this is my coin in the trevi fountain

you are supposed to put a coin in the trevi fountain to make sure you come back to rome.

i know i'll come back, but just to be sure, i put a little coin in the courtyard fountain when no one was looking.

'skills' addendum

my conversation hieri pomeriggio with romano, the very kind older gentleman who drives us to the airport.

me: hi, romano! remember me? i'm hillary and i was here two years ago--

romano: oh, yes! with long hair.

me: yes, that's me! would it be possible to take me to the airport on sunday morning? my flight leaves at 7.

romano: 7..ok, i'll be downstairs at 5.

me: thank you! i'm so sorry, i know it's very...

romano: [word i don't know]?

me: er...i know 5 o'clock is very...

romano: [same word]?

me: er...yes...

milo in rome, or, dear zoe, i was thinking about you in flüghafen münchen

my milo in maine tees came to rome with me. this is a picture of me on the gianicolo wearing one with a pulpo on it. sometimes people ask about my tees and it's fun to tell them i'm from maine and my clothes are, too.


i was wearing this blue shirt when we stopped in munich on the way from paris to rome. i thought about zoe landing in germany in the fall and knowing she would be there for a year. the year is almost halfway done now.

skills

so...
i studied italian for about 3 weeks, but i also lived here for 5 months. so my italian skills are...bizarre.

here's the thing: i love speaking italian, and do it with a certain amount of confidence. my pronunciation isn't terrible either, so when speaking with me, most italians identify me as (obviously) a non-native speaker, but they often continue with me in italian rather than switching to english. where it gets weird is this: there are a lot of very obvious and basic words that i don't know. after a few sentences, i sound like someone who speaks the language, but is too stupid to know the names of, say, the colors, or the parts of the body. this was my conversation this morning with the pharmacist:

me (in italian): good morning! i went running this morning in the park, and i...

pharmacist (confused): what?

me: i hurt myself, on my...

pharmacist: on your what??

me: (rolls up sleeve to show scraped arm)

pharmacist: oh...on your ARM.

me: yes! can i please have some antibiotic ointment?

oh hi guys!

look! i went to the beautiful church of santa maria sopra minerva, and found a few of my friends inside:

animali in liberta

this weekend i visited dana and don and lulu in gubbio. i LOVE dana and don and lulu.

gubbio is the kind of place you don't imagine that people really live. it looks amazing ALL THE TIME. i wake up and say "the mornings are beautiful here!" and then in the afternoon i think "wow, the afternoons here are lovely" and so on.

lulu liked barking at me. she thought i had been brought in to provide her with entertainment.
i could hear some sheep but i couldn't find them. i saw a deer, though.

why are nuns funny?

perhaps because you don't expect them to do normal things like eat lunch. in rome they look like old-fashioned nuns in habits, and there are many of them, especially here, near st. peter's.

when i lived here two years ago, one day i went for a run down a street i didn't recognize. it was deserted, and there were a few abandoned motorini laying around, so i was nervous. when i finally reached the end of the street, i was in another country: the vatican.

when i was little i kind of wanted to be a nun. not for any religious calling whatsoever but because i wanted to wear a habit and live in a place that looks just like this:

it's spring here, which is another new thing! there are three types of flowers: tiny white ones that look like daisies, even tinier purple ones, and daffodils.

the aventine

today i climbed the aventine hill. this is something i did once and always dreamed of doing again. on the aventine is the tower of a church that i always looked at when i lived in rome before, and today i went there. it was san anselmo.

it's a long walk up the aventine and i guess not too many people did it because there was no one else in beautiful santa sabina.
i lit candles for ann and mimi. rome is like a place i lived in and never saw. i see it now, and it's amazing.

what was wrong with me??

anyway...grateful for the second chance.

i woke up, and rome was outside my window

yesterday was mimi's birthday and today i woke up and it was spring in rome. i went outside and there were tiny flowers and little chirping birds. it was like i got on a plane and flew to paradise.

i've been to rome quite a few times now but i guess this is the first time with my eyes open.

i took a long walk to all the places i remembered to make sure they were still there. the place i like to buy socks had moved, but i found it. a restaurant that i liked moved closer. i couldn't find the pantheon but i found the gelato place near it. first things first!

andiamo!

thank you for your comments!

little owl guy and I are on our way. I'm wearing my leggings from wal-mart.

HELP: what does 60 degrees feel like??

i need some help! apparently the average temperature in roma right now is 60 during the day and 45 at night. i don't really know what that feels like...it seems like here in new england it's either hot or cold. what do you wear when it's 60 degrees?

my preemptive strike on jet lag

on wednesday i'm going to paris and then to roma. yippee!!!

today was a day of many new things: i ate at pat's cafe with nicky, visited betty, and ate half of an avocado sandwich (betty's...oops) that janet had made. here's what i'm doing tomorrow: getting up at 6. tuesday i'm getting up at 5, and wednesday--you guessed it--4! which is 10 in parigi and not too crazy a time to wke up. this is a test to see if it's possible to avoid jet lag by messing yourself up on purpose, in advance.

check back and see how i did!