Distance Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

That can be true. I have been remembering a lot of old songs of my growing up years, with the help of the very funny people who post on http://www.expatsinitaly.com/ ... 'Purple People Eaters', 'Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Polka Dot Bikini', Marty Robbins' cowboy song 'Town of El Paso' ... all the way up to the hauntingly beautiful (and I do mean this, as a native-born Northern Californian) 'California Dreamin' ...

All the leaves are brown And the sky is grey

I went for a walk On a winter's day

I'd be safe and warm If I was in L.A.

California dreamin' On such a winter's day

I stopped into a church (stopped into a church) I passed along the way (passed along the way)

You know, I got down on my knees (got down on my knees)

And I pretend to pray (I pretend to pray)

Oh, the preacher likes the cold (preacher likes the cold) He knows I'm gonna stay (knows I'm gonna stay)

**** flute solo ****

Oh, California dreamin' (California dreamin') On such a winter's day

All the leaves are brown (the leaves are brown)

And the sky is grey (and the sky is grey)

I went for a walk (I went for a walk) On a winter's day (on a winter's day)

If I didn't tell her (if I didn't tell her) I could leave today (I could leave today)

Oh, California dreamin' (California dreamin') On such a winter's day (California dreamin')

On such a winter's day (California dreamin')

On such a winter's day (California dreamin') On such a winter's day

I'm thinking about the impressionability of my youth, how I really can remember a lot of goofy lyrics as well as the beautiful ones, though I wasn't good at remembering names of groups and who played what.

Wanted to live in Europe, how impossible I thought it would ever be.

And then I met a man (I met a man),

who got down on his knee (on his knee .. well, sort of)

and asked, 'Will you marry me?'

And twenty six years later (twenty six years later), it all came to be (came to be).

Now in Italy two years, and I'm California dreamin' (California dreamin'),

or maybe New Jer-zee (New Jer-zee).

The man is wondering what I'm thinking (what I'm thinking).

***zither solo***

Fall the leaves are yellow (leaves are yellow), don't turn flame and autumn gold.

Someday I'll return home, before Medicare kicks in (Medicare kicks in),

and I'll have my memories when I'm tired

and old, when I'm tired and old.

Bricks and Beams in the Morning

This morning I woke up and, for the first time since August 2, 2005,

I did not say to myself,

'This is not home.'

I looked up at the bricks and beams, and smiled.

Total relaxation, no split-second of panic.

Maybe I am turning a corner.

Customer Service, Part 685

This is just a little vignette of the customer service that isn't. We go into FNAC, the 'Best Buy', 'P C Richards' equivalent in Europe. We are looking for a shelf stereo system, and we settle on two or three systems to test. We go home, telling Francesco the salesman that we will be back tomorrow. Tomorrow comes and we have brought two CDs so that we can hear what we need to hear. We listen to the first system, the more expensive one. Then Francesco suggests that we listen to that system over there...less expensive, smaller speakers but by the same manufacturer... but it isn't hooked up. He says, no problem, he can do that.

So while he is doing that we look at something else in the store, nearby. I don't want to appear to be looking over his shoulder. He tells us the second system is ready, and we listen to the CDs. Then we take the CDs back to the first, more expensive system, the one that we really want, to listen one more time before we make a buying decision. And the cables are gone!

There aren't enough cables in the store for all the systems, so our oh-so-helpful salesman hooked up the second system with the cables from the first system. Now we have to ask, beg, please would he hook up the first system again, as we are making a big decision (remember that 35% exchange rate) and we need to hear the first system one more time. I promise that if we like it we will buy it. I am dancing as fast as I can to get him to change the cables again.

So, he does and we do and we buy. Now, my question is: Why would a salesman disable one of the two systems a serious customer is examining? It was our second day there, we brought our own music for listening, he knew we were going to make a decision that morning.

Answer: ...This Is Italy.

Deep Roots

I have wondered why I felt the need to bring so much stuff with me on our move to Italy. One obvious answer is that I thought we would be moving here to stay for a long, long time. Now I have changed my mind on that time frame. When we were planning our move, we briefly considered the furnished pied a terre option, and I vehemently discarded it. I felt that I needed to leap in with both feet, and bring my stuff so that my new home would feel like home.

So, something Angel said the other day really has been percolating through my mind, and I think this answers my question to myself. Some people are deep-rooted and some are shallow-rooted. I am deep-rooted. I put down deep roots by decorating my walls, accumulating books and papers, saving mementos, buying pots and pans and china and crystal. As a deep-rooted person, I am also a collector, for a collection ties me to a time and place. Maybe I collect 1930s kitchen implements, because doing that recreates for me a mythical time in the life of my family of origin that I have romanticized.

Therefore, when a deep-rooted one decides to uproot herself and plant herself somewhere else, a lot of stuff comes out with the roots.

A shallow-rooted person travels easily, rents places to live, doesn't mind using someone else's things temporarily. A deep-rooted person has tentacles that go back into her life, that drag things along from place to place.

Every once in a while there is a pruning, a garage sale, a dumpster to be filled. But basically it just pares things down a little. The ties to my past define me. I look at framed pictures and smile. I look at favorite books and think 'maybe I'll reread that this summer'.

When we have gone back to New Jersey, I will have objects from Italy and France and Vienna and London, and all the places we have yet to go.

When I was a kid, my family's neighbor was a couple who had lived in Saudi Arabia for thirty years, while the husband worked for Aramco. After he retired and they returned permanently to their home on our street, their house then held memories of all their travels. Roots in their pasts, however long into the future the past took to build itself. Layers of meaning, physical memories of a life. I like that. And so my boxes of stuff will always go with me.

London, London! June 2007 Part 5

One afternoon I visited Westminster Abbey, in memory of my Mom, who had made some artistic pottery that she sent there for the sacristy. Its probably long gone, but I knew that if she visited London, she would go to the Abbey. I was not prepared for how much this visit affected me. I was raised in the Episcopalian church (The Anglican Church of England in America...at least that's what it was a long time ago; today it is full of controversy and rifts), I haven't gone to church for myself for forty years, yet there was something so familiar about being there. I took a guided tour, 90 minutes. All the history, all the centuries. Just spendid.

Chimneys masquerading as ice cream cones. I like this photo a lot.
The actual motorcycle (totally restored, of course...the English apparently do this a lot, restoring things...see earlier photo in earlier post about Montgomery's tank) that T. H. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) was riding when he veered off the road to avoid boys on bikes, and sustained a terrible head injury which killed him within a few days. There it is, in the museum.

For my daughter, Sandra, I visited Covent Garden, where she had been on a school trip. It was fun, noisy, full of people, wonderful stuff.
And, yes, I went to Harrod's. From the guidebook: No backpacks, no torn jeans...Harrods' doormen ensure even the people in the store are in the best possible taste. This world-famous emporium began life in 1849 as a small, impeccable grocer's, and the present terracotta building was built in 1905. It is most striking at night, when it is illuminated by 11,500 lights. It has more than 150 departments full of extraordinay things at extraordinary prices. The photo above is part of the escalator well, rebuilt by the current owner, Mr. Al Fayed, in an Egyptian theme at a cost of over 21 million BPS ... incredible to see. Fortunately, I wasn't the only one snapping photos.

That's it, my wonderful visit to London. The 2:1 exchange rate of the US$ to the British Pound Sterling was a little bit of a damper, but not enough to make me second-guess the trip. I loved London. And, not surprisingly, one of the things I loved most was being able to speak ENGLISH for four days, be understood, ask questions, be understood, listen to guides, be understood...did I mention being understood??? And the people were terrific, everyone was friendly. I learned to ride the tube and by the second day was scooting around without problems. Color me independent.

London, London! June 2007 Part 4

Always having been fascinated by the whole WWII era, two of my 'must-sees' visiting London were the Churchill War Rooms and the Imperial War Museum. I spent hours between the two.

The Command Center for Churchill and the General Staff. The white phone at the far right is the direct line to Churchill.

The Churchill War Rooms, from the guidebook: During the dark days of World War II, Winston Churchill and his War Cabinet met in these War Rooms beneath the Government Treasury Chambers. They remain just as they were left in 1945 [with the addition of Madame Tussaud-type figures, as lifelike as can be dressed authentically in the uniforms of the day, putting pins in maps, talking on the phone...eerie].

Churchill's quarters in the bunker: his bed, and his desk.

I found this experience, of this visit, to be very emotional. These were the men who held Hitler at bay until America woke up and joined the war effort.

The Imperial War Museum, fittingly enough, is housed in part of the former Bethlehem Hospital, immortalized as...in the vernacular pronunciation...'Bedlam', the hospital for the insane.
These mammoth guns sit before the entrance. I always think of them as the lesser cousins of 'The Guns of Navarone'. Looking at the size of the people at the right, maybe these ARE the guns of Navarone.The smallest existing boat that evacuated soldiers from Dunkirk. The advancing German army was threatening 330,000 French and British soldiers trapped on the beaches.

Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery was the hero of El Alamein and Africa, as well as a continual thorn in Eisenhower's side. This is his personal tank, totally restored (of course).

London, London! June 2007 Part 3

Sunday, I went for a walk and met the most wonderful couple, the Williamses, who were planting window boxes at their son's house. Great faces.

Monday I passed a church with a sign for a harp concert at 1 PM, so after the Kensington Roof Gardens, I returned to the church and listened to a young harpist perform for an hour.

Monday night was the theatre experience of a lifetime, seeing 'Billy Elliot', music by Elton John, based on the 2000 movie of the same name. The story of a young boy who finds out that all he wants to do is dance, set in 1984 against the backgroup of the Thatcherite assault on the coal miners way of life. Terrific.

Tuesday night, dinner with the Kenny family at Lundum's Cafe Bar, a wonderful Danish restaurant. That part of South Kensington at one time was settled by the Danes, and this restaurant serves only Danish food at lunch, and continental at dinner.

Wednesday, my last full day in London, I just walked and looked. I went to Covent Garden, to a British pub for traditional British food (OK, done that, not doing it again!). I ran across this group of schoolgirls in the theatre district going to 'The Lion King'.