Much of the last 10 days or so has been devoted to getting ready for our upcoming move – and of course to our visit to the US. We still haven’t decided on an apartment yet and continue to surf the Internet for possibilities. The security deposit (which apparently is translated from the French as enough money to completely refurnish the apartment if necessary) and rental agent fees are scandalous; but hey, life is so very full of tradeoffs, right? In any case we are eager to do this – and the anticipation grows with each passing day.
Here in Italy we contacted a local mover by email to get an estimate for our move north. They called back a day or so later giving us the specifics on how this is going to work. We have to put together a written list of what we want to move and fax it to them. After that they will send us an estimate. When I spoke with the woman on the phone she seemed keenly interested in how many flights up our apartment is here in Florence as well as our new one in Paris (which of course we don’t know where that will be yet). So we started boxing some things up, taking measurements and marking down what we have and hope to get that off to the mover by midweek. We don’t expect to find out anything definitive one way or the other for a week or so after that.
We just can’t get over the fact that we have “stuff” in storage in Vermont – and who knows when we’ll see that again – and yet here we are arranging for someone to come and move more “stuff” here in Italy to another foreign destination and for how long we don’t know. Not that we are complaining mind you – we cannot believe how fabulously lucky we are and what a grand avventura this all is – but it is, well, amazing.
Besides the Paris move our trip back to the states in June is also demanding more of our attention as well: from trying to figure out what to pack (computer yes camera maybe that sort of thing) to finding a place to buy US SIM cards so we can use our phones to deciding on the best time to advertise our car in the newspaper – and which paper, and where? (OK that’s an easy answer: The Boston Globe.)
But while much of our attention has been focused on our US trip and our move to Paris at the end of July, we also have to keep refocusing ourselves on the fact that, hey, this is our home here right now, we live in Florence.
So it was a treat when we finally caught up with a couple of other Americans who have lived here for some time, Melinda and Dave. Susan and I met Melinda at a book signing at McRae’s books a couple of weeks ago. At one point Melinda leaned over and asked Susan if they knew each other from somewhere, and quickly discovered that Melinda is a good friend of one of Susan’s teachers, Simone; in fact Melinda and her husband are renting Simone’s apartment here in Florence. We talked for a bit and then made plans to meet at Simone’s restaurant, Il Canapone, which is on the south side of the river (“oltrarno”) for dinner later on in the month – it seemed that all of us were heading for France in the next week or so, Susan and I to Paris and Melinda and Dave to a conference near Nice.
Anyway we stayed in touch by email and soon after we returned from up north we set up a time to meet at Simone’s in early June -- but also thought why not get together for an aperitivo sooner?
So we met at (another) book signing, Friday evening, this one at the Paperback Exchange. Linda Falcone, who is the editor of the local English language newspaper, The Florentine, was signing copies of her new book, “Italians love to dance and I’m a wallflower”, a collection of her witty and touching newspaper articles about the unique and often intimate meanings found in Italian figures of speech.
So the four of us met just outside the quite full bookshop, and stepped inside where we listened to Linda read from one of her chapters, “non si fa”, which in essence means “you don’t do that” or “that just isn’t done,” a popular figure of speech which describes certain things that, well, just aren’t done in Italy. Period. End of discussion. No “whys” or “because ofs”. It just isn’t done and that’s it.
Afterwards the four of us strolled to the Arno and went to the Golden View Bar to have a drink – and since the time got away from us we decided to stay and have dinner.
It was a great opportunity to swap travel stories and with a bonus: it turned out that Melinda had lived in Paris for some years so of course we started pumping her for information about our impending move there. Melinda has spent much of her life abroad, in London, Paris and now in Florence. She writes one of the most sophisticated blogs I have yet to read, and one that is extremely well designed as well. Check it out!
It was plenty of fun, and a grand evening spent in lively conversation.
Above everything else, one thing stood out in the evening’s discussion: the traveler’s determination “to learn”. We continue to learn and develop that peculiar frame of mind which all independent travelers strive to possess, no matter who they are or where they begin their journey, a frame of mind that seeks out new avenues of discovery, new things to see. Not necessarily in the obvious “things” but in those that are subtle, like in Linda Falcone’s stories about figures of speech that are not necessarily clear even to foreigners fluent in Italian but which nonetheless go far in describing a cultural identity that surrounds us everywhere.
Last night, Saturday we did a rather strange thing -- for us at any rate. We watched a French film, Blue, in French but with Italian subtitles. Fortunately the dialogue was sparse and we had seen the before but we found ourselves saying that it was nevertheless an odd thing to do. Pleasantly odd.
We will certainly miss Italy.
Although Monday, May 29th, is just another day for Italians, for the local American community it is of course Memorial Day. We hope to meet with Warren and Gladys and head to the Florence American National cemetery just south of the city for the Memorial Day service. We have driven by the cemetery on the bus to Siena numerous times and it is most striking. Set against a small hillside as a backdrop the memorial is beautifully framed by the green slope while the stones themselves seem to cascade toward you, rather like a carpet of thousands of white crosses. We are certainly eager to spend some quality time in this particularly unique “garden of stone”. I hope to have some photos to share with you later this week as well.
Until then, take care, stay well and
Wish you were here.
Steve
Oh and here's a visual PS from Paris: susan, me paying our respects to Fred Chopin.
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