What´s the flippin´ deal with Honey.

My time in Madrid can be described as that strand of honey that connects the knife to the jar and follows you around the room until it finally-- several sticky fingers later— severs and pools into a heap on the kitchen counter. It´s been over a year since I dipped my greedy fingers into the pot and I am still here pulling, unsure as to when my time here will end. For now, I´ll just let myself simmer in its sweetness like a fly at a wasp party-- big, lumbering, ginger guiri that I am.
 
But it will end at some point, because I want it to and I have always wanted it to, and this recognition of temporality begets fast living. Weekdays are spent teaching English in a job which is, however enjoyable, a one runged-ladder, frozen and unchanging apart from the annual rotation of fresh faces. Weekends whiz by in a topsy-turvy blur-- in Madrid we call a toast to the rising sun. Mondays take me by surprise. Some months are more viscous than others as life slows down for friendships, for lovers, for unique interactions. Others pass by more silently.
 
As much as I feel ready to sit my arse down elsewhere for a while, to get my bearded gob round a new idioma, I wouldn´t wish any of what I have away. The two people you see photographed have drastically sweetened my honey-strand year.

 Mario moved into the apartment last March and although my Spanish communication skills at that point were restricted to holding out a beer and grunting with an upward inflection, he stuck with me. Ten months later I have since spent New Year’s with his family and, of course, I speak Spanish, albeit with a Canary Island accent. He knows more about me than I will admit on here.
 
Fiona moved into the flat in October, after a mildly awkward silent stand-off with another prospective tenant outside my bedroom door. Now, like a trained puppy, I get excited when I hear the front door open at the time she usually gets back to the flat. I talk about them both with my parents more than I do myself. Colleagues ask me where they are if I go into my other place of work for a drink without them. And even my Spanish teacher knows them by name. 
 

Knowing that I will definitely move away some day is made easier by the knowledge these two particular strands of honey will stretch and stretch and stretch.