A New Heading

As you can see, I have replaced the borrowed windows with a new image. I took this picture from the steps of Santo Miniato al Monte. This could be a postcard, you say, and you might be correct. I haven't seen a postcard with this exact image yet, but as suggested by a distinguished reader of this blog, I will beware of the infinite variety of possible postcards. My vow was never meant to deny me the benefits of personal photography, it was to prevent me from limiting my vision to a 2 x 2 inch digitized view of the world.

This particular image I felt inspired to carry back down the hill with me. I will claim the shadow on the bush behind the graves in the foreground as a signature. The statue belongs to the grave of a woman whose husband died in 1944. Although you can't see them in my cropped version of the image, at the base of the statue there are four children who grasp the woman's gracefully inviting cloak. While this scene is undoubtedly maternal, from where I stood on the hill yesterday, I saw a young woman, opening herself up to the expanse of the city with humility and calmness. Although I am growing more accustomed to sights, sounds, smells, sensations, tastes, and customs here, this city is still forcefully foreign. I doge Vespas and walk with raised elbows to maneuver through crowded sidewalks. When I walk alone (during daylight hours and on crowded streets--before anyone gets too worried), I am rarely bothered by street venders or other passersby. For the most part my uniform of black boots and a knee-length black, waterproof, hooded coat imitates the majority of Florentine females' wardrobes. On drizzly days, like today, when my hood is up, I have twice been confused for someone who could give detailed directions in Italian.

When I walk with others from my group, I'm no longer the silent, solitary pedestrian, but part of a noisy gaggle of mostly blonde-headed American twenty-something women, and suddenly there is an onset of "hello"s and "how are you"s and "where are you from," or "where are you going"s. Coming from the urban environment of Seattle where human interaction in public is characterized by a particular brand of passivity and subtly, this aggressiveness is outstandingly rattling. In the U.S., I like to smile at strangers, particularly those I sense are in need of one, but here, especially in certain locations, I've seen that a smile can invite an onset of undesired attention. This bit of commentary of course reinforces cultural stereotypes, of both young American women abroad and Italian men on the street, but the reality is sometimes stereotypes call out to you from bridges and piazzas.

So, where can I go from here? To the individual, of course. When I went to the lecture at the British Institute earlier this week, a young man with the beard of a grad student walked up to the chair next to me and gestured to make sure I wasn't saving it. I smiled and opened my palm over the seat to indicate its availability. We did not speak to one another throughout the lecture but as I got up to leave, through an identifiable but completely understandable Italian accent he said, "I thank you for your smile, they are rare and expensive in this city." As I walked back to my homestay, I was pleased with my well-spent smile, and was reminded the singular instance can be more potent than a litter of catcalls.