Long Time No Blog, or What I've Been up to for the Past Four Months

Oh, my darling bloglings! It's been too long! My guess is that you're either asking:

Where in the world have you been in the last four months?

or

Who are you again?

Of course, there's a third option, that no one is actually reading this since I have all but abandoned my poor, dedicated bloglings.

I will try not to dwell on such unpleasant possibilities, and attempt instead to rectify the situation by catching you up on what's been going on in my life since I last posted four months ago, because, well, it's been one hell of a season. If you've followed this blog for any length of time, you'll know that I rarely talk about my personal life. I'm not a naturally shy person, yet for some reason I have censored myself when it comes to revealing details about my life.

This is all about to change. You may also know that I started a podcast in the past year (one of the soon-to-be-mentioned reasons for my lengthy absence). I don't seem to have the same bashfulness when it comes to podcasting, and I'm pretty open about my life when I'm on air, so I figure, all my personal business is already out there and it's too late to get it back, so I might as well mention it here too from time to time.

So without further ado...

This winter has been one of the busiest, most exhausting, and most exciting in recent memory. It started out with a bang as I threw a bridal shower for a dear friend in early November. She's mad about the Etruscans (and in particular bronze Etruscan hand mirrors) and so it made perfect sense to throw her an Etruscan-themed bridal shower! I may have had more fun planning this shower than the bride-to-be did attending it. To put it briefly, I went a bit overboard, making Etruscan-themed decorations, treats, and even an Etruscan Bridal magazine.

Can I tell you how much I geeked out when I discovered the Etruscan font? For those of you who aren't lucky enough to have a close friend obsessed with the Etruscans, I'm here to tell you their language reads right to left.

Most of the shower games were Etruscan-themed as well, but I think the piece de resistance was the cupcakes decorated with fondant bronze hand mirrors. These beauties, which were as delicious as they were adorable, were made by the uber-talented Alexandra of Cupcakes in Rome. I made the red currant scones you see on the left. Also very yummy, if not quite so pretty. The recipe for those came courtesy of my fellow Rome blogger, the fabulous Trisha Thomas, aka Mozzarella Mamma.

 

 

Later that same day, I had the pleasure of participating in a segment that will be aired on the Travel Channel later this year. The hour-long feature on Rome is part of a several-part series on some of the world's greatest cities. The series is called Metropolis and should air sometime in June.

The segment I was featured in was on the art of aperitivo in a glorious piazza. Here I am with three friends enjoying Aperol Spritz in Piazza di Pietra at one of my favorite spots in the city, Salotto 42. I'll be sure to let you know when it airs so you can hear me trying not to embarrass myself on camera.

Aside from these fun events, what I really dedicated myself to during the month of November 2014 was something called National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, as its participants affectionately call it. If you've ever dreamed of writing a book, but just can't seem to find the discipline to sit down and do it, NaNoWriMo is for you. The idea is, you and literally hundreds of thousands of other writers around the world make a commitment to write a 50,000-word novel in just one month, the month of November. That works out to 1667 words per day if you manage to write every day. I didn't start out too strong, so felt like I was constantly playing catch up. But I eventually got into the groove, and seeing the number of words I needed to write to stay on track shrink every single day was enough impetus to force myself out of bed well before six am most days to get my writing in before heading to work.

I earned this badge with early mornings and lots of Earl Grey.

It was an exhausting month, and I'm not one who functions well on too little sleep, but it was worth it when, by November 30th, I had an (incredibly rough, aka nearly unreadable)  first draft of my second novel. Yes, that's right, my second. My first novel took a great deal longer than 30 days to write. I'm actually not sure if I've mentioned it on the blog before, but I wrote an art mystery for young readers that takes place in Rome (where else?). It's for the Middle Grade age group, which is roughly between 9 and 12, give or take a year on each end. I'll leave the details of the book for a future post, but I will confess that I have been working on this labor of love on and off for the past five years. And while, no, I didn't write the first draft in a month (closer to a year, actually), the revision process was a good four times longer. No one warned me that writing the first draft of a book is the easy part! It's the (seemingly endless) revisions which test a writer's mettle and perseverance.

But persevere I did, and by the summer of 2014, I finally had what I believed to be a draft that was in good enough shape to send out into the world. I started querying literary agents last summer. After several months of this disheartening process (which tests a writer's perseverance even more than revising, I'd wager) without any offers, I took a break from querying to participate in NaNoWriMo. It was just what I needed to get my creative juices flowing again after months of stagnation and rejection letters. I dove back into querying in December, and that brings me to my next big accomplishment of the winter, which happened just after the New Year. Excuse the all-caps but I can't help shouting:

I GOT AN AGENT!!!

[source]

For any other writers out there, or for actors, performers, and musicians too, you know what a life-changing accomplishment this is. In a writer's case, signing with a successful agent is probably the most important step in their career, maybe even more significant that that elusive first book deal.
And mine is not just any agent, but one of the best in the business, the legendary John Silbersack of Trident Media Group. I am so incredibly honored and thrilled to have him representing my work that it's honestly hard to put it into words (a worrying sign for a writer!). Suffice it to say, there are a lot of happy dances going on in my apartment these days.

As I expected, my agent (my heart still does a mini-swoon when I write the words "my agent") had a long list of revisions for me, and I have dived head-first into those. I've given myself the Ides of March as a deadline, I spend all weekend, every weekend chained to my desk attempting to wrestle what I thought was a final draft into an even final-er draft. I hope that this explains why, although one of my only New Year's resolutions of 2015 was to WRITE A BLOGPOST AT LEAST ONCE A WEEK, it's already the 20th of February and I'm just finally getting around to my first post of the year. Mea culpa!

The other thing that has been taking up a lot of time, but in a very enjoyable way, is my podcast, The BitterSweet Life. It's hosted by myself and the amazing radio producer extraordinaire, Katy Sewall, who just happens to be one of my closest and oldest friends in the world. When she moved to Rome last year, we decided to do a podcast all about what it's like to be an expat, either for the long-term or the short-term. It's casual, light-hearted, and most of all, non-scripted. We chat about lots of different topics that expats encounter such as homesickness, foreign language, visa problems, integrating, becoming alienated from your native culture, and dating the locals. Oh, and our mutual obsession with Caravaggio, which is slightly off topic, but we don't care.

We finally started a Twitter account, @BitterSweetPod, so be sure to follow us there if you want to be kept up to date with new episodes. Katy, who is currently back in Seattle, recently posted a photo from a recent interview she did that has somehow taken Twitter by storm. Katy interviewed a little girl earlier this week who loves and feeds crows. They bring her shiny gifts in return and this is her collection.

Here's the original tweet:

Interviewed a little girl this morning that feeds crows and they bring her gifts in return. Here's her collection. pic.twitter.com/kqNrlAa4Ie
— The BitterSweet Life (@BitterSweetPod) February 16, 2015

When Katy posted the photo three or four days ago, I thought it was wonderful, but I had no idea it would go viral. And viral it has gone, with over 4600 retweets, 4800 favorites, and hundreds of comments to date. Not bad for an account that had (at the time) just 100 followers. People across the world are so moved by this story, not to mention an entire sub-culture of people out there who are absolutely passionate about crows! Who knew? I'm starting to develop a soft spot for them myself!

My last big project of the winter is my collaboration with an awesome new app called VoiceMap. If you love to dig deep when you travel but don't always have the time or money to hire a private tour guide, this app will make you squeal with glee. The app is the brainchild of some very enterprising and creative people down in South Africa. The idea is that storytellers in cities around the world take listeners on a tour of a neighborhood by way of a smartphone. If you're the listener, all you have to do is walk where the storyteller indicates, and listen to him or her bring the city to life right in front of your eyes.

This video explains the project better than I could:

If you haven't guessed already, I am narrating a walking tour of Rome's Trastevere neighborhood. It is exciting to be a part of a project that I find so meaningful and useful at the same time, although my lack of technical skills has slowed me down more than once, and it's taking me a bit longer than I had expected! I will report back as soon as my walk is ready. I hope you will download it and let me guide you through this neighborhood I adore the next time you're in Rome.

If I have learned anything in these last four months is that synchronicity is real, and that working on projects that push you in the direction of your dreams bring more and more opportunities and amazing people into your path. Leaving The Pines of Rome blog out of this equation just isn't acceptable to me anymore. I'm lucky enough that all my passions intermingle in such a beautiful way, each one inspiring another. So I'm going on the record and making a commitment to post once a week from here on out. The posts will probably be shorter than usual, simply out of necessity, but since I'm not convinced anyone reads through to the end of my novel-length posts anyway, that might be a good thing for all concerned!

All photos by author except where indicated

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So you want to move to Rome? My advice: do it!

I began writing this post in my head last night, as I was trying to fall asleep (the only free time I have these days, as my dearth of blog posts testifies). The idea for this post came to me on the heels of some amazing friends who have been making stops in Rome in the past weeks. Seeing Rome through fresh eyes never fails to remind me of how amazing this city is, and how unbelievably lucky I feel to live here.

View from Via dei Fori Imperiali, photo by Giulio Menna

It is so easy to get bogged down by the negative things about this city. Every city on earth has its unpleasant aspects, but Rome’s can be so glaringly obvious and pervasive (especially as one transitions from happy-go-lucky expat to permanent resident) that it is easy to lose sight of the innumerable wonderful things, the things that made most of us expats move here in the first place.

In the space of two weeks, I have been blessed by the appearances of a number of friends, none of whom live in Rome, but all of whom have a connection with it. Cristina and Tim are ex-expats, who lived here for years and were some of my first friends when I arrived. They have both moved on to have fabulous careers outside Italy, but can’t help feel that magnetic pull to allure of this city, and are even tempted, every so often, to chuck it all and come back (although –sadly for me– I know they won’t).

Another is India, a former yoga student of mine who spent 18 magical months here as an adolescent and now, at 20, wouldn’t be able to survive a year without at least one week spent in Rome. She visits every July and her enthusiasm for Rome is contagious.

And then there’s Maeve. Were it not for a blossoming opera career in New York, she would have taken up residence in this inimitable town long ago. But, as with most musicians, career comes first, and so she’s content to visit once a year, study the language and soak up the culture. Spending time with these four amazing people has renewed my delight in Rome. After a couple of months of more griping than usual about this fair city (and its ever so difficult residents), thanks to my friends I have returned to my “default setting” of being enchanted with my adopted hometown.

Detail of Villa Medici, photo by Patrizia Ferri

And this led me to think about the people I know who aren’t happy to come here only for short visits. People who, like me, can’t help but heed that insistent voice that tells us there is no other place for us, at least at this moment in time, than Rome*. That to live anywhere else would be to deny one of the deepest desires of our souls.

People like my new friend Margaret, who even as I write this is plotting her move here. Although at a completely different stage in her life than I was as I schemed to find a way to live here 8 years ago, she nevertheless reminds me of exactly how I felt when the thought of living in Rome was not yet a reality.

People like travel writer and fellow blogger Keane Li who finds charm and fascination in every angle of the city, and captures them so compellingly in his writing. He asked me recently, in a message that I have shamefully yet to reply to, what advice I could give him on how to make the transition to live here permanently. Maybe I haven’t replied because it’s a big question. There are so many things to consider, including finances, the language barrier, work permits, the bureaucratic nightmare of becoming a legal resident, the horrifying discrepancy between salaries and living expenses, not to mention the shock of up and leaving your home, job, family, friends and culture in one fell swoop.

But, unlike most big questions, this one has a short answer:

Do it.

At the risk of sounding like a decades-old marketing campaign, just do it. There will be so many people, both those who have attempted such a move and those who would never dare, who will tell you it’s not possible, or better yet, that it’s not worth it. That it’s a big risk, it’s financially draining, it stagnates your career, and so on. All this, and for what? Just to live in a foreign country? Life will still go on, just as before.

Detail of the Fountain of the Triton by Gianlorenzo Berlini, photo by SpirosK

Yes, life will go one, and sometimes more frustratingly than before (I wrote about this in a guest post not long ago) and it’s important not to imagine that life will be as easy and deliciously carefree as Woody Allen and Julia Roberts make it seem in the movies. But naysayers who get off on telling others how things can’t be done are generally just smarting because their own experiences were less than ideal.

Don’t listen to them. You have a desire, a calling, even. You can’t explain it; you just know. Don’t let anyone change your mind. Hearing other people’s experiences is necessary, but ultimately, only you know what is right for you.

I felt this unexplainable calling too, from a very young age, as I’ve written about before. I didn’t know why I was supposed to be here. I just knew that I had to come, and stay. (PS Coming is easy; it’s the staying that is the hard part.) So come I did, and let me tell you, the first year was hard, nothing like the month-long study trips I had taken years before. But I toughed it out; I just knew I was supposed to be here, and now I realize why: his name is Claudio. (Not that he’s the only reason, of course! My lifestyle here alone is enough of a reward.)

I don’t intend to suggest that everyone who moves to Rome should stay here indefinitely. Some people come for six months or a year, get their fill of gelato and amatriciana and move back home, richer and wiser for their experiences. And there are others who stay 10, 20 years, or even their whole lives. Whatever the case, if you want to be here, come. It goes without saying, be prepared. Save up some money, learn the basics of the language, have a plan for how to make money, and don’t be too flippant about legal requirements (it’s not 2005 anymore), but just come. Things will work themselves out.

Photo by Mark Turner

It won’t be without sacrifices. You may end up living on a fraction of what you are used to in your home country, and some may see this as a step down on the socio-economic ladder, but I see it as an opportunity to learn to live with less. You’re used to living in a two-storey house? Try a cozy one-bedroom for a change, or move in with roommates, making new friends in the process. Think you can’t live without your SUV? Discover the freedom of commuting by bicycle. What you will receive in cultural, gastronomic and artistic wealth will more than make up for any temporary material lack you might feel.

I truly believe that when you are doing what you are meant to be doing, things have a way of working out. Not always exactly as you had envisioned, but brilliantly nonetheless. So if you really, really want it, take the risk. Give notice. Buy those tickets.

Source

In short, just come. And be sure to look me up when you get here.

*Or Paris, or Tuscany, or Spain, or wherever it is your heart wants to be

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How I moved to Italy and married the love of my life, part 1

As you may have already guessed from the name of this blog, I love Roman pine trees. I adore them actually. I could sit and look at them for ages. Today I have come to the pines for some inspiration.

I am writing this from a bench in my favorite spot in Villa Pamphilj, what I call the pine grove, where the trees all grow in straight parallel lines. No, I didn't bring my computer to the park. I would never commit that sacrilege! I am writing this out longhand. It almost feels like I'm writing in a diary, perfect for the post I have in mind.

As you well know by now, it was my not so brilliant idea to post about my wedding every 29th of the month (because I got married on the 29th), but I quickly got overwhelmed by the back story I wanted to tell.

It started out fantastically. I had a great time writing about my ancestors, and how I feel that they have, in some strange way, guided me here. But when it came time to write about myself, I clammed up. In January I skipped the post, in February I admitted my reluctance to get too personal, but my lovely bloglings encouraged me to bag my inhibitions and open up. So here goes. (I have a feeling this is going to be long. I'll have to do it in multiple parts. Oh, how I love to draw things out. I apologize in advance!)

To tell this story properly I must begin, if not in 1861, then at least in the early 80s when I discovered that I have Italian blood. I can't remember the exact day but I remember the feeling... I felt Italian. Of course I had no idea what being Italian ought to feel like, but I knew I felt it. Never mind that I was only one quarter Italian, never mind that I spoke not a word and had never set foot in the country. Never mind the German, Irish, English, Portuguese and who knows what other blood I had--that didn't matter. What mattered was that I was Italian.

No, this isn't me, although I wouldn't be surprised if a photo of me like this exists.

Not by citizenship of course. The Italianess came to me from my mother's mother, and a ridiculous and sexist law makes it impossible for me to claim Italian citizenship through my ancestors. But that didn't stop me, especially as an exuberant 7 year old, from feeling Italian.

I'll never forget my first trip to Italy, with my mother and sister when I was 14. At that time I was blindly obsessed with the film A Room with a View. I ate, slept and breathed this film. I literally (literally!) had the entire script memorized. Being kissed on a hillside with Florence in the distance was just about the most romantic thing in the world as far as I could tell, and I wanted it to happen to me. So going to Florence was almost a pilgrimage.

I'm embarrassed to admit that at that age I didn't care much about the David or the Botticellis or even the Duomo. I cried when I stood in the Piazza della Signoria, not because of the amazing art surrounding me, or the hundreds of years of history, but because I was standing where George caught Lucy when she fainted.

A Room with a View, Merchant Ivory Film

Ah, the romance! How this scene thrilled my adolescent heart!

A Room with a View, Julian Sands and Helena Bonham Carter

What can I say, sometimes fiction is more moving than history. Blame it on my youth.

We took an overnight train from Paris, and in the morning as the train barrelled through Tuscany, I stumbled down the corridor and bumped into someone. "Scusi!" I said, automatically. Then I stopped, realizing, "I can say 'scusi' now... I'm in Italy!" Bliss.

What would I have thought then to know I would one day live here? Maybe I knew all along it was inevitable. As life sometimes works like dominoes, my obsession with A Room with a View introduced me to the music of Puccini, which began a whole new (and much more time consuming) obsession, this time with opera.

By 16, Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro filled every available corner of my brain. Just as much as I longed to perform the role of Susanna, I equally longed to be able to speak Italian. I would memorize the endless recitativi from Figaro, and rattle them off, imagining I was having a conversation with an Italian (preferably a dark, handsome, male one).

Ten years and many trips to Italy later, I was plotting to find a way to move here permanently. I no longer yearned for anything so specific as a kiss in a barley field. I just wanted to live this magical place, to soak up the beauty that Italy emanates from its very core. At first it was more of a day dream, something that almost didn't seem possible. But I wanted that dolce vita so bad I could taste it. Eventually it became a mission, until finally one day, I said to myself, "What's stopping me?" and three months later I was here.

[Cue record scratch as blissful Amelie type music screeches to a halt]

Those of you who live here know, life in Italy is not only about romance, cobblestones, and picturesque alleyways. It can be a frustrating, exhausting and extremely harsh place to live, despite what the films make you believe. I found that out not long after arrival.

I'd love to be able to say I met the man of my dreams the day I got off the plane, and that my life fell instantly into place. Instead followed four mostly wonderful, sometimes miserable and always challenging years on my own in this crazy country. Still, I wouldn't trade those years, what they taught me and how they shaped me, for anything. You'll have to tune back in this time next month to hear the rest of the story.

If you are wondering what all of this rambling has to do with my wedding, well, I'm getting to it. I have never been capable of telling a short story. The point is, just like Mr. Beebe, I am naturally drawn to all things Italian. If it were not so, I would never have met my dashing Maritino.

Photo sources: 1, by author; 2, 3, 4

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