Junior English

Day One

SYA classes started yesterday.  After reading students' intro letters to me three weeks ago, in which many expressed enthusiasm for the Harkness approach, I decided I had to do it.  Not entirely, but twice a week.  Some years ago our TA English department had a Saturday workshop on Harkness.  I loved it, embraced it, and then tried in with my ninth grade English class about three times per year.  I've been a little scared of it: what if the discussion falls flat?  what if the kids don't get anything out of it?  is it lazy teaching on my part?  what if we don't get do all the themes that we should during these discussions?  In truth, I worry about this final question whether we are doing Harkness, or I am leading the class myself.  I'm not sure whether this is my insecurity in my teaching or in my knowledge, or whether it is a product of my going to Catholic school for thirteen years -- being told and believing that the best answer is always the right answer, that there is, in fact, a right answer.  I find myself even now thinking that there is a best answer to questions or a best way to teach a book.  I know there's not because I've seen colleagues approach and teach the same texts myriad ways, and I admire more than one approach (I often sneak an extra copy of a nifty handout on things I'm teaching and things I'm not from the copy machine in the foreign language office at TA...it could be assignments on the same book from two different teachers.  I don't judge whether one is better than the other.  I get greedy for the ideas of both...and how I can use my ideas plus theirs in my class).  But still, sometimes this thought creeps up on me...what if I'm not doing it right.

When I was working out essay questions on Flight, I emailed a friend who had taught it before.  She answered my email request a few hours after I posted my questions -- which, actually, were based on the discussion questions and exit tickets of the students that day.  I was pretty excited about my posted questions, about the kids' questions really.  But when my friend's email arrived, I couldn't help myself: I read her questions with a critical eye, not towards her but towards myself: had I covered the topics she had found most important?

This second-guessing myself is not new.  I always want to be the better teacher, the best teacher, as I say, to make sure I'm getting it as right as I can.  And I know in my heart and in my head I that the most important thing is to prep well, be totally present in class, and to listen.  Above all, to listen.

Day Two

Three minutes into first period the students let me know that, while I did post the homework last night online, I did not publish the date so it did not show up on their online calendar, so the majority of students haven't done it.  I have no back-up: my lesson was based on that homework assignment.  The only thing that comes to mind is to swap plans for day 2 and day 3.  We're doing Harkness with no more debating or self-doubt or analyzing or researching (will I be put one day into this position when I have to drive the standard Fiat?).

It's good I had no more time to plan and read about Harkness discussions, to search again my google drive for my Harkness workshop notes.  We spent ten minutes talking about what makes a good Harkness discussion with kids who hadn't done Harkness asking questions (e. g. what is it? what's the purpose? how's it different from a discussion?)  and kids who have done Harkness contributing most important aspects (don't interrupt; listen; use the text; include everyone; three before me; be concise; be patient with the pace; let silence be okay; disagree respectfully).  I made a student map while the kids took a moment to think of questions and topics on Sherman Alexie's Flight, and then we -- or rather, they, jumped in.

They amazed me: they covered more ideas and quotes and themes than I possibly could have navigating the discussion from one idea to the next.  We have work to do -- we need every single student to speak during discussion, but we got a super start.  I read in one spot, Don't do Harkness unless you can do it regularly and often.  New plan: twice a week, no exception.

Reverse Teaching/Coaching/Club Leading Paradigm

In independent schools, many teachers coach sports and/or lead clubs.  The reasoning: it's good to get to know kids outside the classroom, to see them in another way, to learn about them, to work with them as they shine or struggle, to develop another relationship with them.  I coached for seven (I think) of my twenty teaching years.  During and after that, I advised clubs.  The reasoning works in reality: I have developed relationships with students outside class; I've gotten a new appreciation for certain kids; I'm a better teacher because of these outside interactions.

This year, the order of knowing was flipped: I worked with the SYA students for three weeks outside the classroom before we ever had a real class together.  I talked with them as they worked through orientation activities, adjusted to host families, retreated in Terracina for three days.  One student approached me about starting an SYA literary magazine; three others came to see me about moderating the academic work that accompanies the orientation activities; an advisee set up a meeting about food issues with her host family.  I read the students' homework and essays, so I knew some about them as students, but I didn't know their classroom personae at all.  I knew some reading and writing skills, some homework routines and standards, some issues or interests outside the classroom.

In this first full week of classes, I had some of my observations and assumptions about students challenged.  I learned that one girl was a lot brighter and more engaged with the literature than I had imagined; that one boy was less cocky than he seemed and a better listener than I had seen outside class.  Some kids, whose writing was mediocre, gave brilliant comments in class.  A girl who seemed to have it completely together was paralyzed by a writing assignment since her home school does different types of essays (and her teacher grades different from how I do...do all teachers hear this accusation yearly?).  After class this week one kid recommended I read Siddhartha; another recommended the short story "The Lie" by Kurt Vonnegut ; another the website mcsweeneys.net.  They told me about the difference between Ted talks and Ted X talks.  The morning after I assigned Brene Brown's Ted talk on vulnerability, one boy started the conversation with the comment, "I'm so glad that you assigned that Ted talk.  It's really relevant to our experience this year in SYA, and it gave me a lot to think about in terms of putting myself out there."  Another girl soon followed up with, "I related Brene Brown's points to Flight and to Zits and to his journey in becoming more vulnerable and letting people in."

Teenagers have so much to say.

So much to teach.

Just listen.

(Well, prep and grade and listen.)

A few photos before I erase them from my phone...

First day of school at Santa Maria del Paradiso

Star Wars bamboo saber fight at Lago di Vico

Capalbio...life imitating art

Santa Rosa Procession -- awaiting the macchina at Fontana Grande

Boulder climbing at Cimmino beech forest 

Friend took this photo at Sperlonga and sent to Daniel...that's me in the distance taking a walk -- such a September school day treat.  Daniel responded to friend, "Now I'm thinking perhaps we should have come on the school trip."

August 30, 2018: Hannah's birthday: Hannah and Connor licking up her spilled birthday Fanta from dining room table lest any go to waste

Polyphemus (reconstructed) sculpture from Tiberius' grotto at Sperlonga (SYA trip)

 SYA faculty (there's me!) at Sperlonga

Cinqueterra hike at Monterosso al Mare

Hannah in a faghetta (beech tree) at Cimmino (20 minutes from us)

Stop on way to Cinqueterra: the well-kept, gorgeous Capalbio

Sleeping quarters for one night: a yurt in Rosignano Marittimo, Toscania

Con and Hannah imagining another yurt on site?

Connor at the terme -- hot hot! (10 minutes away...recently filled a water bottle here and used the natural spring water to heal my stye...it worked!...or was it the eye drops from the Farmacia...or the chamomile eye drops from a colleague?...we'll never know, but thank goodness my eye is opening more easily again...)

Nostalgia for Summer: Viterbo by Gelateria

Gelataria Antica
The first gelataria I went to here in Viterbo, and the first one I took the gang to the day they arrived.  Daniel's favorite.   Super flavors.  At Porta della Verita.  A five minute walk from our apartment which I can turn into thirty when I take a wrong turn.   (Not kidding.)  Also on possible route home from kids' school.  How many days will they stop by on way home if they are walking home themselves?...only gelateria open tonight at 9pm since it's gotten colder, and summer is over.


Cream Italy
In Medieval quarter of town (= easiest place to get turned around).  Daniel claims that he got smaller scoops than the rest of us.  We've gone back to test his theory and to see if we can get him bigger scoops.

Polozzi
A Mary find: They put chocolate in the cone before the gelato.  Then, when you get to your cone, the chocolate has hardened, and the cone has become a sort of cookie.

one up the street from us -- I can't figure out the name
When it's approaching 9pm and too late to motivate the adults and the gelato intake is at a negative for the day, the kids say, "But we can go right up the street!"  We parents give in, and up the thirty yards they go.  Smaller scoops if they get an employee-in-training; bigger scoops if not.

Gelateria Gelart at Piazza del Erbe
Great seating area outside and open late.  Also across from Tiger, a store the kids frequent for a massager, slime (which I am now officially banning), hair scratcher, caramel sticks.


Polozzo
Not a chain to be confused with Polozzi in Piazza Plebiscito (which the locals call Piazza Commune).  This one is special because it's a gelataria and pasticceria in one.  On Sunday afternoon, half of us got gelato and half of us got cannolli...and then Daniel went back in and got everyone more cannoli and pastries.  We sat on benches and tried everything, walked to the park across the street, then back home, where Daniel's sweet potato pie awaited us for dinner.  When we arrived home, I tried to get the internet working (it goes out every three days or so), Daniel worked on dinner, the kids discussed which movie they'd watch (big news last week: we signed up for Netflix...first month free...).  We agreed on Back to the Future, classic '80s.  The next day as we ate lunch Mary said, "You know, we didn't eat dinner last night."  Gelato, cannoli, pastries, a movie.  She was right: we forgot to sit down and eat dinner.

Bagno Vignoni

When we get out of the car at Bagno Vignoni, Sebastian is teary.  I think he's just hungry.  We're going for another 3pm lunch; one of these trips we'll master the art of planning and finding restaurants open for meals at the right times.  Finally he tells me, "I had planned for us to hike, then have lunch, then go to the hot water spring, and now it's 3:30, and we don't know what of those we're even going to do."

He's right.  Entirely right.  Last night Daniel and I flipped through Italy guidebooks looking for a spot for a day visit.  When the kids were antsy, we said that they could participate in the planning.  The two of us had been going back and forth, indecisive, open to too many options and not enough at the same time.  Ten minutes later Sebastian told me, "I found a place.  We're going to Bagno Vignoni tomorrow.  We're doing an 8 mile loop trail hike, then lunch, then going to a hot spring."

Daniel and I were thrilled.  An hour and a half ride, a hike, food, a terme.  We were in.

The next morning we grab colazione at Happiness Cafe two blocks over, feeling like normal, relaxed folks on an Italy Saturday morning.  When Daniel goes to get the car, some of us pop into the cartoleria (stationary store) to get school supplies.  We text Daniel, and he decides to go get some of the kids' books laminated/covered (per school policy).  We buy more pens at another store, meet up with Daniel, then head to Upim (department store) to get school clothes for Connor.  When Upim doesn't have all the clothes we need, we head to OVS (another department store).  When Upim and OVS don't have the pencil cases all the second and third graders have (who knew?), we stop at Ipercoop.  Then.  Then we leave the environs of Viterbo and head to Tuscany.

So, yes, Sebastian's right: he made a super plan, and we are not executing it.  Or we are executing it six stops and four hours later than planned.   We can't even find lunch.

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Hannah and I find the red and white trail signs while we await cold sandwiches (post gelato) at a bar good enough to serve us at Bagno Vignoni.  We meet a man who advises our calling a friend of his in Viterbo ("the richest man in Viterbo," he tells us.  "Call him!  He'll have you over!"...this fact, that this man is indeed the wealthiest landowner is confirmed the next day by a Viterbese at the SYA picnic).

We hike the eight miles with the Tuscan hills around us and the river nearby.  Hannah gets soaked in the river as we all jump from rock to rock.  The kids play some bodyguard game in which we often hear Connor jumping out of the bush to scare someone.  We chat.  We admire the country.  We take breaks.  Talk.  Sit.  Walk some more.  We wonder, Can we do that peace walk from Perugia to Asissi in a few weeks?  Is it double this?  We know we have more walking to do.  Our feet hurt (no, we're not experienced hikers).  We're so proud of ourselves (okay, likely all of us except for Daniel, who knows that this is not a very long hike in real hiking terms).

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We find our accommodations when we are about half an hour from finishing the trail.  Alto Vignoni. Daniel contacts the apartment owner, who has not actually received our reservation.  No matter: within moments of the phone call, the owner's wife and son and daughter have made up beds and welcomed us and are ready to drive us to a nearby restaurant for dinner for a 9pm reservation.  It's 8:30 now.

But Sebastian wants to finish the loop back down to Bagno Vignoni.  We don't want to offend the owner, but we respect Sebastian's wish.  He's 12, and he's planned a simple, good, doable family trip.  In halting Italian I explain some to the owner, and Daniel explains some more to the owner, and his wife expresses her opinion that we're crazy to walk in the dark, and the son offers us his flashlight, and off we go to finish our loop to and find dinner in Bagno Vignoni.

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Sunday morning.  The final part of the outing is the terme: the hot springs.  Preferably free.  We are almost ready to leave, grab breakfast, and find a terme.  And I slow everyone down.  I feel pain that I have never experienced (other than childbirth) before.  I can move only slowly.  I am reminded of having small kids with diapers and cleaning up after them, but there is no one to clean up after me except myself.  I can't believe it.  I am entirely incapacitated.  I will forever have more compassion for those with constipation and diarreah (don't we always think we will?), and especially for those with both at the same time.  I cannot fathom how this has happened.

Luckily, I have extra shorts and Sebastian's long shorts fit me, too.  A Dutch woman and her twenty-something daughter see me sitting in pain in the piazza and overhear my talking with Daniel trying to figure out what to do, how to move, what's next.  When it's just me and one kid again, the woman turns to me and says, "You're not feeling well?  Your stomach?"  I nod yes.  She says, "Here.  Take four of these with a lot of water.  They'll settle your stomach.  They take care of bacteria."  I don't know this woman.  Likely I'll never see her again.  And yet she is so kind, generous with no agenda.  I trust her entirely.  I take her pills (which have the town Amersfort written on the back...and this, to me, is a sign, a good omen, since Daniel's brother and family used to live in Amersfort, and we visited there four years ago).  A friend from home sent me a short video this summer on reasons it's good to travel.  One of the reasons was something along the lines of, You learn to have faith in people, to trust others.  Here's this random woman and her daughter and their pills.  People in the world are really this kind, this generous.

We see cars at a bath, but there's no parking space, and we keep driving.  When we finally park, we cross the road and check out some waterfall-esque steps where the spring comes down.  The kids immediately climb up.  I think the sulfur might cure me.  I walk in gently, climbing slowly.  It's warm, but not hot this low.   The kids climb and climb, laughing laughing, slipping, laughing, screaming.  I hang on to long blades of grass, the clay-ish ground beneath, using hands and feet to move, afeared of more internal accidents.   (And I'm thinking that even though I really hate the spot I'm in physically, I'm still pretty sure that it's easier that it's me rather than one of the kids.  There's so little to do for them when they're in this position.)

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On the way home, we go to the SYA family picnic -- for students, host families, faculty, staff, families -- at Lake Bolsena.  The kids swim and play chicken fights.

It feels like summer again.

And the pills work.

Cliche

I'm trying to think of a better cliche than the honeymoon is over.  But it's 5pm, and I've just finished grading 44 homework assignments (all reading questions on novel Flight), and I still need to use google traduttore to read the Paradiso form that I've now signed and handed in twice -- once for Mary and once for Sebastian -- about policies and procedures at Santa Maria dell' Paradiso.  So I'm sticking with the cliche: the honeymoon is over.

Honeymoon was gelato every night, dinner at 8pm, a walk every morning, some stretching every day, talking with Daniel, kids reading on kindles for hours on end.  Today Daniel was up at 4am prepping for his sixth grade English class; I head out tomorrow for a three day trip to Nympha (sp?), Terracina, and Sperlonga with SYA (Daniel and kids could come, but they have opted to stay home to get into a groove here...I am regretful that they're not coming because Sperlonga is a beautiful beach and Nympha is a stunning garden and we'll see Tiberius' grotto at Sperlonga and sculptures of the adventures of Odysseus...and I know that it is good for Daniel to teach this week, only his second week of classes, and I know that our kids should be in school not for the academics as much as for the getting some Italian practice, continuing to get used to the school, the kids, the language...); the kids have homework and are way behind on chores (baskets of unfolded laundry await the folder; baskets of dirty laundry await the runner).

We haven't grocery shopped in over a week, and not because we've been to Costco.  We did go to Tuscany over the weekend and eat at the SYA family picnic at Lake Bolsena on Sunday, but now we have no excuse other than...well, other than being overwhelmed.  The past two mornings Hannah has gone across the street to the pasticceria to get cannoli and pastries for all of us for breakfast.  We've eaten lunch at the Mensa (where SYA faculty and students and faculty families eat -- a gift).  We've eaten the picnic leftovers for dinner.

Pathetic of us?  Entirely.

Alas.

We are learning.  And trying, trying to remember to give each other a little TLC in the process.  Not always, but sometimes.

There are some big changes going on, and we are all feeling it:

1.  Connor and Hannah need to wear jeans and white polos UNDER the smocks.  They thought they had freedom.  We did, too.  After day one, Connor told us that he needed said clothing, so Saturday we hit four stores to find what he needed, and we still didn't find short sleeve white polos.  As I passed Hannah in her school hallway yesterday, she pointed at the other second graders and whispered, "I need the clothes, too!"

2.  Homework.  For the most part our parental involvement in homework has been, "Have you done your homework?" and sometimes we even forget to ask this until breakfast.  I generally look over the little kids' work not to check the work itself, but to see that they have been neat (often not).  Now they actually need our help.  I realize that soon we will need theirs.  But my goodness, we need to set aside an extra hour or two a day to do this Italian with them.  My goal this year: to be almost as fluent as a second or third grader, or, if not that, to be able to complete second or third grade homework (sans google).  Last night Connor and I read about a girl who wanted to wear a silk dress for the first day of school.  Rossa, scuola, nuova, gonna (maybe?), vado, compagni, sole, sia, va, sono.  We'll get there.

3.  Kindle reading in English now limited to 20 minutes per day for kids.  This is so harsh.  SYA director's wife/also a friend/colleague and our contact for Paradiso (yes, they do call her and not us to communicate what kids need, kids' behavior and attention, etc....puts a lot more pressure on us as parents -- no slacking!  At home in Waltham we are forgiven for being late, missing deadlines, forgetting things at their elementary school...here we actually need to do the correct parental thing.  This is entirely daunting.  She is becoming the parent of us parents.) has suggested such kindle limitations (and really, the kindles have no apps, only books) nicely...after Paradiso direttore called her to offer to meet with big kids out of class daily to help them learn Italian.  In other words, Paradiso is doing its part, and it's time we did ours.

(Sebastian requested that I follow this 20 minutes only of English reading daily...I pulled the adult card -- I just can't commit to this.  A friend once told me that it's good for kids to realize that, along with responsibilities, there are benefits of being an adult.  I am so going with this rationale so I can read before bed -- not that I find myself with more than 20 minutes to do so anyway...hmmmmm...)

4.  No movies in English.  Only Italian.  See #3 for source of this idea/mandate.

5.  Italian practice every day at home.  (Again, see #3.)  Duolingo accounts for everyone by the time we went to bed last night.

6.  We need trip #8 to cartoleria to get school supplies.  We never get it all.  We think we do.  By the next day, we realize we don't.  After our third trip, the owner started to like us.  (On our first trip, he just spoke in fast Italian, and I nodded unknowingly and returned to the shelves of notebooks.  He looked disgusted...or perhaps I was self-conscious and imagined such.)  Yesterday he and I even shared a laugh over the kids' dropping things again and again.  Me: a total look of frustration and mortification.  Him: a gentle and amused smile.

7.  We've got to get kids to school on time.  At Paradiso, one minute late = one hour late.  8 hours = 1 missed school day.  Do I care if the kids are absent some?  No -- in fact, we plan to pull them for my vacation weeks and school trips (other than this week).  But I can't have Paradiso reporting to my colleague/friend/our contact that we are not getting the kids to school on time.  Tricky tricky.  And yes, I know it's good for the kids to get to school on time.  I do.  New habits are hard.  (At home, it's easy to get to TA on time.  Of course, since Plympton is three blocks away, it's much harder to get there on time.)

8. Bedtime has got to be earlier than 11pm for everyone.  Challenging for all.

9. Parenting must kick in again -- it's time to find ways to get kids involved in life here.  Soccer or dance or basketball -- just activities that will help them meet kids and do things they like.   But this means we have to find where and how and when, and then work that into the schedule.  And we might even need to speak Italian to sign them up.

[When Sebastian was almost a month old, Daniel took him out for a morning, and I was home by myself.  I went for a walk and ended up along Lexington Street, just a busy, ordinary street in Waltham with Blockbuster (where I went in for a movie -- I loved Blockbuster.  It was like a book store for movies.  So much better than shopping online for renting movies or buying books...).  I remember walking along and suddenly being struck by our having a newborn.  And I panicked.  I thought, Oh no!  How will we know what activities he likes and what to sign him up for?  How will we sign him up?  How do you do this?  How do you help him with life and hobbies and fun stuff?  How will I know how to do this?  How did mom know how to sign us up for life?  I cried.  There on Lexington Street outside Blockbuster, alone, likely still bleeding and exhausted.   Feeling overwhelmed manifests in all different ways for folks, I suppose.  I'm not feeling that dire at the moment.  This feels practical, doable, get-my-head-around-able...and yet...]

10.  We need to work.

What's still normal: we're hanging out, not being a well-oiled machine, laughing, crying, talking, listening, working, fighting, eating, nagging, making lists, figuring things out.

At 9 o'clock last night as I finished up homework with Connor and Daniel finished up with Mary, I say to Mary, "It's not like we thought this was going to be easy."

Through watery eyes, she smiles.

Paradiso at last (i.e. kids' school)

Day One

I rush the kids down the streets and up the streets, and Daniel follows with Connor -- all of us attempting to get there by 8am.

Hannah's teacher squishes Hannah's tiny cheeks and pulls her in for a huge hug.  Hannah looks a little scared, and I think her eyes fill up...or perhaps my eyes fill up and I am projecting on her. 

Connor's teacher pretty much does the same thing.  Oh, sweet pea.

(When we pull the kids back out of class for a quick kid photo, they all look like themselves, not scared or sad or anything.  I look at the photo on my phone all day, reassuring myself that they are just fine.)

Mary tells us that some kids shared snack with her.  No greater love...

Sebastian says the boys at recess let him play foosball first since he's new.  He's invited to a birthday party of a girl in his class -- at a pizzeria next Friday night.  He doesn't want to rsvp until he knows whether some boys are going.  I'm not sure how he is going to figure this out, but he'll find a way, I imagine.

Day Two

I rush the kids down the streets and up the streets, and Daniel follows with Connor -- all of us attempting to get there by 8am.  (We're working on it.)

Hannah tells me that she played tag with some girl at recess.  Afterwards, the girl says to her, "Domani qui."  (Tomorrow here.)  Hannah does not know the girl's name and does not care.  She has a buddy for recess tomorrow.

Mary comes home and talks about "my friends" at recess and how they rejoiced when she said a few Italian words. 

Connor holds hands with Federico on way to morning prayers.  Sure, all the third graders have to, but my goodness, it is quite precious.

Sebastian does four math problems for homework and is amazed at how long they take.  He sets up his duolingo account to practice Italian at home, motivated because there's a leaderboard (sp?) (this word has always confused me...I've imagined that it's much more complicated than it is...forse like finding and listening to a podcast or downloading music?), and he likes games and competitions.

Culture Shock

Today I sat down with our director and watched a Ted talk called something like, "Why Culture Shock is Good for You."  The speaker talked about how the more new a situation is, the more uncomfortable we are, and the less new it becomes, the more comfortable we become.  He had a nifty graph and everything.  And even though we were watching this to prepare for advisee meetings next week, I kept thinking variations of the following, Yes!  That's me!  Oh, that's so true.  Oh, gracious, I did that, too.  Man, I'm glad that I came here two weeks before Daniel and the kids.

It took me over a week to go to the fruit and vegetable stores one block and two blocks away because I liked feeling more anonymous at the Emme Piu, the grocery store just a seven minute walk away.  I could linger and struggle with the names of the foods, and no one was going to care or even notice me.  I was likely not going to offend anyone if I walked in, looked and looked, turned items over, didn't find what I wanted, bought very little, and left.  At Emme Piu I could listen to Italian pop or American pop (uncensored, no less -- gracious), putter, debate, wander.  There was a strange comfort in music and weird lighting and no one I knew or who knew me.  (I felt the same way about cappuccino: the first time I went to a bar for a coffee I went a town over (on my bike ride to Lago di Vico), very comfortable where no one was going to recognize me two hours later.   Someone here might notice my discomfort, my self-consciousness, and I might do something wrong to offend.)  Kristopher Gilmour (Ted talk guy) calls this culture shock -- my avoiding the local store in favor of something more comfortable.  I hadn't considered it this way, but I can see it entirely.

Yesterday Daniel and I went for a walk around 6pm.  (As we ate gelato afterwards, sans kiddos who were at home, I was thinking, When at home do we ever take a walk together at 6pm, then go for ice cream, and then deal with children and dinner and work afterwards?...then I had to consciously recall those two hours at 10pm when I was still grading reading questions on Sherman Alexie's Flight...which, side note, is quite wonderful to read with high school juniors...)  At one point Daniel stopped to use a restroom and I kept walking.  I walked up a pretty, shady, green, narrow street, and I had to laugh.  I thought, "Oh, golly, Maureen, you thought this road was so scary your first week here!"  Now I'm more comfortable and I'm not scared at seven o'clock at night on the exact same road.  This was the road I biked on for maybe half a mile my first week here.  Then today, the Ted talk....yes -- I'm more comfortable now, so this road is less scary.

This is not to say that I'm always comfortable.  I'm still working on the morning coffee break, which my colleagues are often nice enough to remind me of/invite me to.  At home at work/school during break time, I talk with a friend or colleague (often one and the same) in the hallway or check email or get started on the walk I want to take between classes.  I often do the same at the lunch break at home -- snacking on my Kind Bars and saltines and carrots and whatever else suits me.  I take a break from people-time, get a little more work done to avoid doing it at 10pm, eat what I like.  But here, I'm the newbie.  And I'm the American.  I know it's good for me to head to Bar 103 on the corner with the others, order my cappuccino (Nadia, the owner, now knows me, and this is good and lovely...and also somewhat confirms my thought weeks ago that someone would get to know me and I could totally be screwing up some custom or cultural norm), and stand there awkwardly while my Italian colleagues chat with each other or other folks who wander in or with me.  I just stand, try to drink quickly even though I really, really don't want to (I want to sit outside and sip sip sip and use my little spoon to scoop out the last of the sugary -- I add a good bit -- steamed milk that's in the cup at the end), and try to catch a few phrases.  No doubt I look horribly awkward, gawky American.  But it's okay.  I'll keep going.  I like the cappuccino, and even though I say little in halting poor Italian, I like the company.  Perhaps in a few weeks or months, my bar-coffee-break-awkwardness will be less new and more comfortable per Kristofer Gilmour's graph.  (I love the little glass of fizzy water the servers put out with your coffee.  I always think, Perfect: it will be so good after the coffee for hydration and for getting rid of coffee breath.  Yesterday I had an inkling that I was doing this backwards, so I asked my colleague Ale, "Are you supposed to drink the water before or after the coffee?"  "Oh, before," she said.  "You need to cleanse the palate before your coffee.  We take our coffee very seriously."  She smiled, not critical of my gaffe, just happy, I think, to share Italian culture with me.  Interesting...I feel just fine about my gaffe when I had so much concern/fear about making one for weeks...)

The kids start school tomorrow.  Unanticipated culture shock may be an understatement.  (Daniel and I feel it for them.  They seem strangely okay and even excited.)  They have gotten so comfortable around Viterbo: the guy at the pasticceria across the street gets them their cannoli when he sees them come in (they tell me); they've got their asking for gelato in Italian down; they can find most places we send them (including the olive oil store/museum I assigned them a couple days ago...and where they paid nine euro for half a liter of olive oil.  Wow.  I mean, that was the assignment, and it is really good olive oil, but....); they feel strangely confident that they'll learn Italian soon enough.  Connor and Hannah are actually excited about the blue with white collar smocks: this shocks and thrills me.

So many articles these days praise the lost art of letting kids just do whatever they like instead of structured activities.  For good or bad, we have aced this practice these last three months.  For every error we have made parenting in the past and present (losing kids; having kids not do homework; being snappy with kids; upsetting kids; getting updates from teachers because kids are not doing what they need to in school; dealing with electronics issues; being late for school; missing deadlines at kids' school; being late for activities; missing kids' practices because we just forget or fall asleep; etc.), we have been outstanding at scheduling very little for the past three months (even if it drives me batty at times when I get home from work and people are sprawled out reading or doing whatever they're doing and the house/apartment is a mess).

Here's what they've been doing for the past three weeks with virtually no schedule:

• They read a ton (Kindles have been a lifesaver, Daniel says.  If not for them, they would fight even more.) 
• They practice conflict-resolution (read: they fight a LOT).  
• They found origami paper this week in a bedroom, and the boys spent hours making who knows what shapes that have taken over the dining room table.  
• Hannah bought some pearl clay -- that made me think of slime and consider banning it; she and Connor made it into an octopus today.  To ban or not?
• They make forts (again, it thrills me and drives me batty as I think, Oh no, now this room needs to be cleaned up, and we now need to wash those sheets, dang it, and at the same time I say, Kids -- this is so cool! as they show me the entrances and exits and windows and nifty bells and whistles of their creation).  
• They sit around.  
• They lie in their forts with their kindles.
• They bake (Mary has made at least three batches of cupcakes and frosting, improving with each one as she finds substitutes for baking powder or vanilla or other ingredients that we get easily at home but with more difficulty here.  Again...the joy of baking...not so much of cleaning up....).  
• And yes, they go for walks (which we encourage) and use their spending money (which we don't) to buy gelato and cannoli and random silly things at Tiger.

Strangely, they never say that they're bored.  (But perhaps their fighting indicates they are?)

I grade a lot, meet with kids about showing versus telling in their essays, work on my cappuccino and bar visits.  Daniel works out how to keep his eleven sixth-graders engaged, running ideas by Mary and Sebastian and me (bad wife moment: Daniel, what are you doing for your first class today?  Daniel: We're going to read Wonder some, do an activity, work through a grammar worksheet.  me: A grammar worksheet on the first day?  Death by grammar on day one, eh?  Daniel: Thanks for the pep talk.  Oops.).  The two of us have been adjusting to work life a bit, and I'm sure we have more adjusting to do.  I've felt exhausted this week, and I'm not even officially teaching yet -- online teaching = assigning writing and reading and grading homework and essays every day...lots of grading...

Santa Maria dell'Paradiso tomorrow for the little people.  I have to wonder how many awkward cappuccino/bar moments they'll have.  Likely quite a few.  And I'll have to remind them afterwards that the awkwardness is okay and they'll get through it.   And it's likely even good for them.

I have to remind myself, too.

When summer is approaching and people are talking about summer plans and trips, I often find myself saying, "We hang out."  I mean, we do things: we go to Scituate; we go camping; some years we rent a small place for a few days -- one year in western MA; one year in NH.  But we don't usually take huge trips (unless we're going to visit Daniel's family in NM).   The kids play with their friends, we bike around town a lot, we go to the Y pool, we eat dinner together on the back deck.  We hang out.

Yesterday I had the same thought.  Sure, we're in Italy.  And travel generally sounds exciting.  And it is.  But really, when we're traveling, we're just hanging out in new surroundings, adjusting some, finding ways to be comfortable some, getting to know a place some, learning some.

Saturday Mary, Connor, Daniel, and I wandered the outdoor market in search of pants for Connor, then caught up with Sebastian and Hannah at the sculpture I call The Giant, but which I think is properly called The Awakening (similar or original in Washington, D. C., I think).  A huge head sticks out of the ground, so big you could climb on it.  But easier to climb is the left knee or the right foot.  The kids climbed and then slid down the shin.  We sat on the grass.  Daniel took a video or two.

When the kids got antsy and we all got hungry, we came home, ate lunch, read, napped (disciplined Hannah did some of her Italian workbook since school is starting soon; Mary started to set up a blog so she can do some writing).  Then we headed out to Baita La Faggeta, a forest twenty minutes away, where there are beech trees, trails, boulders.  The kids climbed rocks, ran, made up a water-bottle-rolling game.  We hung out.

We got hungry.  We ate.

The kids begged to return to the terme to wade around, so at 9pm we headed to the hot springs, strangely crowded and festive.  While Mary read her book, the rest of us sat in the hot pool.  Connor lost his watch en route from one pool to another; Sebastian returned with him to search, and they returned successful. (Phew.)

Daniel made the kids practice closing the windows of the car, closing the door to the apartment.  We talked: Mary is considering becoming vegetarian; Daniel may join her.  We called our nephew to wish him a happy birthday.  We called lights out too late, yet again.

A good Saturday.

Hanging out.

Adventures in Keeping Kids Occupied Until School Starts

Inspired by this year's experiential learning approach to orientation at SYA, some days I assign the kids excursions within the walls of Viterbo.  Here's a sampling:

Kid Challenges

Excursion #1: Lesson in Bad Parenting

Find:
4 gelaterias
4 fontane
4 chiese
4 piazze (they may not be in conjunction with fontane)

Kids left apartment at 6:30pm to start their scavenger hunt.  Viterbo is a manageable town inside the walls, and it was still light.  Daniel and I took advantage of the non-kid time to walk to the grocery store since we run out of food every three days or so (no Costco size store or American size fridge here).  Pleased with ourselves, we returned, hung out, and then, as dusk settled and darkness started to settle in at 8:10pm, I got worried (clearly not a new theme here even though I don't actually consider myself a worrier) and went out searching for them.  Nearly panicked, I called Daniel at 8:20, and he agreed that we needed reinforcements (his word).  I called colleagues Amy and Warren, who reported for duty, made the plan for stupefied (right word here?) me; unflappable Warren told me how he talked to the kids early afternoon while they looked at the map of Viterbo at SYA, so he had an idea of which piazza they might be in.  Five minutes later, Daniel called Pat, the SYA director (and a friend), and he and his wife prepared to drive over to help search.

At 8:40, the kids arrived home.  Upon arriving home, Sebastian exclaimed, "We did it!"

Mary had encouraged the group to head home earlier not because she was nervous (they were just fine) but because she thought that her mom would be nervous once it got dark.  (Good job, Mary.)

This day scared me plenty...but didn't stop me from assigning another excursion for the next day.  I did learn, however, to have the kids go out earlier in day, to give an ending time, and to give them one of our phones.


Excursion #2: Sweets always available.

Find:
4 pasticceria
4 porta
4 scalini/staircases
4 tabacchi

Savvy: Shockingly, kids could find only 1 pasticceria, so they ate cannoli there. Fortunately (?) for them, this pasticceria is across the street from our apartment.  Fortunately for me, they did not stay out til dark or past dark searching for other pasticcerias that don't exist within the walls.


Excursion #3: Practical

Find your way to Paradiso (their school...which begins -- finally -- September 14) and back, using a different porta by which to return.

They did this one easily and were quite proud of themselves and pleased with me that this excursion took under 45 minutes.

(Daniel was informed this week that he must drive the kids to school when it rains.  He hadn't planned on it.  He said to this colleague/friend, "Would it reflect on my parenting if I don't drive them when it rains?"  The answer an indisputable, "Yes.")  (Truth is that they'll be soaked anyway because it takes seven minutes to walk to the car.)



Excursion #4: Viva Santa Rosa!

Find all the sostata (stops) for the procession of the Santa Rosa macchina, thereby following the route of the macchina.
AND
Find names of all gelaterias we have frequented within the walls.

Not surprising: They texted me while they were searching and I was out walking, "Want to meet us for gelato?"  Of course.

Surprising: There are five stops, not four as they thought, on the route.  :)


Excursion #5: Mangia mangia!

Go to Emme Piu (the grocery store) with Daniel and learn the names of five foods.
S = farfalle, uva, uova, sausaggio, tostate, salsiccia
M =  lievito, zucchero, uova
C = latte, noi voi (not a food, but the store brand), mela, nutella (biggest jar I've ever seen)
H = ciccoria (my preparation was subpar, but I've had delicious versions of this green vegetable), insalata, arancia, pomodoro, melanzane, cocomero (full disclosure: Hannah had no foods when they arrived home, and I wanted ciccoria, so she came across the street with me to Frutte e Verdura and we picked up a few things)

This evening after dinner I noticed the kitchen door was closed.  Daniel and Connor were in there doing dishes.  Closed door set off alarms in my head: they are finding the Nutella that Sebastian hid!  I ran in, caught them, and revealed the hiding place (the tin in which we're keeping kitchen towels).  How did you know what we were doing?  Connor asked.  How do I tell him that 1) I have much practice in hiding and finding certain forbidden foods, and 2) I am as sneaky as they are so of course a closed door was a tip-off,  3) I so wanted some nutella, too, so I wanted to get some before they ate it all (not that there is truly any danger of such since this jar is huge).

Terme

Five years ago we were in the mountains in New Mexico.  We'd taken a family day away from the extended Keleher family to get some time for ourselves.  We hiked around Tent Rocks in the afternoon, and then we drove to the hot springs in the Jemez Mountains.   It was dark, cold, scary.  Connor was afraid of bears.  We couldn't see our way too well.  Mary was cold.  I was both.  But we trudged on.  When we finally made it up to the spring, everyone went in except for Connor and me.  The possible bears, the cold, the dark -- he couldn't be persuaded to go in.  We'll be support crew, I told him.  We'd be in charge of getting towels ready.  I was disappointed not to go in, but relieved, too.  I really don't like being cold.  The other kids and Daniel revelled in the hot water, encouraged us to come in, but Connor stayed firm in staying out.

It's five years later.  I've told the kids about the hot springs here in Viterbo, the terme.  There are fancy ones, and then there are free ones a ten minute drive from our house.  After an SYA gathering, we head to the free terme.  Connor tells us, "This time I'm going in.  Last time Mom and I were the helpers."

This time it's not dark yet (but it is by the time we leave), there are no bears, the air is cool, but it's not late November in the mountains in New Mexico.  It's 7:30pm, there are other people around, and  it's late August in Italy.

Connor is the first one in.  When I walk up, he is laughing and ducking in and out of the water.   One pool is so hot I can barely put my feet in, but I do anyway thinking that there might be healing qualities here (unlike Connor, I don't get in...feeling a fever I've had all day).  Daniel immerses himself in this hottest pool.  Connor and Hannah head back to the first pool.  At 9pm, I need to leave to get to bed.  We corral the kids.

Connor is the last one out.

Festival of Santa Rosa

Chairs line the sidewalks.  Blankets and pillows cover the steps by fountains in piazzas.  People young and old sit outside visiting with each other, reading, looking at phones, playing cards.  They have bags of food and small coolers.  Some have umbrellas to protect from sun or possible rain. (The day before rain stopped the procession of the heart of Santa Rosa -- everyone stood in the streets waiting.  One woman told me, "We're just waiting.  This has never happened before.  They had to stop the procession.")  They have been here since as early as 9am (or earlier?) staking out spots.

Flags and banners hang outside windows -- some express Viterbo pride; some say Facchini and have pictures of men with their arms up as if holding the macchina.

The procession of the statue of Santa Rosa (the macchina) begins at 9pm.  By 6pm, my colleagues  tell me, you won't be able to walk down the street or sidewalks because both will be so packed.  I have seen the scaffolding and constructing of the macchina since the day I arrived to Viterbo, driving through the Porta Romana, the scaffolding a hundred feet high in preparation over a month ago.  People told me for the first five weeks I was here, "It's something to see.  It's the biggest event of the year.  The city gets crazy."

The statue is 30 meters high and weighs 5 tons (in understandable terms for me, this is 2000 pounds and 98 feet high).   One hundred plus men carry it through the city from the Porta Romana up and down streets all the way to the Chiesa di Santa Rosa, the patron saint of Viterbo.  Plaques marking the route and stops of the macchina take the place of cobblestones in certain spots in the city.

(This weekend we googled Santa Rosa of Viterbo to find out why she was canonized as a saint.  She was not in my sixth grade bible bee or in the miniature books of saints I had as a kid, and I didn't know whether she was a martyr -- do all saints need to be martyrs?  Here's what we learned this week:  Rose lived in poverty, allegedly raised her aunt from the dead when Rose was about three years old, opposed the king who was objecting to the pope, preached to folks to do good and to do penances, stood in a fire for three hours unscathed to rid a town of a sorceress and thereby converted all the town, including the sorceress, to Christianity.  Today I learned that people -- especially mothers -- prayed to Santa Rosa for years after her death, petitions for health and help.)

Before heading to SYA for a potluck and Santa Rosa gathering -- SYA is on the route, and we can get a great view from the windows and balconies -- Sebastian wants to see the final hill that the facchini run up to get to the chiesa of Santa Rosa.  So he, Hannah, and I grab a cannolo and piece of limone pie and walk over.  It's an impressive hill, and the steps at the top are reserved for the families of the facchini.  Sebastian keeps telling me, "Ask if we can sit here."  (More indication that he needs to learn Italian soon.)  I ask a few people, and they kindly explain that these spots are for the families and that those spots are for an emergency exit.  (I understand one of every fifteen words they say, but the gestures and the occasional word give me the jist.)  After all, there is danger here: if a facchino slips or falls, if the statue falls...I picture the devastation, and I want to google Santa Rosa macchina accident to see whether there has been one.

As we approach our apartment, Sebastian and Hannah remain adamant that they do not want to watch from the safety and comfort of SYA.  They want the real deal, the whole experience from the ground and with Italians.  Sebastian stakes out a spot in Piazza de Fontana Grande (one block from our apartment in one direction and one block from SYA in the other); Hannah comes up to the apartment to get water, sheet, blanket, kindles, and joins him.

By 7pm, it's Sebastian, Hannah, Mary, and I on the blanket.  (Daniel and Connor are enjoying the potluck and window seats at SYA.) It's like being at the Esplanade on July 4 or at First Night in Boston on New Year's Eve or on a beach where you can't move except for those little spaces between blankets and towels.  Sebastian reads his kindle; I begin An Odyssey; the girls make a new buddy and play Uno.

At 7:30pm, a man with an entourage walks up the street and everyone cheers, Manzini! Manzini! Manzini!  Huge cheers.
I ask a woman nearby, "Qui e?"
"Manzini," she says.
"Qui e Manzini?" I ask.  I know I seem a dunce, but I'm a terrible faker.
She gets her friend to help translate, "Il presidente de reppublica de Italia."
I google (pathetic, but true): Matteo Manzini, deputy prime minister of Italy.  (And this is something else to figure out: now that I have gotten a handle on podcasts and I'm enjoying catching up on American life with choice of what to listen to and what not to listen to, do I instead follow Italian politics and life?  Do I live fully in one place or listen to the news of one and live in the other?)

At 7:45pm the facchini -- all dressed in white with red sashes -- walk up Via Cavour in rows.  Over a hundred men, arms locked in lines of eight or ten (?), striking in their attire and in their quest.  The crowd chants, Facchini!  Facchini!  Facchini!  It's a praise, an awe, a cheer.  These men are heroes, taking on this labor for honor and for the festival of Santa Rosa.

They head up the hill now to the Porta Romana where a priest will administer last rites to them before they carrry the towering macchina through the city.  The four of us sit and talk about last rites (I knew this sacrament in the list by grade three; my kids have never heard of last rites), why the men might need it, how they must be feeling, what could potentially happen.

At 9:20pm, the lights around us go out.  The city is officially dark now except for the ubiquitous phone lights/camera lights.  We are guilty in this, too.  And then there it is, the macchina, coming around a corner into view, its candles lighting up the air.

The towering, sparkling, intricate macchina hovers in the sky, immense against the black sky.  It moves up and down just a little with the steps of men we cannot see.  It tilts a little.  I gasp a little -- could it fall?  could it not fall?  It mesmerizes.  I can only stare in wonder at what seems an apparition, this statue coming through the night down this hill toward us.  It is beautiful.  Surreal.  Stunning with its candles against the night sky.   I am surprised by my own excitement and reverence as the tower makes it down the road to us.  There's so much humanity there, so much spirit in the facchini, in the construction of the macchina, in the man-hours to have made this happen, in the gathering of people to celebrate their patron saint.  There's something about its hugeness and its brightness, about human men carrying it that makes me gape, that makes me think, It's not that surprising that the Trojans let in the Trojan Horse.  Its immensity, strangeness, perhaps even beauty must have attracted the Trojans to it, wanting it inside those walls.

The facchini set the macchina down at Piazza del Fontana Grande, the first stop on the procession.  It is mere feet from us.  Sebastian has been taking videos and photos with my phone.  He hands back the phone and says, "I just want to look at it now, like you do.  It looks brighter, less golden, not through the camera."  He hands the phone to Mary for her turn to take videos and photos.  He and I stand there looking at the macchina.  He points out that we would never see this type of thing in the U. S. 

I tell him, "Well, we have something like it, I bet." 

He says, "Maybe.  But this type of statue would be surrounded by nets or some protection.  It would be all about safety."

He's right.  There is no barrier between the Santa Rosa macchina and us.  It is the people, the machinna, the air.  We stand there looking up.

Admiring.

Cinqueterre: Part 2

After twenty minutes in the line to get one-way tickets, we get in the correct line to get all-day tickets to and from and between Cinqueterre's 5 villages/towns.  Daniel is determined that we hike in Monterroso so we take the train there, the farthest of the five terra (each is only a 5 minute train ride from the next).  A German couple is hiking and they share with us that the trail is closed because of falling rocks.  Daniel is disappointed, the kids and I are thrilled, and Daniel relents and agrees to let us all go to the beach.

We're about to turn the corner onto the sand when the German couple returns and says, "The whole trail isn't closed, just the trailhead.  You can catch the trail over here up the street."

The kids complain.  One of them hurls invectives for about twenty straight minutes, tired and despondent and frustrated.  One runs ahead of all of us.  Two stick with me as we change our attitudes and actually enjoy the hike, letting go our desire for immediate beach.  Daniel walks with the German couple.  We go higher and higher, stopping and looking back at the sea and the other four towns (Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarolla, Riomaggiore).  We are past the tired and daunted stage and now feel energized and proud of ourselves.  The German couple lags behind, a bit slower than we are, then catches us (we go faster and then need many more breaks), passes us.  We laugh.  We try to beat the suggested time of the hike whenever we see a recommended time on a wooden sign.  (Are we so American?)

And then we're at the top.  And no one's complaining or crying any more.  From high up, we see blue sea and the coastline; we've actually done something today besides sit in the car (somehow the four hour drive becomes so many more for us)  and we look out at the water.  We lie on a rock while the kids explore structures and graffiti.

We take turns with an Irish couple for photos, and the kids run back down.  We adults, on the other hand, turn sideways to do steep steps, slowly descending.

Somehow, in a country with some of the best food in the world, we find ourselves struggling to find food: we walk to the restaurant Claudio recommended and they're closing (maybe because it's now 3pm).  We eat American style pizza in a piazza, change into bathing suits discreetly (we think), and go to the beach.  We hop on the train in Monterroso with a plan to pair two remaining towns with food.  (A Italian colleague told me today, Italians spend less money on clothing and more money on food.  Perhaps we're becoming more Italian?)

In Manarolla we eat gelato and watch teenagers jump off huge rocks in the sea.

In Riomaggiore we eat dinner and watch the sun set.  We get gelato again as we wait for the train.  (Daniel claims that he needs it for driving back to Viterbo.  The kids justify two in one day because we didn't find any in our town last night.  I eat it with no justification.)

Back in Spezia, we find the car and praise Daniel for beginning the three and a half hour drive at 9:30pm.

The three and a half hour drive takes one cappuccino, one espresso, one can of pringles, twenty-seven euros in tolls (oops -- we had heard that this route would have tolls...we hadn't asked how much the tolls were), and over five hours.

General consensus: super trip.  Kids want to get back to La Torba to the beach, return to Pisa to climb up the tower, go to Cinqueterre for a week to hike from town to town.

I'm still not sure where all the hours went and how our two days in Cinqueterre ended up being one full day.  And that's okay.  Someone once told me about listening to the music rather than the words.  That sentiment seems appropriate here -- the feeling is good.  (And I get a cappuccino the next morning to make it through the work day.)