Coming home.

Clearly, my early life of leisure prepared me for life in Santa Marinella.



But after four months in this city,



I have to say:



It's time to come home.



I miss Christmas at my parents' house.

I'm ready to catch up with old friends (recognize that person from high school?)



And I'm not too worried about returning. Did you know that the air in Rome is certifiably addictive? A recent study found quantifiable amounts of nicotine, marijuana, and heroin in the air currently muddying the ancient monuments and my American lungs.

Forget about tossing coins in the Trevi Fountain. They’ve found a better way to keep tourists coming back.

It's been four months since I left D.C. A third of a year has never gone by so quickly in my entire life.

Four months ago I knew roughly three Italian phrases well. “I’d like to buy this.” “Excuse me and let me get off the bus. Now.” and “Where’s the bathroom?” Now, if I get a decent amount of sleep, I can blab recognizable sentences. They’re simple, mind you. E difficile per me a cambiare tra l’inglese e l’italiano. Ma quando inizio, dopo un minuto o due, e possible per me parlare in l’italiano. Yes, I make mistakes, like I just did in that sentence. But I understand what’s going on in class. Piu o meno. Che cosa?

There are still quite a lot of things about Rome that baffle me. For instance, why the country that created Western Civilization cannot create water heaters: a) that – prepare yourself – HEAT water or B) have a temperature between hypothermia and a third degree burn is something that I ponder every morning.

But there are many reasons to love this country once you jump out of the shower and stop screaming.

For starters, you don’t make friends in Rome; you are adopted.

There are folks like the 60 year old restaurant owner in Piazza Navona who greets me daily. Pierro made a point of finding out my name. He’s amused by my insane American habit of trying to get to things on time. He does that odd Italian/European practice my American friend has aptly named “making baci”: that weird social practice of grabbing someone’s lower face and making kissy noises on their right cheek, then their left, then their right depending on what nation you’re from. Heaven help you and the recipient if you forget on which side your baci-ing nationality starts. If they're nice they´ll tell you how many kisses to expect.

There are the friends who get you through the day, through the language, through ordering the right glass of wine. Through life.







Then there are those you observe and love.

There are the married couples, ancient and wizened, guiding each other down the aisle at Mass. The man wearing hat and cane, the wife sporting headscarf and swollen ankles, together they hobble and witness to a decades-long love.

There are the cute baristas who put mocha on your cappuccino and ask you why your Italian is so terrible. Suddenly they ask you out and pinch your cheek. Gross. They’re no longer cute. You switch caffes, and discover that the new one has jelly filled cornetti (croissants). Bellisimi.

You develop habits when you live abroad, for better or for worse. You pick up peculiar linguistic terrets, like saying “Si si si” and “no no no” in rapid succession. You start putting your jeans inside of new leather boots and suddenly you're walking out of the house with a belt over your sweater and your collar turned up. It's ok at your school when Christmas carols like Silent Night have a verse in German, a verse in Italian, a verse in Polish, then French, then Spanish - then you all sing in different languages simultaneously to see which nationality can hit the high notes the best.

Practical practices like holding your breath and dashing the split second you see cigarette whipped out become second nature to you.

It must be confessed that letting yourself stay and inhale every once and awhile becomes a guilty pleasure. But then it dawns on you, with a certain amount of fear, that what you just inhaled so happily wasn’t quite a cigarette afterall . . .

Italian Hour

I arrive at the train station ten minutes early and approaching, see a train on the tracks. Thinking the 9.10 came early, I race down and find myself a seat. Five minutes later, still at the station, the conductor passes by looking at every seat and overhead shelf, asking if anyone has seen a black purse. Niente.

Next station, ten minutes later, the same scene is repeated. Niente ancora. We stand for another ten minutes. Trains are passing by on the over side at an alarming rate. Don't they run every half hour?

We get to the third stop. The conductor passes. A caribiniero (police officer, misspelled) passes through. Ten minutes pass. Same caribiniero passes through again. Wait. Wasn't he walking in the same direction he walked the last time? Did he walk out of the train and start at the bottom again?

Gypsy band members outside are showing their oversized, unvarnished instruments to curious stragglers. The giant cello has only three strings, and one of them is light green. That's not normal. Never noticed there were so many mountains in this particular area. Thank God the kid across from me, wearing a Dolce and Gabbana dog tag around his neck, has started listening to music I recognize. Under the Umbrella, eh eh eh?

My last analysis assignment for the year is now being used as journal material. The cell phone in the pocket of the man standing next to me just went off in my ear. I'm still estatically happy that the hot water and heat came back on last night. But maybe setting the temperature at 80 was a little extreme.

The train has started moving. As far as I know, they never found the purse.

Firenze, dahrling

I think I've gotten about 5 hours of sleep every night the last three days. So I will express the following post in simple thoughts.

When in Rome, do as the Romans do.

Leave Rome. Go Christmas shopping in Florence.

See the Duomo and the Duomo's belltower.



Be delighted by green and pink stonework.



Catch one side of the Arno River.



And see Ponte Vecchio on the other.



Have your hair blown by the wind on the bridge.



Be attracted to shiny objects.



Go to Mass in the Duomo and see an 90 year old priest, priestly garb with cross askew on his bent back, clutch the Eucharist to his heart on his way to the altar.



Walk underneath a canopy of lights.



Be stunned with what they can with priceless artwork and blue lights.



Defrost in 6 caffes. Buy 5 scarves for other people. Shiver 4 times per second. Sing 3 new songs per hour. Be grateful for 2 wonderful friends. And have 1 heck of alot of schoolwork to get done in the next four days. But when in Rome . . . .

Illumination: San Giovanni in Laterano

Ah, Saturday mornings alone in my apartment. The sun is shining, Garden State Soundtrack is playing, and wobbly old Italians and children dressed up like Santa Claus are sporadically walking by my window. It's the perfect procrastination setting.

Awhile back I went to the Basilica di S. Giovanni in Laterano (St. John Lateran) on a sunny Sunday morning, and walked into the midst of Borromini's illuminated giants.














San Giovanni has a long and rich history in Rome. The first official residence of the Popes since the era of Constantine, the church was first built by Constantine over the barracks of the emperor's private guards. It was destroyed by the Vandals, restored in the fifth, earthquaked in the ninth, rebuilt in the ninth, twiced burned in the fourtheenth and twice rebuilt, and finally built in its current form in the seventeenth. The basilica hosted the meeting of St. Francis and St. Dominic with Pope Innocent III in the Middle ages and witnessed the Pope's approval of both their orders. Until 1870, it was the site of all Papal coronations.

Lessons. And Lucia.

I'll admit it. Rome became blah to me the last month. St. Peter's? A big overcrowded Piazza. Piazza Navona? Something to cross to get to the jelly croissant on the other side. (To my amusement, I just realized that I spelt jelly as "gelly" a second ago - proof that the Italian replacement for the unknown "j" has finally sunk into my subconscious).

The trains weren't long enough for the naps I wanted to take. The scioperos - those strikes from hell - had finally gotten on my nerves. When I found myself mentally moaning, "Don't you people know that some of us have stuff to DO!" I at first thought that the magic of Rome - its power to grab my heart and make it fall in love with things like light on badly positioned buildings and potent espresso and funkily dressed Europeans - had slipped away. I was rushing through. I didn't care about the light on the building. I didn't see the light. To heck with the pink building. I cared about doing my latest newspaper assignment. What did that teacher just mumble? Are you making fun of me for mispronouncing that? Stress came to visit me with a vengeance. Oh joy.

Life is life. And in the immortal words of the person who pep-talked me into coming here, Life Is Hard. It doesn't matter what continent you transplant yourself to. You can be just as stressed out overlooking 18th Street or GMU's lawschool as you can be staring out of the 4th floor onto Piazza Navona wonder what the heck the teacher just mumbled in Italian. It's a "duh" thing to say. But I think it's one that we all - or at least I - have to learn over and over again. That beautiful, incredibly hard lesson that life is determined by how you approach it - with a soul full of God's grace, or a mind full of your own anxieties and fears.

I knew before I left that there'd come a time when I would get a chance to learn it all over again. And thank God that it came. Because at the end of this hellacious month, I can say with great joy and excitement (again), that . . . .

This is my city.


And this is me looking cheesy and blocking the best part of it:



This is how you feel on top of the heart of the Church:



And I can attribute a big part of rediscovering Rome to the visit of my dear Slovakian friend Lucia. She came just as real Fall weather arrived in the city, with colored leaves and crisp autumn air. We took walks by the bridges:



We did things like the Spanish Steps at night:



We splurged on amazing roasted chestnuts that were so expensive, they deserved a picture before their demise!



We caught Pope Benedict XVI at Vespers the vigil before the First Sunday of Advent (divine music, btw):



And since we scored awesome seats, we had a perfect view of those amazing arching ceilings:


We looked cheerful even after climbing 30,000 steps to get to the top of St. Peter's:


And we caught the beauty that is St. Peter's cupola at twilight (right up there with the Eiffel Tower as the most romantic place at night on earth):


One of the giants on top of St. Peter's. This is what I call a man:


And this is what I call the incredible photography skills of Lucia:

Hope in various forms

Pope Benedict XVI has released the second encyclical of his Pontificate! Check out the goodness here:

http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20071130_spe-salvi_en.html

I started wondering about the definition of an encyclical. Alora, the answer:

A papal document treating of matters related to the general welfare of the Church, sent by the Pope to the bishops. Used especially in modern times to express the mind of the Pope to the people. Although of themselves not infallible documents, encyclicals may (and generally do) contain pronouncements on faith and morals that are de facto infallible because they express the ordinary teaching of the Church. In any case, the faithful are to give the papal encyclicals their interior assent and external respect as statements of the Vicar of Christ. (Etym. Latin encyclicus; Greek enkyklios, circular, general.)

An encyclical epistle is like an encyclical letter but addressed to part of the Church, that is, to the bishops and faithful of a particular area. Its contents may be doctrinal, moral, or disciplinary matters of universal significance, but may also commemorate some historical event or treat of conditions in a certain country or locality. (Compliments of www.catholicculture.org, one of the best Catholic resources out there.)


I've only had a chance to read a paragraph or two, but I hear it's fantastic. It's being added to the ever-growing booklist momentarily. Any good suggestions for the list? I'm on a Josef Pieper streak right now. St. Edith Stein's "Science of the Cross" is waiting on the sidelines. I could use some good fiction - ideally short stories - on there!

I probably won't be able to post again for a wee while. My friend Lucia is visiting from Slovakia for a week (yay!), the internet card we use randomly stopped working with my Mac, and I need to squeeze in a big chunk of communication knowledge into my brain before I come home for Christmas, which is in (drumroll!): 20 days! In the meantime, I listen to Charlie Brown's Christmas CD and James Blunt's latest and attempt to study, study, study . . . (translation: make pasta, make new blog posts, make myself guilty).

Please do keep my close friend Monika and her family in your prayers. Monika's sister passed away yesterday after a long and painful battle with cancer.

A Glimmer of the Splendour - Vatican Museums

Artwork this piercingly beautiful can only be introduced by a poet as equally magnificent.

"Every genuine artistic intuition goes beyond what the senses perceive and, reaching beneath reality's surface, strives to interpret its hidden mystery. The intuition itself springs from the depths of the human soul, where the desire to give meaning to one's own life is joined by the fleeting vision of beauty and of the mysterious unity of things.

All artists experience the unbridgeable gap which lies between the work of their hands, however successful it may be, and the dazzling perfection of the beauty glimpsed in the ardour of the creative moment: what they manage to express in their painting, their sculpting, their creating is no more than a glimmer of the splendour which flared for a moment before the eyes of their spirit." Letter to Artists, John Paul II

This quote best encapsulates the reason I came back to Rome to live and study. I returned to the Vatican Museums today for the first time in four years. Two hours, three rosaries, and lots of eavesdropping after I stepped in line, I stepped into halls and rooms which perfectly synthesized every class and spiritual experience I've had since I arrived.

Down long corridors of Roman busts and figures.



Through the map room, a masterpiece of green and blue detail.



A ceiling fresco depicting St. Thomas Aquinas. The figure below is Aristotle, upon whose work St. Aquinas based his thought.



(Hate to insert the profane here with the sacred, but Aristotle really reminds me of the President of the first organization I worked for in DC).

The ceilings are pure delight.



The Lancoon, the statue which revolutionized sculpture.



A slice of yet another perfect ceiling.



This image made me stop in awe. In the words of my friend, "Never has such a simple image said so much."



The background shadow-work in this series of frescos is breathtaking.



The Battle of Lepanto.



My second favorite discovery of the day. What an image of a man.



Raphael's theological Disputatio.



Its accompanying fresco, The School of Athens.



Inexpressibly beautiful.



My favorite image from the Modern Art section.



The jagged texture seamlessly meshes with this tender moment:



This incredible piece of ivory work, measuring about three inches in diameter, is a "case" (help me out here, theology folks) for carrying a single host of the holy Eucharist.



And finally, the exiting staircase.



Photos and videos are forbidden in the Sistine Chapel (as we repeatedly heard yelled at dense and disobedient visitors), but I have a neat experience to share - not too long after the Pope's Sunday Angelus, the back doors of the Chapel were closed and visitors were forbidden from exiting for a few minutes so that Pope Benedict could pass through!