{"id":343,"date":"2016-02-26T20:53:59","date_gmt":"2016-02-26T20:53:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/?p=343"},"modified":"2016-03-04T11:54:02","modified_gmt":"2016-03-04T11:54:02","slug":"the-origin-of-the-wheel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/2016\/02\/26\/the-origin-of-the-wheel\/","title":{"rendered":"The Origin of the Wheel:"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 1975, I lived in Firenze for a little over three months. It\u00a0was a different city forty-one years ago, if not in form, very much so in tone. Always a destination, in those days it also\u00a0seemed provincial, intimate, local. Gelateria Vivoli was a unadorned counter open to the street where\u00a0a small cup of ice cream cost\u00a0350 lire (something like 35 cents.) I dined\u00a0almost every day at \"Casalinga<\/a>Trattoria La Casalinga for about two dollars in its single high-ceilinged room, Paolo amazing me by\u00a0his dexterous way with dishes\u00a0and good-humored dealings with customers. I\u00a0waited for\u00a0friends\u00a0on Ponte Vecchio while watching Italians of my age, arms linking them into human chains, tease and flirt and rebuff. I learned to identify the provenance of tourists crossing the bridge by the manner\u00a0of their gait. The open air markets near San Lorenzo offered more than leather. Blood oranges, the preferred citrus,\u00a0were\u00a0exotic and luxurious.<\/p>\n

All those particulars have changed. Tastes, styles, customs, and economies do that. That\u00a0it was special for me in those special weeks of four decades ago, means nothing to the enormity of time. I alone am responsible for casing those memories in amber so I can look at them now and again and relive the warmth of their distant sun.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Towards the end of that Florentine spring, my Italo-American friend\"Duomo<\/a>\u00a0suggested\u00a0that with the challenges of life and money and time ahead of us, it was likely neither he nor I would return for at least ten years. To a\u00a0twenty-five year old man ready for adventure, the idea was\u00a0terrifying and absurd.<\/p>\n

For years afterward, I only visited Firenze in a dream. I’d arrive by train, the towers and domes of the town visible in the distance. \u00a0I’d run from the station into the streets, tears streaming as I neared Piazza delle Signorie, t<\/span>hen before the copy of Michelangelo’s David would fall to my knees to kiss the ground. There is probably enough Jungian symbolism in that dream to fill a dissertation. The nocturnal opera played in repertory for two decades.<\/p>\n

\"Casalini1\"<\/a> In 1995, I finally returned to the city while awake. Seven of us\u00a0lived in a restored 15th century farmhouse set among olive groves and vineyards. To the forty-five year old man still ready\u00a0for adventure, being there was more relief than thrill, and strangely, a little bit sad. Firenze had become more prosperous. \u00a0I felt stuck in time.<\/p>\n

Two years later, another group of us\u00a0visited Lazio; we lived\u00a0in a 16th century\"La<\/a> farmhouse set among olives and vines. The nearest town, Roccalvecce, though\u00a0not geographically remote, was remote in other ways \u2013 suspended, not of any particular era. We cooked, feasted, hunted scorpion, toured neighboring towns, and sat on the terrace at nights, debriefing our days while we gazed at a floodlit Palazzo Costaguti, the moon courting its ramparts.<\/p>\n

\"Commedia<\/a>A dozen more visits — Lazio, then Orvieto, then both with Firenze tucked in whenever possible —\u00a0spread over\u00a0another rapidly flowing twenty years. Though I grew older, my friends here never did; a pleasant and somehow necessary illusion. I worked hard\u00a0to know Italy, to understand its\u00a0culture, to learn\u00a0the language, to be a part. As I am a man of the theatre, I cultivated\u00a0a faith in\u00a0confidence, that it could\u00a0outstrip actual knowledge. \u00a0Another level down I feared\u00a0that real\u00a0knowledge was\u00a0out of reach, that\u00a0pretense would always have to suffice.<\/p>\n

When I visited Orvieto and Firenze with my friend Barbara last May it was, in part, to see if I liked it enough to allow\u00a0weeks to\u00a0turn into months, even years. \u00a0By the end of the\u00a0first day here,\u00a0it had become\u00a0clear that\u00a0were these\u00a0flirtations with Italy ever to turn serious, they had better turn soon. My knees already depended on glucosamine for flexibility, other inflexibilities would soon\u00a0follow. \u00a0To delay\u00a0was to be foolish with\u00a0time.<\/p>\n

Touring gorgeous countryside, dining at superb restaurants where prices are\u00a0lower\u00a0tha\"Cappella<\/a>n at mediocre ones at home, meeting kind\u00a0people who\u00a0praise my rudimentary Italian; I could like that, but it didn’t convince me I belong. Then one afternoon while driving alone (after failing to rouse friends in Monterubiaglio by ringing a doorbell I later found did not work) I passed through an industrial zone on a rough road and heard myself say over and over \u201cI really love it here.\u201d<\/p>\n

I scooped up the life maps I’d been peering at, and tossed them away. The new map was a list of things official and logistical that needed doing: deadlines, timelines, underlines, airlines, passport lines, train lines, credit lines. Such\u00a0things frighten me. The actor’s confidence has never extended to believing I can find my way through the complications human society throws in front of all forward motion. However, I had heard myself say\u00a0how much I loved being in Italy while driving on a back road that offered only the autostrada and an industrial installation as scenery. \u00a0It\u00a0was no longer a matter of choice.<\/p>\n

I have a habit \u2013 one likely shared with almost every human being on the planet \u2013 of needing to justify… well, almost everything I do. Multiply that by a factor of six hundred when that thing I’m doing is outside the life I believe I am supposed to lead. The life I believe I am supposed to lead should a<\/b>) make me lots of money, b<\/b>) get me lots of renown, c<\/b>) gain me lots of security in all the ways in which that word can possibly be interpreted. Obviously, I’ve been a long time straying from the life I believe I am supposed to lead.<\/p>\n

Take a breath. \u00a0Ah yes, that internal river. \u00a0There’s a storm on the horizon. \u00a0Looks like a big one. \u00a0Here it comes! \u00a0The river crests powerfully, the mill wheel catches, turns. \u00a0That’s better.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Bits of emotional detritus fly into space. Desires float away. Needs are ground into powder. That\u00a0showers\u00a0should not fluctuate in temperature, that everyone must\u00a0be kind or charming or at least comprehensible, that efficiency will be the meter by which we judge our days; all washed downstream.\u00a0The people around \"Signora<\/a>me \u2013 the beautiful, the fascinating, the crooked, the old, the toddling, the dour, the sweet, the desperate \u2013 they all deserve a good hug, and when that\"Signora\"<\/a> cannot happen physically without causing a stir, there’s always a mental alternative. Is it Italy that does this? Is it the flood? \u00a0What is that flood made of, anyway? \u00a0What is Italy?<\/p>\n

Italy is a place made fascinating\u00a0by a difficult past, a challenging present, and traditions that treat\u00a0such obstacles as unworthy excuses for neglecting enjoyment of good food, good company, and the good experience of\u00a0seasonal rotation; each season special, each brimming with potential for a delicious and festive sagra<\/i><\/span>. \u00a0Enter a Californian\u00a0who views his past as a placid pond and with only a vague memory of what a season is, but who has nevertheless found ways\u00a0to suffer dearth in the midst\u00a0of plenty. \u00a0Bang the two together. \u00a0What do you get?<\/p>\n

I’m talking\u00a0too much. Pass the polenta, would you please? \u00a0Now then, what was it we were discussing?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 1975, I lived in Firenze for a little over three months. It\u00a0was a different city forty-one years ago, if not in form, very much so in tone. Always a destination, in those days it also\u00a0seemed provincial, intimate, local. Gelateria Vivoli was a unadorned counter open to the street where\u00a0a small cup of ice cream … Continue reading The Origin of the Wheel:<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":346,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=343"}],"version-history":[{"count":33,"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":395,"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/343\/revisions\/395"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/346"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/davidzarko.us\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}