L'Albero di Tempo

Every day I pass a maple tree.

I may be going to class, to Sarah's, to anywhere in Florence.

But I pass this same tree everyday.

As I walk down Via della Colonna, this tree stands alone at the very end, just before the piazza. It is in a gated garden and hangs over the better part of the street.

It is one of those trees that cannot be missed. When I walk, I always seem to be walking towards the tree. I can see it as soon as I leave my apartment door, and when I return home, it offers me welcome as a turn the piazza's corner and head back down my street.

It is a beautiful tree, almost perfectly shaped, like a bell. It was one of the first things of my neighborhood that I noticed when I first moved in to my apartment. I can remember walking past the piazza with both of my suitcases in tow, and first seeing the wonderful tree that overhangs the street. It is really just a normal maple tree, but the way that it's permanence that it possesses in this place is relayed to me each time I pass it makes it more than a simple tree.

I have seen beautiful, breathtaking things in Firenze, and my time here is not yet spent. I have time still to pass my beautiful tree, my beckoning symbol for the beauty in store for me as I walk these famous streets. It will be gently calling me each time I walk past it, urging me on, asking me to pass it and see whatever wonder I had planned that day.

It is almost winter now, and the tree knows this as much as I do. When I arrived, the tree was lush and full of green leaves, pleading with me to discover the city for whose gates it keeps. I did listen to my tree, I have seen Firenze and Italy in earnest, and I cannot voice a regret.

As I have said, though, my time is not yet up, and the tree knows this too. It's leaves have changed, turning a soft yellow, and falling gently each day. Now I walk past these leaves gathered in bunches against the walls, counting my time here in their places. I can pick up a leaf and remember a day I've been here, or look at them all on the ground and smile at their simple golden beauty.

There are leaves on the tree still. They wait for me to pass before they fall, and then they do, one by one, counting with me as I try desperately to slow time. But I walk by that tree every day, and there is at least one more leaf added to the pile. Soon I will be able to count the leaves on the tree, and those will fall too fast. When the last leaf falls and winter is arrived, I will take a passed leaf from the pile and place it in my pocket. I will keep the leaf and when I look at it, it will remind me of the pile that sits in the same place where they all fell, remind me of all my time spent in this indescribable place. When I am far away from my tree, when I can no longer turn and walk towards its welcoming branches, this leaf with remind me of each day's passage and each day's entrance, past my tree of welcome, into the place that has changed my life, the city of my dreams.

Guarda Mamma!

Two posts in two days wow!

Don't get used to it.



Tonight the groceries came. My family here in Italy usually buys their food that they will cook for dinner that night the same day, but for other smaller things, they buy everything in bulk and the groceries are delivered.

Nothing out of the ordinary, really, except that they delivered at 9 pm. And also, I could have sworn we jumped ahead 3 months to Christmas.

"GUARDA MAMMA, TANTI YOGURT! MAMMA, BABBO, JOHNJOHN, GUARDA, SUGO DELLE MELE!"

I had never seen anyone so excited about groceries. Giaccomo is my little "brother", so to speak, the 3 1/2 year old commandant of the house. Today was also his first full day of school. (9:00 to 4:00!), and he had just finished his nightly dinner-time tantrum, was brushing his teeth at the umpteenth appeal from Babbo(daddy), when the bell rang and I hear "LE COSE!"

No one could touch anything in the bags. Giaccomo had to inspect first, show everyone what he took out of the bag, and then put it in its place if he could reach (he knows everything's place better than Babbo.) The eggs came in bubble wrap, and Giaccomo, unaware of the wrapped container's contents, let gravity unravel the eggs and all 36 fell to the floor, sparing maybe 2. Mamma was not amused. Christmas in October ended there, Giaccomo threw a spectacular tantrum, and fell asleep when his head hit the pillow.

I am going to try as hard as I can to get as excited as that about anything today.

To Hear Bells

It is easy to think oneself an island, without knowing so.

What shall I do next? Where do I go after this? How can I have time for that?

At home, this is a habit of thinking into which I fall far too easily, as I'm certain we can all attest to.

At home there are few things to distract me from my express line to Nextville. I get onboard and ride until I grow tired.

Its hard for me to recognize others while onboard this train, and indeed, it must be hard for others to recognize me. It would simply take too much time to worry about such things.

But here in Italy, there is still that one remaining reminder, that one rumore that has called attention for thousands of years.

I walk down Via dei Servi on my way home for dinner each night around 6:30, usually briskly, dodging wide-eyed tourists and vespas on my way, watching my feet repeat themselves.

Then I hear the bells.

All at once a symphony of awakening sound erupts. Bells from three or four churches can be heard where I usually hear them. Calling out to other campanile across town, above the rooftops, calling us all. They cannot be ignored.

Whether we choose to dismiss the bells is one thing, but they simply cannot be ignored. What they are calling for is something to be decided on ones own, but they call. In the past, it was for holy men to come to prayer, reminding them to return to community with their brothers. Now, in an almost Godless society, they seem to echo and fade into the past where they would be more appreciated.

For me, it is an awakening. I do not have to ask for whom the bell tolls, I already know. It is a bridge to everyone else. It is my bridge off my island to the mainland. The mainland we are all reminded of at 6:30 each night. We are not islands, as Mr. Donne tells us, but all on this mainland. The next time the express train comes by, I will let it pass and remain on the mainland, though many will laugh, glance downward, and continue toward their islands. Someday a bell will ring for them, and they will hear it like I do now.

Thoughts In Assisi

Here, in this place, a most simple man lived.
Many called him "pazzo", some call him a saint.
But he was most certainly, as he would probably want to be remembered, a simple man of God.
I walk these streets that St. Francis once walked, and I try not to speak much.
I try to see his birthplace, his home, as he might have seen it.
Francis loved beauty, and he was surrounded by it.
This place has such simplistic, wholesome beauty.
Aside from a few amenities for tourism, Assisi has remained untouched by modern times.
Simple, the way Francis would remember it.
Millions follow his example across the world, some dear friends of mine,
And yet he never traveled far from home.
Perhaps this, too, was a lesson from Francis.
Stop for a moment, and look around you.
Listen. Humble yourself and find something beautiful in everything you do.

So as I walk these streets, I'll take a few pictures for the sake of friends.
But I really want to simply see, as Francis saw, beauty in lesser things.
Its not so hard if you try.

Ciao, Tutti, e bevenuti alla mia....blog?

Yes, through various channels, I have been convinced to chronicle my sure-to-be wonderful experience in Firenze over the Interweb, as my brother would call it. So, here I am. I will try to keep up with some sort of regular attendance to this enterprise, but I cannot promise the vigorous attention that so many of our brethren in the human experience seem to apply to their own uncensored electronic creative writing "projects". After all, I will be in Italy.

I leave on Monday, August 31st. I will have a short layover in Switzerland, and will then arrive in Firenze, the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance. The very place that Michelangelo, Dante Alghieri, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Giovanni Boccaccio called home. A place known for its breathtaking artwork, stunning architecture, and, of course, its food.

So as I somehow attempt to prepare myself for this, I thank you for your consideration and your time, and hope to share some of my days and weeks and months in Italy with you.

Gio