Pompeii

I think I've been to Pompeii three times before this year.  Twice I was the student, and once I was the teacher.  I had a clipboard, pen, and map when I was a student; a pink backpack instead of a flag when I was a teacher/chaperone (so as not to lose my six charges, freshmen girls who trusted me more than they should have as I dragged them all over Rome until they insisted that they needed a proper sit-down lunch...fair enough).

This time I was the parent.

Connor is fascinated by volcanoes.  One Christmas he got a Magic Tree House book on Pompeii and the craft supplies -- clay, baking soda, food coloring, cardboard box, white vinegar, empty water bottle  -- to make his own volcano.  Last spring we sat in the living room and watched the BBC documentary/story Pompeii: The Last Day.  The night before we headed to Pompeii we watched the documentary again in our air b and b in Naples: Stefano's fullery, pyroclastic flow, magma, lava, Elder Pliny, Younger Pliny, Pompeii, Herculaneum, three breath death.

The rain kept going.  We were soaked.  Pompeii was out of maps.  This would not be the experience I had had as a student or as a teacher -- no map, no notes, no agenda.

We started in the big theatre, testing the acoustics by having one person down low saying hello and seeing if we could hear the voice.  We hopped from stone to stone in the old pedestrian crosswalks, avoiding imaginary horse poop and real puddles.  Mary took gelato orders in a bar, scooping out stratiatella and taking my euro (I didn't tell her about denarii...didn't even think about it).  Mary and I imagined that perhaps there was grain in the large containers.  We walked in and out of houses, debating which ones had wealthy owners and which didn't.  We checked out what I thought was the hypocaust system (another documentary from Latin class) in the Stabian Baths.  Mary and Hannah climbed into what we imagined was an oven and then back out again.  Daniel and Sebastian made it to the forum.  For the first time, I didn't.  We walked under the amphitheatre where there was a Pink Floyd in Pompeii exhibit.

No map, no notes, no plan.

No Forum, no Villa of the Mysteries, no Street of Tombs.

Walking, running, climbing, imagining, pretending.

Looking around.  Checking things out.  Touching the ruins with our hands and feet.

Connor said to me afterwards, "Next time I come to Naples, I want to see Herculaneum and the museum that has all the Pompeii stuff."

Mission accomplished.