the european way

The School of Athens by Raphael

Lately the ongoing insane health care reform debate has me missing the European way. I do not miss Italy so much, or loath the US so much, but I miss the European way of thinking. There is something so fundamental and civilized about how it feels to be a human being in Europe. At least there was for me. With all the frustrations I lived through, I always felt a sense of extreme civility. A deeply rooted respect for what it means to be a human on this earth. I could see it around me in the beautiful art and architecture. I could taste it in the carefully prepared ceremony that was eating. I could smell it in the perfumes and the spices.
There is nothing like living and breathing civility. And while I despised the traffic and pollution, while I struggled with what I believed to be narrow mindedness, while I missed the glorious diversity that I grew up in, I felt innately respected for my worth as a human being, and that it was the most natural, fundamental, civil thing in the world to be able to go to the doctor and care for myself and my family, regardless of my wallet, employer, social status or unfortunate gene pool.
Europe has been around for so long. So many centuries. Maybe that is how long it will take for this one most basic human right to be recognized in the young, brash, at times ignorant country that is the US.
I miss the European way.

the difference between me and him

My husband and I went hiking on Sunday. We've ventured into the mountains ever since we met in the Copper Canyon of Mexico. We trekked Nepal and we ran a business atop the crest of the Dolomites for 10 years. My children were born in the mountains as was my husband, mountains that go straight up over craggy rocks that slip from under your feet.

And while I love the mountains and choose to live at 9000 feet, my idea of a hike will never have anything to do with his. Nearly seventeen years of marriage and I haven't gotten it. While I stop to admire the aspens changing or the flowers underfoot, he moves forward. Upward. Onward. He goes and goes until the trees are behind us, there is nothing but bear poop and big horn sheep.

The sky darkens and snow flakes start to swirl around in September. There is no chance of a picnic, and my lungs are tight from being up so high. The air is thin and I feel drunk, and even a bit scared that I have no business being up so high. How will I ever get down? Why am I here in the first place?

What is it that makes him push so hard and go so far? It is a man thing? A conqueror thing? Or is it just the difference between me and him? All these years and it is still a mystery to me.

a perfect ending

The urge has finally come upon me to write about my return to Italy. I came back to the US about 2 weeks ago, and only now have I begun to feel any kind of clarity about my days in Italy. Not because they were tumultuous, but instead because they were complacent, and flew by quickly. I suffered jet lag even as a twenty year old. Now I have learned to give in to it, and plan my trips with a couple days cushion on each end, days in which I wander around wondering what language I am speaking, and why I am so hungry at 6am. This trip was no different, except for the fact that it was painfully short, only 12 days, so I spent a good fraction of my time stupid.

I traveled separately from my husband and sons. They had already been there for several days when I arrived. I had not been in Italy for 2 years, and after 15 years living there, it was once again the small things that struck me. I live in a very peaceful, civilized place in the US. Quiet to the point of meditative. The noise struck me first as we travelled the infamous A4 highway from Milan. It was everywhere. And dusty hot. We stopped at an Autogrill off the highway, a fancy Italian rest stop that has absolutely nothing to do with American rest stops. Gorgeous food and trinkets and the BAR... the Italian bar. Oh how I miss real coffee. I have yet to find it anywhere in the US, except in my own kitchen. As I stepped out of the car and into the crosswalk of the parking lot to make my way to the entrance, I was floored by a blaring horn and my husband yanking me backwards. People don't stop for pedestrians in Italy. They even honk at you to get the hell out of the way. I had forgotten all of my hard earned Italian driving etiquette. What was I thinking stepping into that crosswalk? That I could actually walk across it? I live in a town where drivers stop for everyone and everything, deer and foxes included. I've become such a bumpkin.
I came home to find my boys nowhere to be seen. They are immediately taken away by the throng of friends they left behind when we moved. They live like rock stars now in Italy. They are famous because they live in America and go to American schools, and are drilled about girls and sports and getting their driver's licenses at 16. Do they really have lockers? Do they really not have to go to school on Saturdays?

I saw many of the fellow parents I knew while sending my children through elementary school there, and most are in a panic about what to do next for their children. After three years of middle school, Italian students must essentially choose what they want to do with their future at the ripe old age of 14. There are several different types of high schools, from classic preparatory schools for university bound students to trade schools, and a myriad of choices in between. Many of the parents I know who have a child that has already finished the first year of high school as my older son has feel like they made the wrong decision. Can you imagine trying to figure out what a child wants to do with the rest of his life at 14? My own son was so awash in hormones and angst last year that the thought gives me a headache! And in Italy, such a decision bears much more cultural weight than it does in the United States. There is a prevailing idea that young people will enter into one line of work and stay in it for the rest of their working lives... even the same job. That would have meant that I would have spent my own life doing what?? Making sandwiches? Being a florist? A student counselor? A gallery assistant? A restaurateur? One of my husband's cousins came to dinner, and when I asked her how her son is (he is 14 and heading to high school this fall), she said that he had decided to go to a trade school in Brescia. Fiat was implementing a new numerically controlled machine into its production line, and this was one of the first schools training students to use the new technology. When I asked her if her son liked mechanical engineering, she said, "Well, I hope so. He'll be working on that machine for the next 40 years." Enough said.

One of the other things I brought back with me from Italy was 5 pounds. The amount of Gorgonzola I managed to eat coupled with my favorite wines and pizza every night was inhumane. How we miss the food. How we miss the wine. There's just no getting around it. We eat well and cook like masters, but there's just nothing like the real thing. American food just plain sucks.

My father in law's passing just after we left has remained a subtle pang. I missed him at the head of table as we ate. He was such a presence, such a pillar, that things feel almost too fluffy without him. It was never easy prying a smile or compliment from his stern mouth, but oh, when you got a smile or laugh, it was like winning the lottery. A real joy.

My sweet house is lived in by someone else. And while I thought I would feel nostalgia seeing it again, I felt nothing. Only a memory, like a chapter of book that you read once. The mountain refuge we managed for the first 9 years of our marriage, where we raised our children and became a family, has gone from being a centuries old, crumbling stone dairy to a fancy, newly renovated alpine hotel and restaurant. It made me slightly sick to see our old castle that way. My youngest son was quite angry that the chicken coop was no more. It was his favorite place of all, and where he spent hours on end chasing the rooster, collecting eggs and watching out for the weasels. He wanted to leave.

When I packed to come home, finally retrieving some of my favorite things left behind, I was relieved to feel happy that I was coming home. Home here. I felt trepidation returning to Italy. Would I have regrets? But now I am lucky enough to say that I can visit that most beautiful of places as a tourist of sorts. I no longer have to fight the traffic or pay the taxes. I can just enjoy all the bounty.

I have been making that transatlantic flight for over twenty years now, and I must say that on this trip I was finally, finally blessed with that gift of all gifts... I was bumped up to business class!
A perfect ending.

diving into Italy

One of my favorite places in all the world - Lago di Ledro

on the verge of going back

our valley in the Dolomites

There I go. I'm on the verge of going back. Back to the place where I spent so many years, became another person, learned another language, lived another life. Soon I will be heralded with people calling me Jenny, people asking me where have I been. What is it like? I am bringing two sons back with me who have long since become taller than I am, one blondish, exotic athlete with a brain who moves like a beam of light, and one towering, dark haired, handsome, gentle bear with a smile that melts your heart and a light touch.



How I can't wait to see my family in our Italian shoes, to beat the cobblestones and alleys, to spend long lazy happy hours with our friends who think we are so interesting and daring.





Here I go.

From the archives

I was just asked to publish this post, with a few tweaks, for a collection of women's writing. Although here it looks as if I am doing nothing, I am actually doing overmuch. So here's one from the archives, still very apropos today.

Life in the Middle

It may be the effects of my fortieth birthday. It may be my own relfection in the mirror, which unbeknownst to me overnight has taken on the appearance of someone who should be addressed as mam by the supermarket clerk, regardless of my mussed hair and flip flops. Most likely, it is the effect of being witness to death, since I have been one of those lucky people to live my life up to this point without too many close brushes with death, at least not in my own close knit circle. My father-in-law's passing has now led to the eminent passing of my dearest Granddaddy, who has never quite recovered from the loss of my grandmother several years ago. He is wasting away from his own very old age, and I suspect a certain desire to join his beloved wife, as well as a bone deep tiredness. We are awaiting the call that he is gone, which may come today or may come in two weeks.

All of this leads up to my pondering of life in the middle, which is where I feel I am. Writing about life in the middle seems pretty banal, like something from a shallow women's magazine. But to me life in the middle is a mystery. I have no desire to go back, but going forward seems a tad scary. I often find myself thinking that I just don't feel my age, as if there is some way that my age is supposed to feel. At other times I feel content and at ease, like I've finally reached some kind of ephemeral peace, where all the trials and tribulations of youth seem like dramatic fluff.

There is also that part of me that feels an intense need to hurry. Hurry up, or life may just pass you by! When I am able to actually see that part of me in action, I can't help but think how stupid she is. What a fool, running to nowhere. Missing the colors and smells along the way. Thankfully, that part of me makes herself known less and less as I age.

There is also the vain, senseless part of me that misses my youthfulness, not in thought, but only in body. I went out to dinner in a busy restaurant the other night, and the waitress was circling around trying to find who was missing the ceasar salad. When she finally found me, she said, "Oh, there you are! They told me to look for the pretty lady at table 8!" Well, never mind the lady part of that phrase, or the fact that everyone else at the table were men... it was that pretty comment that made me glow! Being called pretty used to be such a given that it didn't matter. Now that I'm living life in the middle, those compliments have become gold... not something I'm proud of, but it's the plain truth.

There is also the fretting, ignorant part of me, that has to give in to the idea of aging, and finally death. Death is our neighbor and bedfellow, no matter what our age, but the farther along the road of life I get, the odds continue to sway in death's direction. That's just life, after all, the ultimate irony.

The longer I live, the more books I read, the more I think and ponder, the more convinced I am that I know basically nothing. Nothing in the best sense of the word. Life is a mystery, surprise, box of chocolates, passing of a loved one and birth of a child. It is only when I feel that irrational need to know that life in the middle becomes unbearable.

a revelation

My boys on the beach a week ago

I've been alone for a week. Alone relatively speaking, since every now and then my younger son, that brightly colored sprite of a boy, makes an appearance between skateboarding, biking and the general revelry that is his life. My husband and older son are away until the end of July. We then go to Italy, lovely, crazy, besotted Italy. I actually miss it. I actually can't wait.



Being alone is not at all what it seems. I have taken on a huge project about medieval Italian architecture. The Italian text is erudite and challenging. The English translation is even more so. I am trudging through that place in brain where I once felt marginally intelligent, peeking around the creeping moss and ivy growing there, looking for words. I don't usually take on jobs so big in such a short time span, but this was the only way I could get through this next month. I, who love to be alone, love solitude, quiet, peace, I miss my boys horribly. Terribly.



I miss their laundry and dishes. I miss their deep voices and big hands. I miss their bickering, laughing and snoring. I miss their smell and sounds. I miss it all.



What a revelation.