 10 days. Good friends and family were about to embark on adventure and discovery in new territory.