An Origin and an Ending

On February 12th, 2019 at 6:41 in the morning, I experienced the greatest origin there is - the arrival of our daughter after 26 long hours of unmedicated labor. Life changed in an instant with the birth of our baby and my subsequent birth as a mother. Our girl has already taught me everything and then some about being in the moment, letting go of control, cultivating gratitude, and amplifying love.

I'd been contemplating for some time - years really - how and when to write the final entry for this blog. I want to keep writing, tried to start again here, but never quite found my momentum. Life has moved forward. I have a new home now, a new partner, a new family. I'm a new person. Only right that I'd have a new space in which to share.

And with new beginnings there are endings. The news of Cyclone Idai last week, and the subsequent devastation of Mozambique's central region (as well as Zimbabwe and Malawi) has my mind and heart back in Africa. It's surreal to see the places I lived and worked in when I started this blog back in 2005 completely underwater, decimated, the future precarious and uncertain.

Photo credit: Denis Onyodi/IFRC/HANDOUT/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock

Here is a link to donate to relief efforts - I personally know the country director for Save the Children Mozambique and, despite all my NGO cynicism documented in this blog, this is the best way I know to help at the moment - cash aid, in the hands of a team I know is "real".

May these waters recede and somehow there be a thousand miracles.

If you'd like to stay in touch, you can find me at www.aliambrosio.com - a space that is still very much a work in progress. I will be starting a blog over there, and updating the content regularly.

Much love and my most sincere thank you for following me here over the past fourteen years. Here's looking forward to the next chapter, the next routes, the next adventures.

xx,
Ali

Belated Mom Love

A bit late, but better than never! Happy belated birthday to my Mama, and Happy Mother's Day as well. We had a great time celebrating her bday at a local nursery called Annie's Annuals. It's a literal oasis tucked away in an industrial and somewhat blighted corner of North Richmond. So many lush and unusual plants and flowers, truly a delight for the senses. My mom, who is a master gardener, was in heaven. Roberto and I were very inspired too.

Book Three

Sunset from Hawaii's Big Island, understanding what this next phase is all about.

If moving to Mozambique was Book One, moving to California and starting art school was Book Two, then this is Book Three. I am still based in the Bay Area but the cast of characters is significantly different, as is my perspective. I feel deeply moved to write these days, but found myself questioning whether it was right to continue blogging here, in this space that is all about homes I no longer live in, a career I no longer have, and a man I am no longer married to.

Despite all that has changed, this is still the place where I feel the most comfortable sharing, documenting, and processing my life. I remind myself there is no "wrong" in continuing to write my own story, even if the space is imbued in memories of Books One and Two. What a blessing, really, to have this record to look back upon.

Thirteen years have gone by since I started this blog on a rainy evening in Austin. I am now 36, working as an artist and translator, married to a soulful Brazilian cinematographer named Roberto. We met in San Francisco through a mutual friend, a beautiful story for another day. We live in a light-filled apartment about 10 minutes away from my mom's house. My days are spent making jewelry and painting in my studio, interpreting in hospitals and at welfare appointments, and translating technical documents. Roberto spends his time going to ESL school and working on various film and video projects. Life is good.

At some point I'll share some photos, perhaps from our wedding at City Hall, or from recent travel to Hawaii, New Mexico, and Italy/Slovenia. And I'll share stories. There are SO many stories from the last two years that I want to get out before the details dull. But for now, a small synopsis of Book Three thus far:

• I healed my heart from the end of a marriage, relationship, partnership, and friendship
• I lived with my mom for 1.5 years for the first time since I was 15
• I started working as an interpreter
• I reconnected with my roots in the Italy/Slovenia border region
• I opened myself to finding love again, and did!
• I lived in San Francisco for 6 months with Roberto in a shared apartment in the very foggy Outer Richmond neighborhood, and eventually rented a place of our own in the East Bay. 
• I realized that I want to be a mother. 
• We got pregnant!!
• We found out at 13 weeks that our baby had Turner's Syndrome and the pregnancy was not viable.
• We lost the baby at 14 weeks.
• We got married!! (Very strange to be celebrating and grieving at the same time).
• I have a new name - Ali Ambrosio!!
• My dad was diagnosed with cancer (again) and had major surgery. Thankfully he's now recovering.
• Roberto had a heart attack (he is 40 and otherwise healthy) and we discovered he has several congenital heart defects. So so so grateful he received treatment and is now seemingly okay.
• Contemplated moving to the Big Island of Hawaii (the tropics were calling big time, but we realized our destiny is elsewhere)
• Currently figuring out how to make life work in the Bay Area, with a medium-term plan to spend half our time in Italy/Slovenia.

So far Book Three has been dizzyingly intense. You can understand why I need to write again. Looking forward to sharing here frequently, I've missed blogging and missed interacting with you, my lovely readers, if any of you are still out there after all this time. :)

More Endings and More Beginnings

It's been a year since I last wrote here. Often I've had the urge to come back and chronicle what's been going on in my life, but while this is my favorite space for writing, it also felt strange. Outdated. Too connected with people and places who are no longer in my life and, honestly, a reflection of a self that I no longer am. I suppose that's inevitable when you blog for over a decade, but my goodness the changes have been massive. New continent, new school, new profession, divorce, passing of loved ones, new relationships, new homes, new beginnings. It's been so much.

For a while I was decided that I would start a new blog for this new chapter, but I never found a format or space or whatever that seemed right. I like writing here, and I like all of you who follow(ed) me here, and so I've come to peace with the idea that yes, my past is present, but my present can be as well. 

So where to start? This time last year I'd just come back from a month of traveling. Geographic distance from Casa Cali, as well as the constant stimulus of new landscapes and languages and people, allowed me to feel like my old self again. The traveler, nomad, extrovert, adventurer. It also helped me begin to glimpse my new self, who I would become after all the transitioning, questioning, grief and growth.

Back in the Bay Area, life delivered up one of those sublime coincidences (that aren't coincidences at all, really) and I met a very lovely person who has become my partner in life and in love. I certainly wasn't "looking," but when you find treasure you most absolutely open your heart and say yes. I would like to write volumes about this person, about our adventures and insights together, but I must say that I have come to value privacy immensely and so choose not to. But know that I'm happy and, true to my Libra nature, am in a pair and feel at balance.

Over the past year I have really reconnected with my roots on my mom's side, and spent a lot of time along the Italy-Slovenia border where my family has had a home for centuries. I recovered my ability to speak Italian (it's full of mistakes but I don't really care, I'm just happy that it's present and functional!). I made many local friends and danced salsa and kizomba till the wee hours (funny how there's such a passion for Latin/African dances in that part of the world). Together with friends and family, we did a bunch of work on the house my grandmother used to live in, trying to get it fixed up and ready for who-knows-what next incarnation. Retreats, a place for wellness and healing, wine tourism...there are so many attributes and possibilities. But for now, as they say in Italian, piano, piano. Take it slow. For a while there many people were asking if I'd moved to Italy. It was/is definitely in my mind, but I'm letting life lead me there at its own pace. Although I am applying for Italian citizenship - it will take two years, and just getting together the necessary documents has been a fascinating process. Stories for another day, however...

Last month I was back in Italy and we had a memorial ceremony for my grandmother, who passed away last year in California. It was quite the event. My family was there from the US, the whole village turned up, we had two choirs sing, and everyone came to the house afterwards for prosciutto and pastries and wine. Truly the closing of one gigantic chapter and the opening of the next. I want to write about the whole funeral organizing experience, as it was priceless. Talking in limited Italian about opening graves and preparing floral wreaths, and trying to figure out catering, and getting the priest booked, etc. etc. etc. Truly memorable, I swear many of the people and situations seemed straight out of a film. Too good (and sometimes too bad!) to be true.

Now back in California I continue to make jewelry, my focus these days is on heirloom redesign and memory projects. I've also been working as a medical interpreter (Portuguese and Spanish), which is interesting and a good counterpart to my studio practice. Always the Jill of a thousand trades it seems. :)

I suppose what really moved me to write here again is the sad news that Pria passed away three days ago (the cats are still at Casa Cali with Ricardo and his new wife). I got the call that Pria had collapsed and was at the emergency vet, and that it didn't look good. Apparently he had cancer all throughout his body. I'm grateful that he didn't suffer long, and I know he was in good care. Still it is so incredibly sad. I feel lucky that my last memories of Pria are of days when he was happy and heathy and purring in my lap. I miss him. I'd been missing him all year. Losing our animal companions is terrible, but boy did he give us years of funny stories and fond memories. I hope he's living it up on the other side of the rainbow bridge with his brother, Parceiro.

Valencia County Observations

I'm in New Mexico for a week, enjoying some time observing life in the place where I grew up. Here are some of the moments that have stood out to me about Los Lunas and Valencia County, the place where my dad calls home:

This is a rural area about an hour south of Albuquerque. The scenery is serene and classically New Mexican: wide open fields of hay and corn, grandiose cottonwoods whose leaves have started turning yellow with the changing seasons, chile roasting on street corners, and dusty mountains in the distance. In the middle of this all runs the Rio Grande, currently a small trickle because so much water has been diverted into the irrigation ditches that criss-cross the landscape. The people here are connected to the land, to family, to tradition.

Driving around I am struck by the billboards along Highway 47, which fall into a few main themes:

- DWI (You can't afford it!)
- Anti Domestic Abuse (Elders and children are our heritage, our future!)
- Pro-Life propaganda (My heart beats 18 days after conception!)
- Personal Injury Lawyers
- Military Recruitment
- Indian Casinos

Tells you a lot about the problems people face and the values they hold...

As I write this I am sitting in a café in Los Lunas (the main town around these parts) that is part coffee shop, part Christian bookstore / religious supplies, and part guitar store. It is the closest wifi to my dad's house (he has no internet and my cell signal is practically nonexistent) so if I want to check email or blog or do some work, I come here.

Culture shock is an understatement. Not only is there all the religious paraphernalia and "church people" vibe from the staff and patrons, there is the political aspect. The people here like their guns. Next to the coffee creamer is an advertisement for Concealed Carry Training. I just overheard someone talk about how Obama was the best thing ever for gun and ammo sales, that they skyrocketed because of him. Another table over there is a guy loudly voicing his support for Trump and calling Bernie Sanders supporters "sheeple" for now supporting Hilary. He's all about the government conspiracies, too, talking about 9/11 being an inside job and how he just bought a $2,000 end-of-the-world survival kit because shit is going to go down.

The scary part to me is that everyone who walks in and overhears these conversations in progress jumps in and is in agreement! Guns and Trump and anti-Obama and God are the anthem over here! It makes me reconsider where I am spending my $7 for coffee and a breakfast burrito, but then again there's no guarantee that the owner of Starbucks on the far side of town (the other wifi option) is not cut from the same cloth, even though the corporate aspect of the place might suggest neutrality.

I don't identify with Valencia County as being home (I lived with my mom in Albuquerque from ages 5 to 15), but my dad has always been here so it is familiar and full of memories. Since my mom moved to California over a decade ago, my dad's house is now my base when I come to New Mexico. While I appreciate the hospitality he and his wife extend to me, I am struck by how anthropological these visits feel. I am definitely an outsider, observing "the other," gaining heightened perception of my own views and values as a result of the contrasts.

Road Trip to Arizona and Nevada with My Mama

A couple weeks ago my mom and I took a road trip starting in the Bay Area and passing through some of the most beautiful deserts and mountains in the Western US. We needed to clean out a storage unit (of unknown contents) that my grandmother had in Flagstaff, as well as take care of some of her affairs there, so we decided to make an adventure of it and take the scenic route. Here are some highlights:

The Colorado River appears like an oasis along the California-Arizona state line, with the Needles mountains in the background.

My grandmother owned an apartment building in Flagstaff and at some point the property manager commissioned a local artist to paint a mural to ward off vandalization. I love the imagery and colors.

So far the mural strategy has worked, because there is no tagging and people have respected the art.

Here is the storage unit we had to clean out. My mom was hoping it would be empty (fat chance knowing what a packrat my grandmother was!) and I was expecting it to be full...but not exactly *this* full. What a nightmare. Stuff was all jumbled up, in various states of damage (there had been water, bats, and rats in the unit at some point from the looks of things), and most of it wasn't "worth" hanging onto in the first place. Happily we did find a few family treasures, and there were a lot of throwback items to my mom's childhood...but mostly it was books and old clothes and a lot of junk. My mom and I spent a lot of time sorting what to keep, what to donate, and what to throw away. Sadly in the end the charity shop rejected the donation pile so everything we didn't keep went into the landfill. What a lesson...

At least we got in some quality outdoor time while in Flagstaff. There was a walking path right outside our hotel room that crossed through ponderosa pine forests and open meadows full of wildflowers and lava rocks. Beautiful!

There's nothing quite like the clear air of the mountains. Big sky, sunshine, and the afternoon monsoon. Made me miss my homeland of New Mexico (although I'll be there next month for a visit, yay!)

On the way from Flagstaff to Tonopah, Nevada we passed by the Hoover Dam and Lake Mead. Really stunning scenery to see that big body of water amid such an arid landscape.

We walked across a highway bridge to get a view of the dam, which was worth it despite the 106 degree weather and strong winds.

A convenience store and rest stop in the middle of nowhere in Nevada. There was a brothel behind this building, by the way. No big deal, business as usual!

In Tonopah we stayed at the (supposedly haunted) Mizpah Hotel. I didn't experience any ghost encounters but the place was definitely like being in a time warp.

I had fun sketching one of the big chandeliers in the lounge while waiting for our dinner.

From Nevada we crossed back into California and drove on some very hilly highways and over some major mountain summits. It was a massively scenic stretch, including Mono Lake (above) and Monitor Pass (below).

It was a long, hot, tiring but fun trip. Definitely the kind that is better with company, and I'm happy to report that my mom is an excellent road trip companion. Maybe we'll do another one next year (although without the storage unit!!).

Spreading Love All Over the World

Caricature my friend Rrramone did of me back in 2006. I was living in Maputo at the time.  I definitely feel like this.

As you can imagine, I am going through a roller coaster of emotions these days. But mostly I feel peace and excitement, and lots of love amid heartache.

For many years the thing I most feared was not being together with Rico. I knew how much it would hurt for us to break up. I felt the weight of the multiple personal-family-business connections our parting would disrupt. Rico works with my family. My mom is his boss. My aunt and uncle are the investors in the businesses they run together. (Rico and my mom actually are involved in three different businesses together, all under the same big umbrella though...) Also, there is the small detail of me wanting to make a living as an artist and translator and traveler, which is not always easy even with a gainfully employed partner.

And of course there is a geographic component to how connected we are. My mom lives just up the hill from us, so it's about 3 minutes walking to get from one house to the next. My studio is in my mom's basement. My gallery is downtown, two blocks from the clocks and home decor business Rico now runs (one of the above-mentioned businesses). Rico's mom lives 10 minutes down the road by car, near the marina.

Everything is together. Has been together. Is always together. Family, business, not wanting to intrude, having to always strategize, compartmentalize personal and professional, put up limits but also have no definition to what is family and what is business.

Rico and I started out working together, as you know. Living together. Being 100% together from the moment I set foot in Mozambique. We were a team on all fronts. We continue to be a team on all fronts. We are a really good match, life partners is how it feels. We could run the world together, that's for sure.

So all of this to say...deciding to separate was excruciatingly hard and took a long time for me to find clarity about what I was feeling. But, after a long summer and winter and start of spring examining ourselves and our relationship, Rico and I looked at each other a couple Sundays ago and just knew. It was over. We have evolved into something new, whatever's next.

It is one of the greatest gifts I've ever felt to know that he and I are at peace. That we see eye to eye and feel heart to heart about where we started and where we are now ending. That we are separating but the other interconnected layers of our lives can continue, will continue.

Likely there will be better harmony there, as well. I really like Rico's mom, for example, but it's a bummer to hang out with your mother-in-law when you are contemplating the impending breakup with her son. So she and I can hang out now like I imagine we've both always wanted to. Having fun. Dancing somewhere. I can hang out with my mom again and have it be just mom. I'm not self-censoring all the time, we can travel to Italy together, eat and drink and visit and hike. Enjoy life.

I am in awe to see how many of the other relationships in my life have also healed in the wake of me and Rico separating - and also of my grandma passing away. Gina, my mom's mom, finally let go at age 94 and went to have a party with all her friends up in the sky from Italy and all around the world who have been waiting for her arrival.  So after my grandma passing and then Rico and I separating, I have experienced so much healing, so much closeness and authenticity with the people I love. I am grateful for all the support and to be able to be real with my people, without walls around my heart and constantly putting up a positive front.

Gina Paola Cantoni. 1922-2016. I look a lot like her and have inherited many of her traits and interests.

Also, conveniently, people can give double condolences to the family. Sorry about Gina. Sorry about Rico and Ali.

I've been meeting the most incredible strangers lately, too, as a bonus gift from the universe. People with whom I can share a moment or two whenever paths randomly cross in a café or restaurant or while listening to live music. Travel reminds me to disconnect from the phone and be a person in the present moment. Eye contact. Breath. Sand. Saying hello and good morning. Smiling whenever people pass me to see who I can get to smile back. Spreading love all over the world.

Return to the Origin

I consider myself to be New Mexican, as I was born and raised in Albuquerque and have green chile coursing through my blood. Ask me where I am from and that will forever be my answer (as opposed to where I currently live, which is what most people actually mean with that question).

Ask me where my roots are, though, and I will say a small village in northern Italy called Peci. It is a speck on the map, really. A rural outpost where my grandmother was born and where my maternal side of the family has lived for over 400 years. In European time I suppose that's somewhat commonplace, but the centuries-long continuity blows my mind even though I am part of it.

I spent summers here as a child. This house is etched in my memory. I used to ride a pink bike in the courtyard and make tiaras with the daisies that grew amid the grass. I was afraid of the lizards that would sun themselves on the walls, and (obviously) of the scorpions we'd occasionally find in the cellar or hidden in a forgotten shoe. This house is my heritage, my legacy, my blood.

There are many stories here, well before mine. A lot of gossip. A lot of ghosts. A lot of borders - both international and between neighbors. Class divisions. Endless preoccupation with wealth and status and reputation. Loneliness. Abandonment. Mental and emotional anguish. And yet also the blessed possibility of change. Of growth and evolution from one generation to the next. Of being able to break down walls and rearrange furniture and say, "This isn't how we do it anymore."

Things are different now. We are different now.

The Ride

Amid the heavy emotions I'm feeling lately, there are also many lighthearted moments. Solo dancing for the security cameras in my gallery, enjoying wearing new spring clothes and high heels, trying new restaurants with Rico, being around the family's assorted cats and their funny ways.

Ups and downs, choices, and a big-ass learning curve on this ride called life.

Next up: three weeks in Italy - two of which will be with my mom, and one will be solo. I'll be doing lots of art and writing and dancing, exploring, eating and drinking the region's delights, and taking a welcome break from my regular routine.

I am very lucky.

Yes to This, No to That

This year I'm making some intentional shifts in where my yes's and no's are. Some of this feels terrifying, some of it feels like a relief, some feels like adventure waiting to unfold.

SAYING YES TO TRAVEL means saying NO to:

- a geographically fixed workspace

- a consistent open-to-the-public schedule at the gallery 

- being able to attend all of the local events that interest me

- other tempting ways of using my time and money

SAYING YES TO THE WORK I WANT TO MAKE means saying NO to:

- certain requests for custom work or repairs

- certain social activities because I need lots of time in the studio

- an easily defined image/style (which causes me stress because I like to be cohesive, and the work I want to make feels pretty random right now)

SAYING YES TO MY PHYSICAL HEALTH means saying NO to:

- eating too much sugar

- smoking too much weed

- weighing myself obsessively

SAYING YES TO MY EMOTIONAL HEALTH means saying NO to:

- behavior patterns that cause me pain

- toxic relationships

- the stigma of being in therapy

SAYING YES TO THE SPACE I NEED means saying NO to:

- a shared studio space

- employing an assistant

- a boundary-less existence with the family business

SAYING YES TO MY CREATIVE PRACTICE means saying NO to:

- having my phone in the studio

- the need to make "good" work

- fear of being vulnerable

Photoshoot with my Mom

I will be doing a photoshoot tomorrow (taking pictures of the crown I made, as worn by my client) and I needed to figure out what the light will be doing at 3:30pm. Yesterday my mom and I went for a walk as I scouted locations here in our neighborhood. She posed as my model so I could test the light and be sure the camera was working properly, and in the process I got some amazing photos of her. Here are a few of my favorites:

Every time I do a photoshoot I'm always so excited to see the results. I love taking portraits of people, and even more so if it involves them wearing my jewelry (my mom has on earrings I made using Mozambican blackwood and slices of dried acrylic paint...the necklace is from New Mexico).

Here's hoping tomorrow's shoot with the crown yields equally great results. Thanks for the help, mama!

Textures and Surfaces of Avignon and Les Baux

Last September I visited southern France for the first time, part of a super family bonding trip with my mom, uncle and aunt. One of my favorite things to photograph is surfaces, in particular those that are worn by the elements and marked by time. I am drawn to walls, windows, doors, pavements, and natural elements like roots and soil. Here are some of the textures that caught my eye in Provence:

Imagens do Dia a Dia

This is what life has looked like over the past three weeks...

 Maybe it doesn't reflect in the photos, but I've been feeling really overwhelmed lately. Like I'm being suffocated by my own momentum, my own relentless organization, my own ambition. It feels very heavy and condensed. Definitely one of those "learning a lot of lessons" periods, where I'm pursuing lots of opportunities and figuring out which ones are worth the hustle and which are not. Like I said in a previous post, it's a lot of work, and I feel exhausted.

Today Rico and I made a spontaneous decision that makes me feel more balanced, less stressed about all that is currently on my plate. I will be joining him for a very, very short holiday in Brazil next month. Rico's mom is having surgery, and he will be in Rio for a bit helping her out with the recovery and logistics of it all.

Initially I was going to stay here, because I have so much going on, but today we found a ticket using miles and I thought fuck it, why not? It gives me something to look forward to, a reason to really get it in gear in terms of studio efficiency (I am working on several custom projects and it will be nice to just knock them out before I leave), a natural deadline by which I need to have certain things finished or off my plate.

The trip is also a welcome reminder that my physical presence is not necessary for the gallery to be open, for my business to move forward, for things to work out. It's okay to take some time off, especially if I am feeling burned out.

Now the hurdle is that I need a visa for the trip to Brazil. Although I'm married to a Brazilian, I'm still on a tourist visa (mine is expired, of course), and the consulate in San Francisco has at least an 8-week turnaround and no available appointments until the day I'm supposed to leave. So clearly that won't work.

Rico and I are currently figuring out how to get an expedited visa when the consulate for your jurisdiction is seemingly incapable of providing one (only Houston and Atlanta emit rush visas, according to the official sources, and you need to be a resident of those jurisdictions to qualify for that service). Looks like there will be a despachante in our future...

In the Ali Amaro Gallery: carved granite sculptures by Martin F. Rickert. They remind me of hedgehogs and pineapples, and I want a trio of them for our porch.

Mano and Nina, enjoying a nap on our messy piano.

A new series of necklaces I made with Mozambique Island trade beads. I love gradients so much.

Rico built us a bed using reclaimed wood from part of our deck that we tore out (and are replacing/expanding). It's beautiful, as are the new master bedroom and bathroom we are enjoying these days.

Wine tasting event a Brock Cellars in Berkeley, together with Tarryn and Bridget from the 4 to 9 Wine Bar (the best neighbor a gallery could ask for)

Friends from Brazil who now live in the Bay Area joined us for the event.

I've been working on a crown design...a lot of things still have to come together before it's made a reality, but I hope it happens. It's a really cool concept, as the crown will be covered with clip-on earrings from my client's nana.

And of course, let's not forget Point to Point Richmond! It's happening again this month, and Marie (my assistant!) and I are busy prepping sail cloth and hand-dyed shibori squares for a prayer flag interactive activity outside the gallery.

What's new in your world these days?