I took my midday walk in the Circus Minimus, but instead of counting laps, I listened to a fifty minute podcast from WNYC; Krista Tippet’s conversation with Ross Gay, an essayist and community organizer. I trust I did the reps as scheduled. I was appropriately tired at the conclusion. But never getting to free movement may suggest returning to the street tomorrow for my midday jaunt. Or, to take advantage of the privacy of the courtyard, adding an early morning walk in my sweats and slippers.
As I climbed the exterior stairs to my studio, Patrizia came onto her balcony. We chatted.
“Any big plans for today? Exciting trips? Maybe a movie? Dinner at Sette Consoli?”
“Maybe I’ll sit in the living room, just for a change. I didn’t work today.”
“No?” Patrizia is secretary for the entire district of five (maybe six) high schools. “Because it’s Saturday?”
“No, because I didn’t feel like it. Working at home is fun for awhile, then it feels like you never leave work. So, today I’m staying at home.”
Renzo joined her. I explained I was walking the circuit and listening to a podcast, “Not the news, the news from the States is too brutal.”
“Brutal all over. Difficult to listen to. I’ve got something in the oven.”
“Oh boy!”
He chuckled and went in. Patrizia remained, taking the air and staying at home.
The circular walk merited a short nap, so I took one. I replied to a bunch of emails, trying to direct friends to this blog in answer to questions about life in Orvieto, or at least about my life in Orvieto. Then after a phone conversation with a friend who lives five minutes away by foot (ten by car), I fixed a sandwich and sat down to write an early post.
When I use too many adjectives, it’s a sure sign I have no real idea of what I’m trying to say. These pages are a journal. I may admire the work of essayists, may slip toward that format myself from time to time, but these should be based on what happened today, or at a minimum what memories were provoked by the day’s events. So, I pronounced the post aborted, saved it generically, and took a walk.
Probably because it was earlier than usual, I passed several people tonight. The beautiful brown boxer was out with her owner. She slyly managed to perform a double feint and snuck in a lick on my hand. That alone might sustain me for a week. It was as if she understood the situation and wanted to express her affection in spite of it.
I passed my neighbor, Enrica, who is also an assistant to my beloved dentists.
A man I don’t know in stocking cap and mask, collar on his coat turned up, appeared suddenly out of an alley as I passed. My body responded with a thrill of unnecessary, but rather pleasurable fear. At the end of the street I turned to change direction and inadvertently paid the poor fellow back in kind.
At the same spot on the next lap, I caught Stefano, who makes my favorite soups, just as he went into his house. He recognized me late, reopened his door, and sent a smile, a wave, and a buona sera my way, all three gratefully returned.
Mumbling back to my gate I could feel my body loosen, slide into synchronicity with my gait. A healing body is not only an expression of mechanical functioning. It wants to be well-tuned. I’ve had several wonderful conversations with absent friends yesterday and today, courtesy of WhatsApp, but this evening’s brief encounters were as rich and beneficial with no conversation at all, and really helped with the tuning.
I love the rapt attention dogs will give each other from across a piazza, an unabashed admission that to see one of its own species is significant, even if one of them is a wolfhound and the other a terrier. What happens next is not always so admirable, but each time I see that spellbound fixation on the possibility of a social interaction, I look around at the people going here and there and am struck at how strongly we too are socially wired, we just have more complex communication skills – or at least more complicated.
At times like these, during which spontaneous contact is so rare, I am reminded again that even in its rareness and brevity, and even from a two-meter distance, contact is very, very special.
The photo, by the way, is from 2018.