Going to an ancient city wasn’t part of my plan for May—it happened as these trips always do: my boyfriend got a job there and I tagged along. Usually there’s a business seat that can be split into a pair of normal tickets, sometimes airline miles are harvested. These trips usually occur without much notice and in many ways, that’s how I like it. I’ll go somewhere without a lot of pressure, spend a lot of time wandering with no destination, or I’ll write for hours in a hotel bar with a glass of wine and almonds.
Last week, I had the same plan in mind as I packed my carry-on sized luggage, but Rome had other ideas. It’s a city that demands your attention. I beat my jet lag easily, leaving the curtains open and the window ajar, welcoming in sounds of the street waking up, cars honking, church bells, lyrical Italian layered with the hard edged English words that I know too well. My eyes would snap open and I’d emerge from the hotel ready to greet the ruins in their various states of preservation.
The blue sky was concealed by blobby grey clouds—whenever we left the hotel without an umbrella we got caught in the rain. A lesson quickly learned, we went to the nearest stall designed exactly for us and bought compact umbrellas that jumped open with the press of a button. The constant threat of rain cast a spell over the city, dispersing the crowds and brightening the wide green leaves that hang down over narrow sidewalks. After a nice wet down, the onyx sampietrini cobblestones became a rippling dark pool reflecting many moons, or maybe just the dim yellow lights strung from building to building.
This damp magic rings a familiar bell in my heart, as I’ve spent a lot of time navigating the swells of tourism in LA. In a city overtaken by its fame, you could almost feel an exhale in the momentary calm.
Footsteps are soft in the rain, dust is washed off loud graffiti running across buildings, all the way down to the walls of the river. It clashes with the stately bricks and rust orange storefronts, markings that persist to remind us the city is more than a string of monuments. The thick black marker and red spray paint exclaims “here!” for a culture of current dreams and ideologies, filling up the patio at wood paneled dive bars. A smoke cloud forms over the figures sitting outside despite another night of thick rains. The generation of today can be spotted in wide denim and bulky shoes, with cropped jackets or heavy plaid flannel that resists the breeze.
When I go to a busy tourist hub, I become obsessed with questions about growing up in such a place. Is it like LA, where you never really go to the hotspots unless you were ushered there on a yellow school bus? In Rome, the area surrounding the touristy landmarks seems pretty devoted to that energy. In LA, you can do your best to avoid the madness, but sometimes you need to run an errand that takes you to Hollywood Blvd. Or you want to break a sweat and end up at Griffith Park where a bubbling sea of visitors greets you at the summit. If you dare to visit the beach after April, you must prepare to enter a land of people who don’t know where they’re going. When I worked at the Third Street Promenade it was still a shopping magnet for out-of-towners. I’d take the bus to the corner of 4th and Wilshire and thread myself like a needle through a camel's eye to clock in on time. You get the picture. It’s not that I am constantly shaking my fist at tourists, but navigating this city means you are constantly factoring in an unpredictable wave of untethered, experience-seeking masses. Their presence is mostly benign, but the city was not designed for such a swell of humans and the infrastructure is only beginning to catch up.
After all my years of ducking and rolling through unaware visitors hoping to capture some elusive slice of the LA myth, it’s odd to find myself on the other side of the coin. Seeking something I can’t describe while possibly disrupting the flow of foot traffic, unsure of how to find east from west or even answer a simple question with more than a blank-friendly smile. But something I discovered on this trip is the egoless quality of being a tourist. You must surrender to a whole different side of the earth and praise all that you do not know. There is beauty in the childlike wonder that can overtake your senses, in the humility of taking a turn and going twenty minutes in the wrong direction. Being a tourist requires activating an extra level of sensitivity, to pick up cues and offer respect to your surroundings.
Though LA is a land of hasty history and adolescent landmarks, I was struck by one similarity it shares with Rome. Experiencing both cities is better when you know a certain amount of context. Shortly after I found out I’d be going to this far away place, I walked to the neighborhood library and asked the librarian to point me to a book titled Rome, written by Robert Hughes, an art critic who died in 2012. I was hopeful that Mr. Hughes would offer me some quick insight, but I wasn’t prepared when the librarian extracted a 2.5 inch thick hardcover from the shelf. I lugged it home and dutifully wiped it down with rubbing alcohol (anyone else’s mom do this?) before promptly falling asleep while reading the second page. I had about three days before my flight and I quickly got lost in the laundry list of preparation that all trips require. I still have the book tucked in the gap between my mattress and the wall—did I mention how thick it is? Maybe now I will read it and the arched windows of the towering Colosseum will make sense retroactively.
What they don’t tell you about visiting an ancient city—not that you asked—is that emotion will not present itself to you. You can stand in front of the Colosseum and feel nothing, except for maybe the widening gap between you and the perceived importance. I only skirted the exterior and gazed up, shaking my head when offered portable phone chargers, giant bottles of water, roses on a long stem. I don’t like to wait in lines, especially the kinds where groups of three, five, ten people are huddled together with pamphlets and a shared anticipation of discovery.
I’d rather tunnel through the side streets like a mouse seeking out cheese and stand under a fountain with no name, marveling at the mystery. In those same winding streets, I’ll find a wall plastered with Jewish symbols and mosaic Stars of David. I’ll spend all day at the Borghese Gardens, even if tickets to the museum are all booked up. Again and again, it’s the timeless quality of nature that gets me. I can’t conceive of a ruin really being around for 2,000 years, or what 2,000 years even means, but I can sense eternity in the soil below a tree. Water runs through all of it. The original streets in Rome absorbed rainfall and moisture soaked into the earth. This changed when city planners restructured the cobblestones and added asphalt to accept the load of cars and trucks—suddenly the trees began to die. At first, no one could conceive of why, but all roots weave through earth, pulling nutrients from the underworld. I’m here for the trees that have seen all angles of our existence.
I’m here for the man who brings an oversized messenger bag filled with cabbage to feed the geese. He will not be found in a tour of Vatican City. I’ll go to the tiny restaurant where we are given a shared table, a squiggly line quickly drawn down the middle to show that we are strangers and have no intention of sharing our bread.
I’m transfixed by the Tiber River and the quiet that surrounds it. Up on the bridges, people curve their backs and tilt their chins to fit inside a beautiful landscape of clouds, other bridges, an old castle to the left. All of it practicing dominion over the river. But you can sit with the city’s secrets when you’re down by the rushing water. Grass has overtaken the cobblestones, the graffiti, the sounds of ripping scooters. I could stand in the Colosseum for a week and never understand 1,000 years, much less 2,000. But here, next to the water, you know why they built this city all those years ago. You can tilt your ear away from the current and listen for the echoes of footsteps across the millennia. All of it built around a river that swallowed life when it was offered in war. A river that sustained civilizations who would otherwise have fallen into obscure history when they were beat out by some stronger hand. How would our world be different if the Roman story was erased so another could be written? My head spins. I tilt my ear back to the cascading water.
Rome, they say, is remarkable. And it is. I can eat pizza and focaccia and cacio e pepe with zero repercussions. Gluten usually plays the role of my kryptonite, but here it is transformed into a delight. What could be more miraculous than that? Drinking four glasses of wine does not unleash a dizzy fury in my head the next morning. I could spend a lifetime in Italy on the basis of such pleasures.
The next time I go back, I’ll come with more context in my pocket. I’ll still head straight for the river.
That’s all for today.
xx
James
My deepest memory (1995) is eating carciofi fritti just inside the Porta D'Ottavia leading into the Jewish Quarter. There has to be food involved.
James, your writing, style, voice, every bit considered, has grown so much and so beautifully. It's been a treat to watch. Thank you for your enduring devotion.