Arrivederci Lucca!

Niko enjoying one last ride 

The last days went quickly, a swiftly revolving door of packing, transportation arrangements, farewells, final trips into town and on the walls, cleaning the house, and in preparing to leave our home away from home the poignant moments outnumbered the mundane, pangs of what we knew we’d miss grew stronger, and we felt like we were finally beginning to feel our roots anchoring slightly, our connections with the people and places in Lucca deepening.

Racing down Viale Europa towards the walls. Monte Pisano in background.

The easy to get to activities never abated, either. Niko and I went out one morning and walked to the roundabout not far from our house where we could look up at a bridge where traffic usually flows down heavily in the morning. This was a Sunday, though, and a bike race was in store. The pack of five hundred cyclists glided faster and faster toward us and we almost got clipped by a couple of them who had been forced up on the sidewalk portion of the roundabout. We jumped to the grass and enjoyed the phalanx of streaming color, the gust of air, the whir of wheels without motors. 

Three of more than thirty Fiat 500s

Afterward we walked in to town through Porta Sant’Anna and saw a few dozen Fiat Cinquecento owners with their pride and joy lining up for a yearly rally around the walls.

This 'taxi' is so small Niko could almost drive it

          

              A couple of nights later we rode our bikes to Leo’s, a pizzeria in San Concordio where we’d eaten once before. While enjoying our meter long pizza and watching Italy versus Ireland in the Euro Cup a group took a table across the aisle from ours. I tried not to pay too much attention to them and, indeed, the rest of my family didn’t know who it was I was trying not to pay attention to. We concluded our meal and stood up. I had a very cool situation before me to practice some Italian and meet an icon. When would I ever have a chance like this again? I went up and excused myself for interrupting and introduced myself and family to…  Mario Cipollini! We talked for much longer than I thought we would considering he was eating dinner with a friend and his two daughters and is one of the most famous Italian cyclists ever. He was very nice and seemed interested in us, unlike the impression you might get from the press and reputation he had. Toward the end of our conversation he even said, “Too bad you’re leaving now, I would’ve asked you to help my daughters with their English.”

Saying Goodbye to Friends

We began to see people we knew more often as we went about town and both expressed amazement after going to pick up Ingrid from a friend’s house when the mom had us in and we sat down and talked with her for an hour and understood most of what she said!

Four models of English  for the Italian children: Australian, British, American and Canadian!

Some expat friends of Lauren with whom she created an English reading series for Italian children at the library joined us for a solstice/going away party at Marina di Vecchiano, a beach south of Viareggio, two nights before our flight. Most of the day’s beachgoers were headed home by the time we got there close to six. The weather was still warm but had begun to cool off, the water was wonderful and Niko gathered his courage to have me hold him as the waves crashed against us and he squealed in delight. Ingrid played with a friend and we relaxed with a tasty picnic dinner, fire, and conversation with friends as the sun set. After I dropped the family off at home around ten I made it for coffee with my photography class at the end of the final dinner at a restaurant out of town and said some more goodbyes.

Porta Santa Maria- One of many entrances to get Dentro le Mura in Lucca

I set about on a little project of filming passage through the walls and into town by way of all “Doors” and passageways, hoping to eventually edit them down and piece them together to show others a bit of the everyday magic of the town’s set-up. Actually, it really was probably more of an excuse to help me say goodbye to Lucca. It did occur to me more than once that we wouldn’t have gone in and out of these amazing entrances nearly as much if we had lived in the historical center, an advantage to living Fuori le Mura we hadn’t thought of one year ago.

Ingrid officially passes Italian 4th grade and is admitted to 5th!

         It was around then, eleven or so months ago, that I started the blog and wrote how we hoped to find adventure and that “… we wanted a challenge, but we didn’t want it to be too exhausting. We wanted our kids to be appreciated and to have a reasonable chance of making friends in our new location, but we wanted them to learn about another perspective on life and on the world via a different language and culture, ones that would be within their grasp and ours.” Now, almost a year later, we look back and see we had adventure and challenge aplenty. Nikolai and Ingrid were appreciated for sure, made friends, and ended up speaking Italian much better than us.

End of year performance at Nikolai's Pre-school followed by 'Graduation' & Diploma.

         We’ve been in and out of the revolving door a bunch the last couple of weeks and are now back outside it for good, on the other side, and are still a bit dizzy from the spinning. We’re back home. Lucca and our year there seem suddenly so far away and I’m already getting used to English surrounding us, becoming reacquainted with our house and woods again, gearing up to move back into what was our more familiar life before we left—or will that familiar life be a different one now, even though we’re back home? In some ways, it must be. I can’t find the words or structure to sum up our year much better other than to say that knowing what we know now we would still have made the choices we made despite some rough patches along the way. This year has been a good teacher.

Just before heading off to the airport.

         

       I’d like to thank my employer for making this opportunity possible and to thank our family and friends for their support (we’ll try not to constantly talk about our time in Italy, promise, but if we forget, just remind us!). And thanks to you for reading, for sharing in this year of adventure with us. It’s been fun writing my first blog; I encourage you to try one if you haven’t. With that said, our year in Italy is now over, and so too this blog. Arrivederci a tutti! Arrivederci Lucca!

Italy: What I'll Miss...and Won't

As our departure draws near I’ve been imagining what I might miss about Italy once we’re back in New Hampshire. I want to be realistic, though, and also include what I probably won’t miss so much. Maybe I’ll think of very important other parts to add later, but it’s a start and it helps me as we prepare for our voyage back to our permanent home. What would you miss about the place you live now if you moved away? What wouldn’t you miss?

         I’ll miss waiting outside of Ingrid’s school at dismissal with other parents and grandparents while each class comes out and the teacher bends down to peer out into the crowd with each student until the parent is pointed out and eye contact is made, the child bounds down the steps for an embrace before handing off the backpack and asking if she can run a lap around the school with her friends before heading home. I won’t miss a school day that ends at 12:45. I’ll miss the strident church bells that ring for fifteen minutes a few times on Sunday mornings (I don’t sleep late enough for them to wake me otherwise this one might’ve gone to the other side). I won’t miss construction vehicles backing up (beep, beep, beep), the crane lifting loads, workers yelling at the site on the other side of our neighbor’s yard for the past five months. I’ll miss the warm aroma of fresh bread and pastries emanating from bakeries. I won’t miss the stench emitted by Vespas and various diesel vehicles that are everywhere. I’ll miss being able to walk five minutes to pick up some bread. I won’t miss the traffic and pollution. I’ll miss gelato, tasting it, of course, but also seeing it heaped up so beautifully at the gelatería. I won’t miss the milk from the grocery store that you can keep on a shelf for months before drinking. I’ll miss the pizza, thin, delicious, satisfying; I’ll miss the carrots and many other vegetables from the supermarket that are never waxed and almost always taste fresh; I’ll miss the pasta, the fresh home-made pasta but also the dry pasta bought in stores which is somehow better than what we buy back home and I’ll miss the locally grown and pressed fresh olive oil, of which we have consumed gallons. I’ll miss the barley and bean soup Eva helped us make. I won’t miss the relative uniformity of cuisine here (okay, I admit we’re pretty spoiled in the US with such a great variety). I’ll miss the fruit and vegetable markets. I’ll miss the walls which encircle the town center and are topped with a pedestrian road and lined by trees, sitting up there and watching everyone go by, jogging a loop around it, traveling by bike on it, walking up there on a Sunday afternoon with all of the families doing a post lunch passegiata. I won’t miss the enormous tour groups who walk in a large pack of forty or fifty up there or in town. I’ll miss the pleasantly warm and sunny weather of September and June. I won’t miss the long, gray winter with no snow, high humidity, temperatures in the 30s and 40s, and a cold house. I’ll miss using a bike as primary means of transportation, and being able to easily do so (flat terrain, everything located within two or three kilometers); I’ll miss seeing so many other people from all walks of life doing the same. I’ll miss being able to see world-class bike racing in person and to see live coverage of entire races on television. I won’t miss mismatched sound and lips on Italian TV, whether dubbed from another language or in Italian in the first place. I’ll miss the rattling of my bike as I ride over cobblestones in town and the occasional ding of bicycle bells from those hoping to prevent a collision. I’ll miss the 80 mph speed limits on the highway and the aggressive confidence I’ve learned to drive with to avoid getting plowed into. I won’t miss seeing ninety percent of the car colors only in black, gray, or white. I’ll miss riding back from photography class close to midnight in February or March, very cold but with no cars out, hardly any people, and lots of quiet. I won’t miss all of the lice problems in the schools this year and having the little buggers brought home to us and set up camp for three weeks. I’ll miss seeing the packs of cyclists out training, and the packs of cyclists out just as much to exercise their mouths as their legs. I’ll miss the narrow roads, the incredible climbs and switchbacks through olive groves and woods, the routes with fast down hills where the curves are plentiful but not always so acute that you need to slow down much for them, the anticipation of what will be around the next corner. I won’t miss all of the cigarette smoke or seeing middle school kids waiting for a train on a field trip smoking while their teachers stand right there with them. I won’t miss the bad dollar to euro exchange rate, $7.50/gallon gasoline and the high price of almost everything else. I’ll miss the Parole d’Oro a few kilometers to the south where we’ve gone for picnics where the kids have played hide and seek in the empty canals that lead down to the aqueduct. I won’t miss the much smaller body space bubble here, all of the crowding, cramped spaces and jostling in groups and frequent absence of lines. I will miss the trains and the train system. I won’t miss the strikes and the often seemingly endless waits at the train crossings. I’ll miss discovering, time after time, almost wherever we travel, towers poking out of a forest, a many centuries old church down a non-descript road, walled towns atop hills, cobblestones, laundry hanging out windows, forts and cathedrals. I’ll miss specialty food shops of all kinds and personal service, asking the local butcher if he can get a full turkey for us by Thanksgiving and waiting for two minutes while he calls someone and tells me he should be able to do it and to stop back in a few days. I won’t miss shopping at Esselunga, our primary grocery store (well, okay, maybe a bit). I’ll miss all of the events that take place in and near Lucca and how easy it is to get to them—Lucca Comics&Games, Settembre Lucchese, Desco at the Real Collegio, Italian 10k Road Race Championships, European U23 Cyclocross Championships, Procession of Santa Croce, Free Concerts, Lucca Summer Festival (music), and on and on. I will miss Italian. I’ll miss hearing preschool children speaking it, complaining about not wanting to go home from the playground or describing the best way to roll a toy car down the slide; I’ll miss hearing grade-school kids speaking it, asking their friends if they want to sleep over, describing how a game they’ve made up works; I’ll miss hearing teens speaking it, flirting in Piazza Grande, joking; I’ll miss hearing adults speaking it, arguing about politics, giving their opinion about how someone was dressed, describing which are their best vegetables that day, calling their dog over, giving directions, conversing with friends; I’ll miss older folks speaking it, chiding one another for a naïve move while playing dominoes at a bench table on the walls, complimenting a passing younger woman on her appearance, encouraging a grandchild learning to ride a bike. I’ll miss the challenge of speaking Italian. I’ll miss the sense of satisfaction when I can express myself a little more clearly than a couple of months earlier, when a store owner doesn’t screw up his face or try using rudimentary English in response to me. I won’t miss not being able to instantly and effortlessly communicate any idea. I won’t miss the lag time where I am understanding what a group I’m with is saying and then, in the time I prepare to say something, have the group’s conversation already moved on to something else (hey, to be honest it happens to me in English, too!). I won’t miss having a person I haven’t met before smile, amused, after I open my mouth and say a few words, realizing I’m not Italian (okay at first but after a year it gets kind of old). I will miss the more fluid sense of time, of meeting times and of saying goodbyes that go on and on. I will also not miss that. I will miss all of the people I’ve met, especially those from Lucca Italian School, my photography class, and the Shambala group I practiced with. I will miss writing a blog about a New Hampshire family’s year in Italy. 

From Bianchi to Giro d’Italia: My Love for the Bicycle

 I finally learned to pedal without constantly stopping or crashing, round and round the garage and then on jaunts of a hundred yards down the street—maiden voyages that seemed like I had crossed the country—on a small red Schwinn. A Huffy dirt bike followed with the requisite wheelies and occasional jump down a hill in the yard, then the department store ten speed, facilitating travel to friends’ houses. When I was fourteen, though, and finding limits with my current steed and having discovered a touring event called the Minnesota Ironman when hundreds of cyclists rode past our house on a route of either 62 or 100 miles, I knew I had to do it, too, stated the case for something more substantial and my parents helped me buy my first racing bike.

         It was a Bianchi, that color Bianchi, the dreamy, other-worldly celeste green that was then in fashion and has come back into style of late. It was clean, it smelled of fresh grease, never-ridden rubber tires and a leather saddle, the frame smooth to the touch and bearing the blue stickers which spelled out its brand, so full of vowels, enticingly foreign and suggestive of another land that for decades had worshipped the sport I’d just discovered. I kept it in my room, marveled at it, washed it, adjusted brakes and wondered where it would take me. Sometimes I rode it, too.

         One of the first cycling maxims I learned was that crashing was not so much about the ‘if’ but the ‘when’. It was only a matter of time, I was told. For me it didn’t take long. First came a head on crash with the front grille of some monster of a car driven by a seventeen year old on a rainy day ten miles from home as I was making a left-hand turn. I came to with a ring of people standing around me, couldn’t feel my legs for a few seconds and was taken away to the hospital by ambulance. There was the broken right hand in a crash a couple hundred meters from the end of a road race two years later and a summer of washing dishes and gaining dexterity with my left, some road rash acquired on group rides, one tumble involving a horse who jumped his fence before running alongside the pack and then cut bravely in front of us. He escaped unscathed.

         There was never any question of stopping, of course, of giving up the sport just because maybe, possibly, the next crash would be much worse. We’d even started wearing helmets and I lived in Minnesota, not in the French Alps. The draw of cycling had not too much to do with its apparent danger. Even before the racing aspect began to appeal to me it was the freedom of the bicycle, the travel under my own power, the ability to explore new roads on my own and without a map, the sounds of wind, cranks and gears and the regularity of the pedaling cycle coupled with my breath, the smell of asphalt or rain or freshly cut grass or even, on chilly days, the warmth from underneath vehicles while waiting at stop lights; it was feeling satisfaction of effort and fatigue and it was the discovery of the sport. It was all of this that kept me coming back to my two-wheeled friend.

         I learned that cyclists didn’t stop due to misfortune, however serious. In 1996 there was Lance Armstrong and his testicular cancer (which spread to lungs, abdomen and brain), his surgery and chemo and rehabilitation. Oh yeah, and his subsequent seven Tour de France victories in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005. But even before him came the first great American cyclist comeback story, one who wore the maillot jaune in the Tour even before Lance. It was Greg Lemond, he who was shot by his brother-in-law in 1987 (after his 1986 win of the Tour de France) while out turkey hunting, suffered from lead poisoning and carried 37 shotgun pellets embedded in his skin for the rest of his racing career. After struggling with appendicitis and with tendonitis in the knee he made an awesome comeback in 1989 to win the Tour in its final stage, a 25 kilometer time trial in which he had to make up 50 seconds on Laurent Fignon who led him in the overall standings. Leading the equipment revolution in time trialing by using aero helmet and aero bars, Lemond blasted through the course in an average speed of 54.545 km/hr or about 34 miles per hour (a speed difficult for most to achieve even for a few seconds on a downhill—give it a try!) and bested his rival, winning the Tour de France by 8 seconds. A come back within a comeback. Inspiring? And how.       

 

         The man against himself aspect of the time trial and that day Lemond took the Tour with his unfathomable performance probably played a part in my subsequent competitive leanings. I drifted more towards triathlon where decent biking and running (and very average swimming) added up to more competitiveness than in cycling or running alone. It couldn’t be beat for variety, either, and there was always some aspect to get better at. After some years away from the sport I came back to enjoy it in 2003 and raced for four seasons, including a few cycling specific events on a race car track. I even bought a new bike. In 2006 I dug into my savings and purchased special race wheels. I tweaked my training schedule and thought I was finding smart ways to train better and get faster and I did, for awhile. Then, training for the 2007 season, I did too much (a quantity so difficult to determine until after the fact) too soon, didn’t listen to warning signs from my knee, didn’t rest enough, didn’t want to give up, didn’t want to quit, kept hoping the next round of physical therapy and exercises would be the one that would finally cure me, but every time had those hopes dashed with recurring problems from the knee. I haven’t been able to race since.

         When I knew I’d be coming up for sabbatical all sorts of possible destinations came to mind. We finally decided on Italy. Lucca, a city of about 85,000 in Tuscany, would be our new home town for the year. “Why Lucca?” many people here have asked us. Besides many other factors (not too big, not too small, centrally located with good train system, etc.) it seemed to come down to the fact that Lucca itself was flat, the area inside the walls had many reduced traffic zones facilitating walking and cycling, and the town was encircled by a car-free twenty-foot wide four kilometer path. I guess I kind of also had in the back of my mind impossible dreams of riding with Italian cycling squads through the mountains, having coffee at a bar Sunday mornings with the local club before heading out on a three hour ride, but had consciously seemed to have settled on my new world of great-grandfather-like two-wheeled locomotion. Flat terrain, pedestrian speed, close range. Lucca would fit the bill.

         I could still watch cycling, and I was in Europe, and not far from France, so within a couple weeks of our arrival I arranged a brief foray to see the stage of the Tour de France that went through Briançon. This experience in itself deserves a whole blog post, but I’ll just summarize it by saying it was the highlight of the summer even though we only saw the riders in person for a few minutes as they rode through town and up a steep hill.

Then there was the under 23 European Cyclocross Championships right here on and at the base of the walls in Lucca! Mud, running up hills, powerful cycling, flashing colors, broken bikes, determination, courage—all this and more were on display throughout the day's races. 

And finally last week the Giro d’Italia itself. How amazing to be able to walk to the train station, take a thirty minute ride to Montecatini Terme and see the riders arrive after nearly seven hours of racing! 

I even got to stand with hundreds of others post-race, squashed together as Italians do so well, and watch the live taping of an interview about the day’s stage with some of the top riders, including today’s world best sprinter, Mark Cavendish, and one of the world’s best sprinters in the 90s and early 00s,

Cavendish and baby daughter soon after stage 11

Mario ‘The Lion King’ Cipollini (who, it turns out, was born in and still lives in Lucca!) or, ‘Super Mario’ as he was often called—or simply, loudly, followed with a blast of an airhorn, “MARIO!!!” which the crowd called out several times. The next morning I drove, bike in tow, close to the Tyrrenian Coast, parked, and rode a kilometer or two to the town where that day’s stage would start. After admiring the teams’ large and colorful coach busses and their squads’ scores of top of the line bicycles on display and watching kids get autographs from any pro rider who appeared, I started towards the start line, as did the Giro riders themselves. It didn’t feel too bad to get passed by the likes of Ivan Basso or his teammates.

         The morning after our arrival in Italy I had poked around in the basement and, in a dark corner, found two adult bicycles that, given the encrusted dust, cobwebs and animal hair, looked as if they hadn’t been ridden in a few years. After some serious scrubbing they looked like they’d be usable and indeed, after the addition of a kid seat to each, we’ve ridden them every day, whether to bring Niko to and from school (we bought Ingrid her own bike), pick up groceries, ride into town for special events,

or basically for any type of commuting or transportation within a two or three kilometer radius. It’s also true that we were trying to go without a car, and did so for five months, but finally yielded to the pressure of cold and wet weather, difficulty keeping up with the groceries and a desire to explore more than trains or combinations of trains and busses would allow and rented a car for the rest of our stay. I became quietly fascinated by the spectacle of the daily riding world here. How could these Lucchese people manage to talk on a cell phone while weaving in between thick pedestrian traffic and avoid crashing much less putting their foot down? It was a sixth sense, I was sure, so unnatural was it for me to see folks in their seventies and eighties agilely guiding a bicycle through town along with two sacks of groceries and only occasionally ringing their bell to ward off would be blockers of their path, 

a mother in heels headed to daycare then work, so stylish and so smooth in her riding despite a fifteen month old on the tiny seat in front of her and a three year old on the seat behind her, the nonchalance with which scores of riders soldiered on in the rain holding umbrellas overhead. So this bike riding and bike culture was a bit different than what I’d experienced back home but I was getting used to it and at least I was rolling myself—albeit with a bike I could hardly lift with one hand.

         Have you ever had to work hard to convince yourself some less than desirable condition was okay, or even good? As in “yes, whatever it is is not great but quit complaining already?” Like you know you want more somehow, you want it to change but don’t want to admit it because you know you should be happy with how things are and try hard to appreciate what you have, keep hoping that this bad situation will resolve and work actively at trying to change it but it never does, you keep trying to think this way, to convince yourself, but have trouble succeeding? Yes? Let’s have a beer together sometime. I can relate. While my knee permitted me to commute around short distances on the flats, I couldn’t help feeling the excitement and joy of the sport of cycling all around me, noticing cyclists in 

groups meeting for a lunch hour ride, weekend training session, individuals out for a morning spin, every one dressed up in what looked to be professional kits. Back in the States this would make you the fodder of skilled racing cyclists’ jokes, the over the hill weekend rider shaving legs and dressed in the latest and most colorful pro team’s jersey and shorts, complete with matching shoe covers and helmet, but it is a given in Lucca. Here it is all about la bella figura. There actually are quite a few pro teams that train in the area, too, especially from the Netherlands, from what I’ve been told. But mostly those I see are everyday cyclists and they don’t even necessarily race but do dress to the hilt and draw nary a glance in town or in country, so common a sight they are. I am one of those husbands and dads who will almost always remark to his wife and kids, “hey, look at that cyclist/group of cyclists!” the instant they’re visible, so exciting it is for me to see them. Lauren and the children are used to it and gamely put up with me but since the injury I’ve had that surge of excitement pointing them out but it’s been followed by a bit of emptiness and a tinge of resentment and the effort of trying to be happy with what I have (at least I can walk!).

         A guy can only exert self-control for so long, though. I finally threw caution to the wind and talked with Cristiano at the local bike shop. He took my measurements and pieced together a decent used road bike with a compact gear system which would allow me, in theory, to go up hills, however slowly. 

I knew the risks at stake and that my knee hadn’t been doing great, but just couldn’t help it. The depth of the bike culture here and the enticing hills encircling the city were too much for me. So there I was, he of the Bianchi racing bike bought in the States twenty-five years earlier now the proud owner of a Trek bought in Italy (and guess what? the bike shop even bears an English name ‘Fast & Furious’ !)! I still like to think I have some rationality and hopefully bring a bit more wisdom to bear than before, however, so I didn’t immediately (or later, either, in fact) head out on a mountainous multiple hour adventure. Over several months I’ve probably gone out only fifteen to twenty times on rides usually around an hour long. My speed? Well, the readout is in kilometers per hour, so without doing the conversion to mph it looks pretty good! My actual, slower speed really doesn’t bother me much. Although that and getting into the danger zone with longer distances preclude me from group rides the small adventures I’ve had on this bike so far have already made the purchase worth it. I’ve ridden up through olive groves during harvest on switchbacks, explored back country roads barely wide enough for one car, come across small churches several centuries old, descended through small towns at a pace making me thankful for a bike with quality brakes, gotten away from the pollution of the plains and smelled fresh grass, flowers, mud, found the clean air with my eyes, too, making the views of the nearby Alpi Apuane mountains and Alpennine mountains even more stunning.

         If one has never found the deliciousness of the sweet and bitter in competition, if one has never been drawn to it repeatedly and felt extremely alive and challenged at the same time it might be hard to understand why a person would put his body through such struggles as are necessary to find his potential, to find his limits. One of the beauties I found in endurance sports was the opportunity to compete against myself, to overcome perceived obstacles and find ways to improve that didn’t depend so much on how well others performed. But there was the flip side of that where limits were not accepted and improvement gradually became more important than enjoyment and satisfaction with what I had. Watching the Giro riders, all younger than me now, as they prepare for a day’s stage, I realize they no longer appear so much as immortals and superstars as Greg Lemond did to me when I was a teen. I appreciate what they can do, and am still amazed by it, and inspired, but it is somehow different. And yet, watching them race I vicariously feel the thrill of competition. Even as they start a stage, I can read the anticipation on their faces, the determination or joy or nervousness. That day is another opportunity to challenge themselves and push themselves to their limits. Many make the sign of the cross as they head off past the official start line, knowing that they can do their part but that there is always chance out there, too, that there is the unknown, a new day’s adventure to come. They have not yet met their limit, have not yet realized their potential, and the possibility and hope present in them is palpable.

         Inching up Tuscan inclines or cruising down them, rolling steadily across the plains, the dreams of athletic improvement I had most of the first part of my life have been replaced by another vision of transformation that will be equally, if not more challenging. So simple in theory but difficult in practice, it is to get back to what spoke to me initially in the early days of the Bianchi, to in every moment appreciate whatever situation presents itself, to notice more often and savor the strain of muscles as they move, the taste of a drink of cold water, the rich odor of a freshly plowed field, a smoothly spinning chain and cogs, the sight of a little boy pedaling, slightly unbalanced and jerky, away from his Dad who’s let go of the boy’s seat, has stopped jogging after him and let his son ask a few times, “Do you still have me?” letting the question go unanswered, letting him pedal away and set off on the rest of his life, making his own adventure, a whole world to discover.

A January Check-Up

For months and months we talked about the upcoming year in Italy. We dreamed about the great food we’d eat, the amazing towns, festivals, and landscapes we’d see. But there were also the questions. Would we get our Visa, allowing us to actually go there for more than three months? Would we then get our Permesso di Soggiorno, the Italian version which technically would be the final document necessary allowing us to legally stay for a year? Where would we go? Where would we live? Would we like our new home? Would we adjust to life in Italy? What about schools for the kids? Would the language be easy? What would it be like not having a job?

      The halfway point of our time abroad has already now passed, though, reminding us that we won’t be here forever, that eventually we’ll be boarding Swiss Air in Rome to head back to New Hampshire, and that the new set of related questions percolating up may deserve some attention. Maybe we’ve started thinking about our return also because it finally seems that we are all healthy and somewhat used to living in Lucca. Absent as much stress or as many health problems to deal with, maybe you are the type of person capable of just “going with the flow” or “enjoying the moment”. I commend you; it must be nice! We’re trying to do that, too, of course, but our propensity to plan ahead—now that immediate issues are currently less urgent—brings scenarios and questions of our return more often to our thoughts.

         When will we return home? We need to change the return tickets and fix a date soon. What else do we really want to do here before we go home? Where would we like to visit? Will Lauren be able to find a job? Where will Nikolai go to kindergarten? How will we afford a car (we sold our family vehicle before we left) and should we start looking for one already? What work will need to be done on the house after a year’s use by another family? These are but a few of the current questions on our minds and, as you can see, thankfully none are life-threatening. It’s just us looking ahead.

            So, let’s take stock here at just past mid-way point. Call it a January check-up. 

            Are we glad we came to Italy? Yes.

            Is it much different than taking a week or two vacation here would be? Of course, and I expected that; I’ll let you ponder what exactly that means. But again, yes, we’re happy with our choice.

            Is our Italian as good as we thought it might be at this point? No. Better than when we arrived? I hope so! Sometimes I wonder, though. Recently when I was getting my hair cut or, another time, talking with a waiter, I got a furrowed brow, a pause, and then “Ma non ho capito niente” (“I didn’t understand a thing you just said!”). The kids are faring better. Sometimes when Niko is playing alone at home I’ll find him chattering in Italian. Ingrid usually likes to use English with us but occasionally she’s in the mood for la bella lingua. Yesterday when I picked her up from school we spoke in Italian during our bike ride to the grocery store and while shopping (When the bike key lock broke as we went to head home and were stranded there with both bikes and her backpack locked together and a brother to pick up in a few minutes we did revert to English)! She’s also got a good Italian friend who speaks no English so along with a little sign language when they talk Italian is the only option.

    Are Lauren and I having a weekly date-night while the kids run around the house practicing their Italian with a babysitter? Not yet, but the two times we went out together at night when family was here to baby-sit were a couple of our best evenings so far and much appreciated. Thank you family!

           Do I have the power by my words to conjure up misfortune when I repeat that we’re ‘all finally healthy’? You may knock on that wood for me, thanks, but I’ve never quite caught on to the saying. Anyway, now that ‘that’ is true (saying it three times just may put me over the edge into a believer), hopefully we’ll:  a) find a babysitter b) call her up and c) have some meals out in peace now and then. 

            Are we glad we are taking a sabbatical year together? YES! The change has been very challenging overall (I know this may seem crazy to you. Sabbatical? Challenging? Just trust me.). As a former amateur endurance athlete and current teacher, of course, I am a firm believer in challenges making us stronger and wiser. And it has been wonderful to be around Lauren, Niko, and Ingrid much more than usual. I am still so grateful for this opportunity.

            And last, but not least, do we miss home? YES! What I’m most looking forward to is fresh air and the rural location. Friends, too, of course, colleagues and students, but we’ve got a ways to go yet. The earliest we’ll be back is mid-June, perhaps early July. Until then, we hope to take advantage of all of the time we have here and enjoy this special year together. 

Il Bel Paese

So a sabbatical in Italy it would be (see Intro: World Map, Blindfold and Dart?). From everything we heard kids are adored in il bel paese and with two of our own this element weighed heavily in our decision. The remaining clinching factors might seem easy to add up: good food, good weather, a slowed down life, beautiful scenery, rich history and art, a musical language not impossible to learn. Who could go wrong, right?

            We had read enough on-line from expatriates from the U.S. and Britain living in Italy debunking the typical Pollyanna-like reverie of how life was lived there--said dream-like images often induced by short-term travelers to the country or readers of books describing an artist’s year in Tuscany painting, writing, or restoring that old stone farmhouse--to know that day to day life (and life with a spouse and two young children, no less) would be different from a purely traveler’s experience or an artist’s experience alone and with loads of free time, that the daily grind did exist in Italy, often fraught with noise, endless bureaucracy, high gas prices, expensive everything, difficulty finding a job, long hours at work and a plethora of other inconveniences.

            But when push came to shove we took the naysayers’ advice with a grain of salt. It wasn’t just because their advice was aimed more at those looking to move permanently to Italy and work there, but also because we had never read those popular books prominently featuring Tuscany, didn’t feel like we really shared that dream, and in fact did not want to move to Tuscany or the countryside, per se, since we get plenty of rural life already in our small New Hampshire town. We wanted to experience something a little less rural. Plus, we were on a paid sabbatical and, luckily, so luckily (yes, we are extremely grateful for this opportunity!) would not have to work for the year. And there had to be some truth to the positive associations with il bel paese, right?

            Umbria was our first choice and no, heavy research did not play a role in putting it first on our list. It was for chocolate. In addition to Perugia playing host to an annual chocolate festival attracting visitors from around the globe, Umbria’s capital city also is the permanent home to a well-respected chocolate factory! While that was enough reason for some of us, others wanted more, and there was more: “the green heart of Italy”, fairy-tale like hill towns, music festivals, a region perhaps slightly less visited than Tuscany. But Perugia ended up seeming too big for us, and while Assisi, another Umbrian gem, attracted our attention for a while it, too, failed to make the cut. Although it was smaller and seemed beautiful and peaceful in its quiet hours, Assisi was hilly, too and just seemed too over-run with tourists. Le Marche? Urbino or perhaps Ascoli Piceno? Reading others’ accounts of their time there made this less touristy region with its own breathtaking landscapes very appealing, but from afar we couldn’t get a good enough sense (mostly because of fewer Internet resources) of schooling opportunities or decide on which one town would work the best. So, despite originally thinking we wouldn’t do it--too touristy, too expensive (all of this sight-unseen of course)--we decided on Tuscany.

            Lucca, in the northern section of this region, soon made the final cut. Including around 90,000 inhabitants in all with 8,000 in the historic center, thirty-foot high Renaissance era walls encircling the old town complete with walking and cycling path on top of its four kilometer circumference, limited traffic zones within the walls, flat terrain (my bad knee is forever grateful, just remind me not to climb more than one of Lucca’s many towers in one day), bikes everywhere, plenty happening culturally, several schooling options, proximity to mountains and sea, we finally said Lucca, sì! We had found our home for the next year. Buongiorno Lucca, la Toscana, ed Italia! 

(Many thanks to all of you who have helped us with planning this year in one way or another, from suggestions of places to live to advice about applying for the Elective Residence Visa!) 

World Map, Blindfold and Dart?

            After sixteen years I was up for a year off with pay 2011-2012. A sabbatical! It’s fair to say this probably won’t happen again, and for all four of us the timing seemed to be the best it was going to be, so the option of staying put in New Hampshire for the year bounced back and forth between us for all of four or five minutes. But where to go? Well, besides my wife and me there were our kids, nine and four. What would they do for schooling? How would they adjust? What would they do? We thought briefly of staying in country, of moving to Colorado or California. Communication would be no problem, academics could be worked out, adjustment overall would be relatively easy. We’d heard that in some ways it wouldn’t matter where we went, that the beauty of relocating for the year without the typical work obligations in itself would be a great gift. Moving away from old routines and rhythms to learn more about one another and ourselves, find new routines, live new adventures as a family, gain perspective—all of these ideas seemed to make sense.

            What would be lacking, however, was the adventure element. For us this meant a different country, a different culture, a different language. I guess we were looking to up the ante and challenge ourselves more than California or Colorado (nothing against these fine states, and yes, I’m sure we could still challenge ourselves in some ways there, but we decided we wanted to go abroad). Not too much more challenge, mind you—China came to mind briefly, for example, but one of the goals of this year being renewal--some relaxation here and there amongst the trials and tribulations--such a different culture with such a difficult language just did not seem within our reach given “just” twelve months to adjust. As visitors for a few weeks, sure, no problem, give us exotic, take me completely out of my comfort zone, but as semi-residents? We just couldn’t wrap our minds around it.

            So we wanted a challenge, but we didn’t want it to be too exhausting. We wanted our kids to be appreciated and to have a reasonable chance of making friends in our new location, but we wanted them to learn about another perspective on life and on the world via a different language and culture, ones that would be within their grasp and ours. Given all of this, we rejected taking a world map, a blindfold and a dart and throwing our future to chance. We decided on Italy.