Ah Italy! Even better with age By Barbara Dickinson
As renowned poet Derek Walcott wrote in his beautiful poem, “In Italy.” “I have come this late to Italy, but better now, perhaps, than in youth that is never satisfied….” Oh, Monsieur Walcott, I agree with you one hundred percent! I traveled extensively in Italy when I was young (that time of my life seems a century ago) and, alas, I remembered very little of the country when I revisited it in April. Youth does funny things to one’s brain. Call it “selective memory,” or “crowding out,” but information that lasts forever and ever tends to pertain to husbands, children, former loves, former homes, sudden crises, health issues. One may easily recall certain famous buildings or particular paintings, but oftentimes it takes a real jolt to bring those peripheral memories back into focus. This is exactly what happened to me on this recent trip. My memory got the BIG JOLT, and I was able to recapture some of my youthful scenarios and focus on, oh, so many more scenes. At the risk of boring you, gentle reader, I’m going to ramble on once again about this beautiful, sensuous country stretching into the Mediterranean Sea. SENSUOUS is definitely the one adjective that describes Italy. It appeals; it gratifies all of the senses. Sometimes this gratification is subtle, sneaky, catching one unaware. At other times, a site or an architectural wonder is able to bowl one over in a heartbeat. An example of the subtle: The afternoon of our arrival found us winding up into the Tuscan hills south of Florence, sleepily jolting along on a bus after most of us had just embarked from nine-hour flights from the States. Ho-hum. The sun was warm, and our group lazily took in the passing landscape until, as we rounded a bend in the road that continually climbed higher and higher, we looked out on a silvery, shimmering landscape below. Distant pale green hills framed a valley so spectacularly beautiful that there was literally a collective gasp throughout the bus. We were looking down on an orchard of olive trees in full leaf. (Fortunately, these trees had not been pruned yet, as late March/early April is the time to prune the wayward limbs.) It was a sight of breathtaking beauty, and one that was to be repeated time and time again. What a visual introduction! And the other trees that we learned to identify were equally as lovely. There were the tall and stately dark green cedars, usually associated with cemeteries and often found in the 13th -14th century Italian paintings. And the charming “umbrella” trees (whose name I never learned) also associated with landscapes of the Renaissance era. Looking at the scenery each day was a visual slideshow. Each view reminded me why I had come on this trip. The smells of Italy! I could wax poetic about the freshness of the countryside and the glorious hunger-producing aromas of the local trattorias or sidewalk bistros. Italian chefs know how to pick the plumpest tomatoes to make the choicest of sauces for their pastas or risottos…and they choose the proper herbs to bring out that tomato’s flavor. Fresh baked bread, roasting beef or lamb, selected cheeses: every meal was a challenge for the olfactory senses and the overstuffed stomach. Although visits to the two larger cities on our tour (Siena and Firenze) brought the usual cacophony of traffic noise, there was always the ringing of the campanile (bell tower) to remind one where you really were in the world. These bells have been sounding for generations, long before radio and television, calling people to work, to play, to church, and long ago, to war. In the smaller hill towns, the noon bells signaled lunch hour and closing time for all shops. Woe to the tourist who plans to purchase that last minute souvenir between noon and 3 o’clock! Obviously, I cannot continue this love letter to Italy indefinitely. My senses are sated. I can close my eyes and remember the beautiful Botticelli’s in the Uffizi Museum. I can hear the last peal of Siena’s campanile at sunset. I can taste the last morsel of Pienza’s pecorino cheese, washed down with a gulp of ruby-red Chianti. It was a trip that I am filing away in my head … to revisit when I can no longer travel. Barbara Dickinson is a Roanoke-based novelist and freelance writer.
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