Some of the best meditative, self-reflective and breathtaking moments I have spent on this Earth was when I studied abroad in Italy back in 1989 and 1989 for a total of a year.
In the summer of 1988 I studied Italian (intensive) at the School for Foreigners in Perugia. The school paired the students with others around the world. My roommate was from Germany. She was tall and blonde and I remember respecting her a lot. I don’t remember a whole lot of details as to why except that she was intelligent, was kind, her English impeccable and we shared a commiseration about our “house mother.”
Bless her soul as I’m sure she’s not alive anymore. She had grey hair curled up tightly around her head like someone had curled their hands around it to turn upward and inwards, wearing a “housecoat” like my grandmother Florence wore back in the 1970s with stained floral prints and dark red edging, and shuffled around the house in her stained slippers. I remember paying her the equivalent of $400 U.S. in Lire to stay at her place for a month. That’s pretty good money ($800) I would think back then for two boarders for a month.
I think the only time she left the house was to get groceries but we didn’t get cozy chatting about her life. That would have actually been an interesting story to learn about her. Me being a twenty year old American girl probably wasn’t someone she wanted to have un cafe with and talk about her life story.
She was pretty stressed out all the time about how much water we used and also if we were sneaking to use the telephone when she wasn’t around. I think she actually locked up the phone with a padlock for real. Water was super expensive.
You have to understand that calling internationally back then was insanely expensive. I don’t think it’s cheap now but back then you just didn’t know how much things cost until you got the bill.
My brother came to visit me and we would go to the telephone shops where you went in, claimed a telephone booth and sat down to call the United States. There was an old machine that clicked numbers counting up and the horrifying thing was that you never knew how much each click cost or how long you talked. We’d talk really fast to our parents who were back in Pennsylvania probably wondering if we had already spent our monthly allowance doing who knows what. We would come out of the booths with sweaty palms and ask for our conto (bill) and they’d push the piece of paper across the counter and waited.
Plus you had to do a money conversion in your head (it was lire back then instead of Euros). “Sixty thousand lire? Elliot, that’s like fifty dollars!!?” I yelled at my brother, “Oh my god!” and still say “Grazie” to the shop owner because you needed to show respect because I was a foreigner in their country.
I look back on those days with a really warm heart and happy joyful smile on my face. I’ll never forget the times I spent in Italy. Sounds kind of trite, I might think, but there is so much to my experience, which is why I enjoy writing and talking about this gorgeous country. Today I can feel the soulful smiles pass across my vision like I were looking at them today.
Being twenty and never having spent time in Europe, it was all a very educational experience. Daily I would be greeted with something new. I would meet people constantly from all over the world, no matter where I went or what I was doing. That is one amazing beautiful thing about being in Europe, in general. Here in the United States the only time I felt even close to having such a cosmopolitan feeling was when I lived in New York City.
In order to bring to you the essence of what I experienced when visiting and living in Italy, I have decided to write a luscious meditation experience for your brains. The microcosm of tranquility and peace encapsulated in a page or two of descriptive sensory language… for you. Thank you for continuing to be a part of my writing journey. (Someone please remind me to scan all my fine art photographs from Italy…)
Guided Meditation in Tuscany, Italy
As I sit on the side of a hill above one of the gorgeous green valleys in Perugia
I feel the sunshine on my cheeks
The warmth of the light around me
Filling me with a sensation of freedom
No one I have to go see
No where I have to be but here
My journal in my lap, open to the next page that
Is open for my next set of words to describe yet another
Glorious day of a new culture
I write about my day, my pen writing large letters to
Express my joy that I feel
After I write some more I feel complete
I lay back into the grass and breathe deeply
My journal on my chest
I appreciate this book that holds so many secret quiet moments
Where I have written words of laughter, words of kindness I felt
Descriptions of people who I met
Boys I have met who loved life
Girls who befriended me simply because I smiled at them today
Drawings of places I dreamed about while sleeping in a room
With a window wide open with no screens
The black night sky with stars twinkling into my room
I dream of the cafe with savory sandwiches and black espresso
Where I found another relaxing place to write my story
In that wooden seat next to the blacktop bistro table…
I remembered the villa where I stayed with one of
The families associated with my school
The mother of the family was a countess it turns out
From Switzerland, her husband, a caring handsome man
In his fifties
They cooked us four or five course meals daily
Meat, soups, salads, pasta with a light red tomato sauce
made purely from freshly squeezed tomatoes, olive oil, basil, salt, pepper
My roommates were two or three Americans
I didn’t associate with them much outside of our quarters
We always ate on the veranda because we could
Bread always bread with olive oil and garlic smashed in it
The wine. Always wine except for breakfast when we would drink
Cappuccinos, bread, butter, fruit
On the veranda again we would watch the sun come up to warm our arms
One day our house father would take us to the wine store
Out in the country away from anything to close to anything
There was a barn-looking building and humble signage
He parked anywhere
His little compact car fit anywhere especially because
There was no one else there but the shop owner
Buon giorno, signore…. Good morning, sir
He carried several gallon sized glass jars to the back and we walked back with him
There was a tall machine with side dispensers that looked
Just like a gas station would have. I couldn’t see all the equipment behind it
But I knew that we would receive an incredible amount of wine, red wine
The dispenser clicked with each gurgle of spouting burgundy colored liquid
That insisted on filling the jugs within a minute or two
Beautiful red wine
We carried them back to the small car and thanked the owner.
House father just looked at me and smiled…
Sitting at the cafe I realize it was time to leave for home
Or at least where I was currently staying
I picked up a delicious sandwich from the cafe to take home
Where my German roommate would probably be
We could hang out with some tea
As I make my way through the streets
Where there was little room for big cars
I could smell bread cooking through open windows
Passing another “bar” with rich coffee seeping out the doorways where
Shop owners stood, long white aprons flowing
Arms tucked behind them as they nod to me
Buona sera, signorina, Good evening, miss
Above me there were always signs that
Laundry was completed because the hanging blankets from window sills
Flapped in the wind. Fresh sheets, linens, pants, blouses
And even some underwear dangled precariously
I smiled. I feel so present, so alive in that moment
I begin to eat my sandwich on the way, I couldn’t wait til I got home
She won’t mind
Prosciutto, cheese, hard bread, the saltiness of the ham
Delicious and nourishing
The bells from the closest church begin to ring, back and forth
Back and forth, back and forth until it told the precise time
I breathed in deeply, I breathed out with confidence. I feel
Like there was nothing to be worried about today. Not thinking about anything
Else other than my physical sensations of walking home.
Experiencing the place that I currently call home, my mind full
From the teachings of my school
We read another few chapters from this book from southern Italy
Written in the 1940s in a dialect that I also learned along side
Classic Italian or Italian from Central Italy, Florentine, beautifully
Spoken, eloquent, elegant, and made you want to listen to them
Speak for hours on end.
Southern Italian was similar in comparison to how American English
Changes when you visit the southern United States back home
Words are abbreviated, words meaning different things, words combined
Beautifully converted to another word that was almost easier to pronounce
Different names and landscapes, fisherman, changes in cuisine
Ocean stories, speaking a little bit slower,
darker skin more frequent compared to the north
The book was a rich study of southern culture here
I look forward to another day of reading this book
on the hill beyond the school where I write daily
What time is it? I don’t care.
What a glorious clear dark blue sky, turning colors and transforming
Into night
Pleasantly coaxing me towards the apartment
I reached for my key to let myself in
And wait for my friend
One last tea before bed, I write in my journal
Buona notte, good night
Blessed be.
