-I- and -R- Tales of Security Operator

Hi everybody,
It's been a very long time. I wanted to post about the many changes I
had in my life in the last period, and how this interacted with Tori's
new album. I think that we all tend to appreciate Tori for such
personal reasons, that it's not really possible to separate our lives 
from what we find in her music. So, here we go. I'll try to keep the
personal section as short as possible (heh heh).

The most evident thing in my life is that I don't have any more a
marriage. S. decided to go her way and left our home this April (the
friday before Easter... this year I didn't enjoy much Easter). 
Many things followed. Basically, being no more emotionally envolved, I
started to see everything more coldly, and I started also noticing
that there were things that I did not like. 
This process went on for a while. I noticed more and more things that
I did not like, and a very few that were OK. One of the latter was me
teaching basic computing to a variety of people, the last in time
being boys and girls at a rehab community for ex drug addicts near
Bologna, with great success.

Since teaching has always been a good thing in my life, I decided to
stick with that. Presently in Italy you must attend a two year
finishing school to be able to teach at high school. This school is
equalled to a master degree. You have to pass a tough exam to enroll
at the finishing school, and in my case since I had enrolled for both
Math an Physics I had to do first a written exam and then an oral,
just about all things math and physics.... sounds tough enough? ;-P

I ended up 14th over 64 candidates, and that was very good news, since
only the first 34 candidates were admitted to the finishing school,
and I was obvioulsy between them. I started my classes on monday, 3rd
november. During this month I attended mostly to Social Psychology and
Story of Physics and Mathematics. 

Social Psychology has been incredibly helpful. I learned basic
theories about our mind and personality, and the way they develop and
react to traumas. This is specifically designed so that we can
hopefully recognize potential problems in teenagers before they get
too serious. But I noticed that some theories work very well also for
divorce ;-)

Most of all I enjoyed J.E. Marcìa theories about the four states of
identity. Generally speaking, traumas force you to redefine your
identity. I could assess that I got a very deep trauma,  and so I just
had to wait for my identity to accept the trauma and be redefined. 
As Monduzzi, a writer from Bologna said, talking about his depression
and the way he was helped to get through it "One morning as I woke up,
I noticed a new wrinkle in my face that wasn't there the evening
before. It was a smile." 
One morning I woke up and found that my identity had been formed
again. And I think I love it :-)

My friends say that I look younger now, except for my hair that is
more grey (I started getting grey in my hair more or less at 20, and
I'll be 35 just before Christmas). Oh, and I forgot to tell you, since
Easter I lost also slightly more than 20 kilos. Part of my new
attitude is that I just did not want any more to be fat. I still can't
see me as thin, I'm still 82 kilos for 1,70 m.
I'll have to buy me a new belt for Christmas, since the smallest I had
(unused since high school) is now too big for me ;-)

As I attend the finishing school for teachers, I found a job
opportunity working as a security operator in a big electronics shop
(nothing to do with wearing weapons or arresting people).
We just walk in the shop, dressed like "Men in Black", and occasionaly
pick youngsters that think that hiding a walkman inside their jackets
is "really kewl". The job is physically demanding (standing for 13
hours straight is definitely not easy) but is well paid, and I can do
it when I do not have lessons at the finishing school.



And now on to the -R- part

Last Thursday my boss instructed me to check the CD deparment. After
some wandering, guess what I saw in the new CDs section? The beautiful
cover of TOAL.... I knew that the new album was coming out, but in the
general confusion I think I forgot about it.
So I asked the CD desk girls to keep one copy for me, and I got it
when we got out in the evening. 

The "restored" versions are incredible. I of course have all the other
CDs and have listened to them also on very expensive stereos at hi-fi
fairs, so I think I know quite well how do they sound. There's
something unique to the "restored" versions. They sound waaaay more
Tori than ever. The voice has a lot more emotion in it. I think I
heard a little less piano than before, but now it sounds more natural.

For me, listening to them was like listening to Tori for the first
time. This must definitely have something to do with all the
psycobabble, ahem, personal events I described earlier in this post:
maybe I too feel "restored" now. 

I have been thinking about this for some time (I started writing this
post two hours ago), and the only thing I can compare it to, is the
first time I saw Tori playing live.

I think the new album is also an excellent way to turn other people
into Tori. I recommended it to a couple of Tori-virgin friends, and
will see what happens. 

Ciao, Stefano