Sniffle

Today I went from being really,really sick to just half-sick. My ears are still ringing, but today, if you call me, you will hear someone that sounds like Lynda on Steroids instead of the wicked witch of the West (you know...I will get you Dorothy and your little dog Todo too!" ). I have been suffering from the bronchitis from hell and I’m still coughing like a maniac.

I hate being sick. I hate not being able to walk into a super all night pharmacy with 37 isles of cold medicine and 56 flavours of cough syrup, plus cheap DVD's and Fiddle Daddle to see you through several days in bed tucked in with Puffs Plus extra soft Kleenex. Being sick in Italy means I am stuck with the well intentioned "Omeopatico" belladonna drops delivered by a bella ragazzo that not only give me the hives but which must also be drunk with copious amounts of Tisana. I think I actually heard myself slosh when I walked down the hallway a few minutes ago.

Something tells me though that I’m going to be paying for my stubbornness though....however will I ever get my North American body to accept (read - trust) Italian cures if I do not at least open my mind to the possibility that one of them might actually work and that the erboristeria really and truly isn't an Italian cousin of the Wild West's Doc Johnson Snake Oil salesmen.

It sucks being sick. Being sick and alone while all your friends go out and have thanksgiving turkey is even worse.

Poor me. Boo. Hoo. I feel a pity party coming on. Dishevelled Redhead in Monti goes on a belladonna strike. Better dead than a woman with water retention.

I don't want to be Penelope!

Ever read something and suddenly imagine yourself juxtaposed into the same pair of shoes? Over cafe this morning I am gleefully reading Of Cities and Women (Letters to Fawwaz) by Etel Adnan, when I stimble across the following passage....

Penelope is thus to Ulysses what Job is to God: the object that waits, and which by waiting, "divinizes" Ulysses.

And, ever since, in a collective imagination that is brought to date constantly, the woman is that which waits, she waits to grow up, she waits for puberty, waits for her fiancee, her husband, her child, her old age, and her death. She waits for the children to come and go, for them to grow up, for them to marry, for her husband to go to work in the morning and come home at night. She waits for the water to boil, for the war to be over, for the spring to return. She waits to be kissed, taken, rejected, forgotten. She waits for the moment of love, the moment of vengeance, of oblivion, and again, of death. She is the flower awaiting the bee, and the valley awaiting the storm. She is born practically seated, and Penelope does nothing but sit. She is pure waiting. She weaves and unravels her work. She is the one to be Sisyphus. and for the waiting to be perfect, she must produce nothing lasting with her hands.

There you have, In Monteverdi and his poignant accents, the best exponent of woman's fate.

I think I am going to switch to cafe corretto this morning.

Autobiography

recently Christopher asked me to write a short bio for my new staff profile in the magazine. which, after procrastinating endlessly, all out pleadings to just get on with it and a fair amount of teeth gnashing followed by several failed attempts coupled with an editorly "Lynda this is a bit flip!" we finally settled on something somewhat conducive to journalism that was enough neutral for the purposes of magazine readership, even if it didn't capture my I-HATE-WRITING-BIOS mentality.

having succeeded in baring my soul (well not to the buck nekkid point) for that readership audience, it only seemed fair to tie things up with a nice red bow by doing the same thing here.

so, without further ado and a little kind assistance from my friend, this is the official unplugged Blogger version...

Blogger ambivalente. Poeta contro le rime e la poetica. Memoir-ista alternativamente riluttante ed effusiva. Scrittrice; vice redattrice; femminista; accademica di professione; madre per inclinazione naturale. E' una "hi-tech dipendente", ma allo stesso tempo prova repulsione per tutto cio' che é tecnologico. Cogliona multi-uso in alcune occasioni, per chi voleva e credeva di approfittarsene. Riesce ad amare e voler bene con passione ed intensità tenendo ben distinti i due significati e mai con leggerezza. Non politicamente schierata, ancora devono inventarle la categoria politica dove identificarsi, ma certo é che la notte in cui é stato eletto per la prima volta George W. Bush ha pianto parecchio.
Sa bruciare i suoi ponti ma è anche desiderosa di ricostruirli, con la voglia di continuare per la propria strada e guardando sempre avanti. Cinicamente ottimista, con molta cautela si intende. Tanto profondamente morale ma anche scandalosa. Cambia piu' facilmente idea che l'olio del motore della sua macchina (ne ha distrutte cinque di macchine! ) A proposito, non affidatele le vostre piante in vaso, non conosce il significato della parola " pollice verde".

Seeing your name in print

its nice to be noticed professionally. in the last week i have recieved two calls and one email from persons in the wine trade congratulating me on my new monthly wine column in The American magazine.

but nicer still than this accolade has been and is the support i often get from the magazine's editor. Christopher has helped me past a few skinned knees and bloody noses to see that writing professionally, while damned hard, is well worth the effort and for that I feel like I am growing creatively and that is something fun to do when you are a late bloomer in the writing world. add to that some sweet text messages and e-mails from friends old and new who like my poetry and prose and who do not think what i write is useless dribble and i begin to feel myself more confident, as well as blushingly proud.

now that is not a feelin us southern gals try and cultivate. it usually leaves us embarassed or worse yet, fully expecting the gods to smack us down for feelin a uppity. but sassy i feel today, and for one day at least, the gods be damned.

Caffè Caffè Caffè

Thank you Silvana Panero, a professional in the art of italian coffee, for a comprehensive listing of all those wonderful types of coffee i hear shouted out in my bar each morning. I think I am going to carry this list with me and order something different every day.

Caffè normale
Caffè ristretto
Caffè lungo
Caffè macchiato
Caffè ristretto macchiato caldo
Caffè ristretto macchiato freddo
Caffè lungo macchiato caldo
Caffè lungo macchiato freddo
Caffè ristretto macchiato caldo senza schiuma
Caffè ristretto macchiato schiumato
Caffè normale schiumato
Caffè normale macchiato caldo
Caffè normale macchiato freddo
Caffè normale macchiato caldo con un pò di latte freddo
Caffè ristretto in tazza grande
Caffè ristretto in tazza grande macchiato freddo/caldo
Caffè lungo in tazza grande (macchiato caldo/freddo/con acqua calda/fredda)
Caffè americano
Caffè Usa
Caffè normale con acqua calda/fredda
Caffè normale con un cubetto di ghiaccio
Ristretto, ristrettissimo, schiumato
Caffè ristrettissimo con poco latte
Caffè in vetro
Caffè ristretto in vetro
Caffè ristretto in vetro macchiato caldo
Caffè ristrettissimo con tanto latte
Caffè in vetro (macchiato caldo/freddo/con acqua calda a parte/lungo)
Caffè in tazza fredda
Caffè in tazza bollente
Caffè bollente
Caffè bollente macchiato caldissimo
Caffè macchiato caldissimo
Caffè in tazza grande con panna
Caffè corretto grappa
Caffè corretto whisky
Caffè corretto Fernet
Caffè corretto anice
Caffè corretto schiuma
Caffè ristretto in tazza fredda•
Caffè ristretto in tazza bollente
Caffè ristrettissimo
Espresso
Espresso molto lungo
Brodo nero & caffè al volo
Espresso ristretto
Caffè corto
Un nero
Caffè basso
Caffè macchiato lungo con acqua calda a parte
Caffè lungo molto macchiato
Goccia di caffè con crema di latte (paperino)
Goccia di caffè con latte senza schiuma
Caffè marocchino
Caffè macchiato con cacao
Caffè doppio
Caffè doppio ristrettissimo (con latte freddo a parte)
Caffè doppio ristretto/lungo
Caffè doppio macchiato caldo/freddo
Caffè doppio ristretto (con latte freddo a parte)
Una spremuta di brasil
Una spremuta di arabica
Caffè con cacao
Caffè corretto schiuma
Caffè con nuvoletta
Caffè spumato
Un brodo nero
Una spremuta di chicchi
Un caffè con la barba
Un americano macchiato
Un macchiato lungo
Caffè alla caffeina
Mi tiri un caffé
Caffè super
Caffè francese
Caffè al volo
Un caffè leggero
Caffé con fiocco (di panna)

SVBURA

SVBURA

I have the strange and sometimes noisy privilege of living in the oldest of Rome’s original twelve rione. Just a few crooked narrow streets, less that one mile in diameter, inside the heart of Monti that is sometimes still referred to as Suburra (SVBURA in Latin).

For the last 2,500 years working class Romans (and now much wealthier ones, investing in the "shabby chic") have "abitata sotto la città" in this area that is not only a blend of Baroque, Rinascimentale, Medieval, and Roman architecture but a melting pot of cultures, classes, affectations and professions. And each day I come home dragging my weary laptop or overnight bags, I am left smiling and glad to be here…..a place uniquely Roman and with a history as colorful as it is ancient, and as original as the Roman bricks in the basement of my palazzo. It is a place that is as different as any I have ever had the privilege of visiting and yet, it has also begun to feel like home.

For it is within my network of narrow cobbled streets that I can find just about anything or anyone. The president of the republic has a house here, complete with security guards and scary men in fancy suits, sitting in black sedans wearing ear pieces. There is one of Rome’s oldest blacksmiths and the man who has made keys on Via Cavour for nearly 30 years. There is the mosaic artist who created the image in New York’s Central Park for the John Lennon memorial and despite being blind in one eye, still teaches his apprentice to cut the tile using the same tools and methods used since ancient Rome.

Suburra is also the place were Caesar sent his troops to unwind and get randy, where even Messalina and Nero were reported to have hung out, disguised in search of a little anonymous debauchery with the lower classes. Ask around, and you will hear the tale of Empress Messalina's challenge to a prostitute named Scylla for an all-night sex marathon. Scylla gave up at dawn when each of the women had taken on 25 lovers, but Messalina continued well on into the morning, stating that while she was exhausted she was still unsated.

Maybe it is for this reason that even today, you can still find brothels here, and the girls working them who smile at me and say "Ciao! Or "Che freddo!" as windy autumn sets in. I am tempted to invite them upstairs for tea, just to warm them and to understand better just how they do what they do, but I’ve already had to go one or two rounds to convince a few overly curious neighbors that no, just because I am friendly and speak to everyone does not mean I am for sale. Unlike Borgo, the Rione closer to the Vatican, the "cortigiane" here were never the elegant wealthy lovers of Popes, high prelates, or the noblemen long ago. Svbvra’s gals gave solace to tired troops and the sexually hungry of the middle and lower classes. They were even looked upon by the church as a necessary facet of every day Roman life. Even Thomas Aquinas in the Summa theologiae, stated "Taking away prostitutes from human affairs would stir up all matter of licentiousness." And as Aquinas graphically explained, "prostitution is like a sewer in a palace; if the sewer is removed, the palace will fill with filth".

I cannot say I agree with his assessment (girls in my neighborhood representative as sewers) but I do imagine for some of them , life would be infinitely more stimulating in some other line of work that didn't require them to sit perched on motorini for hours on end waiting for their next few euros.

But their presence here as well as their curious johns is a facet of life in the neighborhood, as real as the baskets some of the older folks still lower down on string to the waiting fruit vendors below and as colorful as the smells of minestrone, curry, Mexican and Chinese all mixed together with the paint of artists and the greasy muscle of repair shops.

From my front windows every afternoon I hear jazz, (one of the blessings of living near a jazz school), and at night the occasional refrain from an avant guard film playing at the near-by club. There is a classical pianist who practices arpeggios and the vendor hawking his knife sharpening skills and sometimes, infuriatingly at 7 in the morning, I hear the clickity clack of suitcases from the hotel just down the street.

From inside the maze of my building, I can hear Fabio yelling at his wife (proving once again why I think marriage is for the birds!) or Nina Simone, blaring from a worker’s radio as they refurbish the 4th floor apartment. I also hear the thump, thump thump, of another neighbor’s son running from one room to the next as it mixes with the sound of laughter from Probahker’s family across the courtyard. At night I hear the giggles and drunkeness of the twenty-somethings from the near-by hostel and have been known to shout myself "Aye!" to get them to be a little quieter when they forget that there are folks who have to get up for work in the morning trying to sleep in the nearby flats.

Last night I have walked home from a delightful dinner in the ghetto, past the Roman Forum and onto via Serpenti, turning again onto my own little narrow street. I had Rome almost to myself except for the couple holding hands whispering in "monticiani" the local dialect. Eavesdropping, I overheard him ask if they had bread for tomorrow’s breakfast, and her romantic response, "who needs bread, we have each other".

Ahhh Monti, I think I am in love.

Aegroto, dum anima est, spes esse dicitur

update on the future of the best Latin classes in Rome. dearest Fr. Reginald Foster has found a home (god looks after spritely Latin teachers, even when members of the clergy don't)
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in the end this incredible spirit did just as i suspected he would, and rightly so, he chose a school that could give him a classroom immediately, The American Institute of Roman Culture, and i respect that from a man who at 68 (me thinks), instead of thinking about simply retiring, chooses to take only a fortnight from termination to initiation to begin a new post. A brave and charming professor, willing to take on a new post so that the language he loves can continue to grow in the minds of the next generation.

Aegroto, dum anima est, spes esse dicitur.
godspeed Reggie! you rock!