Posted by on Apr 12, 2013 | 3 comments

(Anne planting a kiss in Rome)

 

I have memories of being out the wilds after someone dumped me somewhere, and frankly, I don’t relish stirring up those flashes of feeling cold and abandoned and know knowing where to sleep or how to eat. Humans have bad memories, too, sometimes but every now and then, there’s a sweet little memory that sort of tickles one’s fancy, wherever that is. Mama was talking the other day about her first time in Rome, so many, many years ago (don’t let her know I said THAT) —she was here with her best friend, Nan, and they were in Italy for a long time together, young and crazy and living in Viareggio and they drove down to Rome in their little 850 Fiat named The Grape because it was purple—yes, purple—and in those times, as I understand it, kids were starting to smoke some strange catnip, which mama did for only a few youthful years but on that particular night, she and her friend hit Rome on a perfectly lovely moonlit night and in the distance they saw a wonderful structure called the Colosseum and in those days one could drive around and around it as long as you wanted and so they did that for what seemed like months, awestruck by its beauty (I was, too, when we drove by it the other day coming into Rome) and a little out of it because of the catnip and that was mama’s first coup de foudre (that’s lovestruck in French, like the way she was by papa at the French door) with Rome and she has been in love ever since.

Now I’m making memories in Rome to take back to France with me. As I gaze out the windows (apart from watching those dumb doggies snarling at one another) I see two little plaster angels who watch over our bedroom and I see pigeons roosting in the roofs of the lovely old terracotta-colored building across the street, and every now and then, I see a couple kissing and hugging in the street, just happy to be in this magical city, maybe for the first time, and they are having their own coups de foudre like mama.

Wait a minute!!! Those guys out there are our friends who are visiting Rome for the first time!!!

This is a small town, a really small town….