As Close as It Gets

How does someone make new friends? Get involved, I thought. Somehow. Play sports. Join a team, take music lessons and participate in what group functions that affords you. Take art classes. Volunteer. Do what you can to get out there. That’s where the people are. Not online. Not on TV. If people are to become friends, they must be present, in the flesh. You just have to get out there and meet them, I thought. Maybe those activities will lead you to the type of people you like. There: a plan. Now to implement it.

I’d always thought I might like curling. I have no idea why. I’d never curled. That’s not entirely true; if you recall, I did curl once in an HSM curling bonspiel. But that was all. I heard it was a social sport, and I remembered that past bonspiel to be very sociable, so I thought I’d give it a try. The Mine hosted an annual curling bonspiel, a funspiel, they called it, so I asked Bev if she wanted to sign up for it. She’d curled before, so she was up for it. We got a team together, paid our admission fee, and had a good time. We liked it so much I thought we might join the club and take instruction.

But it never led to anything. We never looked into joining the curling club, but we did sign up for the Kidd Recreational Bonspiel every year. When the CIM chapter began hosting one, we signed up for that too. They were fun. We began to look forward to them.

I can’t say we were any good. Sliding out of the hack was problematic. I’d wobble and fall down. And even when I did keep upright, I could never hope to place the rock in the house if I did slide. So, I didn’t. I kept my foot on the rubber grip and thrust the rock down the ice. I didn’t use a slider when sweeping, either. “I’d likely crack my head open,” was all I’d say if asked why I didn’t. I probably looked foolish. But what the hell, I only curled a couple times a year. So long as I kept on my feet, I was happy. I fell once or twice, but I never hurt myself. The potential was there, though. But I always had fun. That’s the main thing, I suppose.

Our last funspiel was not that fun.

We set up to play our first game. We gathered, introduced ourselves to the opposing team, shook hands and I set about throwing the first rock of the game. I threw it right through the house. I turned my back to the rink and crouched to gather my second rock. When I stood again, I saw a group of people gathered mid-rink.

“Did someone fall?” I asked the other person at our end.

“Yeah,” he said. He looked concerned.

I looked to see who it might be. I saw a white sweater through the grove of legs. Bev’s got a white sweater just like that, I thought. Then I realized that it was Bev. Holy Crap! She was flat on her back. She didn’t appear to be moving.

I rushed to where they were, taking care to not fall, myself. I thread my way through them, coming upon our friend, a nurse, on her knees beside Bev, with another guy with his hand under her neck, already manipulating her neck. If she’d had a neck injury, it would have been too late to prevent injury, she’d have been paralysed. I decided it was pointless to point out that he ought to know better than to wiggle a person’s head about after an injury, thinking afterwards, but not then, that he must have asked her if she could wiggle her toes before he began messing about with her neck. He was a mine rescue man, after all. Bev says he did not.

There was no visible blood. But she was dazed.

I took over. The Mine Rescue man backed off. Maybe it was something in my eyes that told him to.
I asked her how she felt. Dizzy. She couldn’t see well, she said. Her head hurt. Her back hurt.
I asked her to move her arms and legs for me. Wiggle your fingers. They wiggled. Can you wiggle your toes? She could. Everything worked fine, so the Mine rescue man was forgiven.

Someone asked me if I thought that we should call an ambulance. I was surprised that no one had already, so I told him that I’d like him to do just that. My voice was deathly calm. I was not.

Bev was cold, so I asked her if she thought she was okay to move. She thought she could, so we sat her up slowly and once she gained her feet, we helped her off the ice and into a chair in the glassed observation area, away from the chilled rink. She was not steady. She was far from steady.
I began to worry.

She grew too dizzy to sit, so I tore a few parkas off their hangers so she wouldn’t have to lay on the hard floor, then another as a pillow. When we laid her down, she couldn’t lay on her back, she thought she might throw up. I didn’t really care if she puked all over everyone’s coat.

The ambulance arrived. They did a thorough inspection, and finally put her neck in a brace and strapped her to the spinal board.

She wanted me to get a few things from home, in case her stay at the hospital was longer than expected. Oddly enough, we both still thought they’d give her a quick once over and we’d be on our way. I even said as much, fully expecting that we’d be back for the gala Chinese buffet at evening’s end, at latest. Our friend, the nurse, took me by the arms and said, “Dave, you are not coming back today. They’re going to want to keep her for observation.” She didn’t want to worry me, so she didn’t tell me how serious Bev’s injury might be.

Even so, the severity of her injury began to sink in.

When I got to the hospital, I was ushered into her triage room. She was to have an MRI. The neurosurgeon in Sudbury was waiting to watch, in real time, to assess. But first, they wanted her to sit up. They gave her the largest bowl I’d ever seen for her to clutch while she did. She needed it too. She sat up, the world whirled, and her breakfast was in the bowl. The headache that rushed up and took hold of her paled the pain she’d been afflicted with until then. She almost passed out. The ER got very busy with her just then. She was rushed to the MRI, after which I was told they’d found a couple intracranial hemorrhages. But they were slow. She wouldn’t be rushed for emergency surgery in Sudbury. Not yet, anyways. They’d reassess in the morning.

Surgery? In Sudbury?
She was being transferred to ICU for the interim.
The ICU?
That’s when it struck me.
Bev had almost died. Right then. Right there.

A Cry for Help

I was lonely, despite being married. What friends I had were not a support. In fact, they hardly seemed like friends at all. They only spoke to me when I sought them out, and in my mind, they only spoke to me when I initiated conversation. They never did. They never called. They never initiated get-togethers. What invitations I received only came when I sought them out and asked what they were doing Friday night. No one seemed particularly pleased to see me. Ever. That takes a toll on a person.

I was becoming perpetually sad. Long years prior, I was jokingly called Smiling Dave. I’m not sure if that was a dis; it may have been, considering the people who’d strapped me with it. No matter, I had friends then, and if those others didn’t like me, they could go fuck themselves, as far as I was concerned. But not being liked grated on me, too. But times had changed. I didn’t have close friends anymore. Not that I could see. My armor had gaps. I was becoming vulnerable. And sad.

I’d been sad for a long time. I was aware that I was, too. I was irritated by the slightest thing and would fly into a rage. I would scream “Why me?” at the world. And, “Why does this always happen to me?” Not that bad things happened to me, it’s just that I became easily flustered and impatient with whatever I’d happen to be doing. My mood swung to black without warning and I’d find myself in a funk that might last for days, if not weeks. It got so bad that I had a difficult time getting out of bed. I couldn’t seem to get through the door in time to make it to work on time. And when I was at work, I was just as prone to having a fit as not, maybe more so. Stress, and all that.

I decided it was time to talk to someone about it. I chose Lynn, a nurse at work. I’d known Lynn for years and I’d always found her to be a kind soul. She was as good a person to talk to, as any; even better, she was a nurse, and bound to some level of confidentiality, I assumed. In fact, I was counting on that. But it was still hard to come out and ask, “Do we have any literature about depression I can read?”
She looked shocked to hear me ask such a thing. Her smile fell away. She got serious, her face and voice filled with concern. “Are you feeling depressed?”

“I am,” I admitted. She gave me some literature, but she also gave me a number to call. It was the EFAP number, she said. The Emergency Family Assistance Program, or some such. It was a psychiatrist’s number, is what it was.

It took me a couple days to work up the nerve to call him, but I did and I made an appointment, keeping that fact a secret from everyone but Bev. She seemed concerned. She also seemed pleased that I had taken steps. Black moods and perpetual impatience are a hard thing to hide.

I stepped out of the elevator and walked down the hall, afraid that someone would recognize me and that some stigma of mental illness might stick. There was someone leaving his office when I entered. I averted my eyes. I sat down and waited. I read the book I brought with me to pass the time. Yeah, I brought a book. I always bring a book if I expect to wait. I didn’t wait long.

The Doctor discovered me and greeted me warmly. I was vague when answering his, “How are you?” I said fine. It was reflex. Everyone says fine to that question. No one wants to hear any other answer, in my experience. My response was taken in stride; I expect everyone says “fine” to his initial greeting, when nothing could be further from the truth. Everything wasn’t fine, or I wouldn’t be there.

So began a process. We would meet at the appointed hour, I’d be led into the consulting room, and I’d be guided with ever more pointed, if gentle, questions.

They were generic at first. Introductions and instructions. Name. Age. Marital status. Kids? Tell me about your family. Tell me how you’re feeling. Why do you think that is? Let’s start at the edges and work our way in until we begin to get to the root of the problem.

It was difficult at first. It never got any easier. You have to tell the truth. You have to peel away the lies that you’ve been telling everyone. You need to peel away the lies you’ve been telling yourself, lies that you’ve been telling yourself for so many years now that you believe them to be true.

It’s never easy to hold up a mirror to yourself and see the pain and suffering written there.

What was I sad about? What lies did I tell myself?

None of your business. Suffice it to say that he told me, after a time, that I ought to write a letter. He told me to forgive the person or people that I was anger with. To not do so could wreak more damage in years to come than not. To forgive is to invite closure. Don’t just bitch. Be kind. Remember good times and good feelings, too.

He also told me that I had to get busy. Change is work, he said. Change is hard. Change has to be earnest. Change required me to actively work at it, to instigate it, to address it. Change had to come from within. Or there can be no change without.

No growth.

He told me that I also had to forgive myself, too.

Then he sent me on my way. But not before he told me that I could come back anytime, if I decided that I needed more help.

I was pissed. I was angry. I was not ready to give up on therapy, yet. But I didn’t say anything, either. I internalized my anger, and focused it on him. You didn’t help me, I thought.

But I was wrong. He did help me. This series of remembrances, these missives, are proof of it.

It’s a letter to myself.

It’s me holding up a mirror to myself.

Rome

Rome

Cooking classes complete, we were on our way to Rome. Italy is not a big country, so we took the train. It only took 45 minutes, and we were deposited in the centre of the city. Ya gotta love the train for that.

Finding our way to the subway and sorting in out to our stop went off without a hitch; the short walk to the Hotel Empire Palace, less so. It was 35 degrees and humid when we surfaced at the corner of Via Vittorio Veneto and Via Leonida Bissolati, scaling Via Leonida to Via Settembra, losing our way every few steps while we searched for cross-streets on our map. The streets of Rome are not what I would call a grid. We’d only gone a couple blocks so far, and if those few steps were any indication, finding our way didn’t bode well, so we decided to keep out of the warren for a while until we found our bearings. That went better. We had to double back a couple short blocks, but we arrived, a little warm and flustered, but otherwise without mishap. We knew our best routes before too long and kept to them.
There were restaurants along the way, shops and wine outlets. They were good, but we’d been spoiled. No meal could compare with those we’d prepared under the tutelage of Claudio. We had to remind ourselves that they weren’t bad. They were better than most restaurants we’d ever ate in, as a matter of fact. But nothing compares to home-cooked, if done right. And we’d done right.

On impulse, I ducked into a Brioni outlet, where I could have bought an uber-expensive Italian suit, were I so inclined. It was not large. Rather narrow, in fact. The shelves were not so packed with wares as we’re accustomed to. Everything was just so. So much so that a sales clerk followed my every move while I was within. Just in case I stole something, I suppose. “Not to worry,” I told him after he’d shadowed me for a minute or so, “I may not look it," (shorts, T, and sandals) "but I can afford anything in this shop.” I could. I own Canali and a few customs, if that means anything to you. I just chose not to. I didn’t need another suit. I just wanted to take a peek at James Bond’s (the Pierce Bronson years) tailor.

The Colosseum

We began the grand tour the next day, taking the subway to the Colosseum. The guidebooks had warned us to get there early to avoid the lines. What we thought early was not early enough, apparently. There were long lines already. We bought our Roma Passes and set about waiting for the line to move. It did not. Not to worry; we did not wait too long before being headhunted.

“Why are you waiting in line?” a young man said. “Buy a tour with us?” he said.
I was reticent. I told him I’d been warned about scams. He set me at ease.
“You are not buying the tour from me,” he said. “You are buying a tour from that lady, over there,” he said, pointing at a young woman with an abundance of people around her.
“What’s in it for you?” I asked
“I get a commission for bringing you to her,” he said.

The Forum

“Sold,” I said, eager to get out of the line and into the shade she was in. We lucked out. It was not a scam. She was a travel agent of an actual agency situated just outside the Vatican. More than that, the tour we were booking was not just for the Colosseum; it included a tour of the Forum in the afternoon. We passed the line, having booked their tour, only then realizing that the line we had been in was only the tail of a much longer line. We’d likely saved ourselves hours, if not the whole day, booking with them.

Great tour. Of course I’d say that. I love history. I especially love the Cradle of Civilization stuff. I’d taken Classical History in university, after all. I barely listened to the guide, already knowing what I was looking at, its history, its legend. So too the second tour of the Forum, although I did listen more carefully to David, our Italian/Brit guide, from time to time.

When the trip was winding down, David said, “See that small cluster of tourists in the shade by that column?” We nodded. “I want all of you to go there. They’ll leave when we arrive.” We did, and they did. “I hate the sun,” David said, looking up at it through the trees, glaring at it as it glared back down on him and us. All people who live under the glare of the sun hate it, David said. But we had a shield of leaves, then, and its baleful glare was reduced to a whimper.

I paid even closer attention when David gave us travel tips. He told us how to look out for and to avoid pickpockets. “They’re so good, they must have a university to teach them how to do it.” He told us not to buy water from street venders, but to refill our own from the fountains about the city. He told us where the good restaurants were and how to recognize them. He also told us that he was conducting another tour the next night around Trajan’s Column, if we were interested. We were. We signed up for that, too. It was much easier signing on with these consecutive tours than trying to sort them all out, ourselves. So we told ourselves.

Trajan’s Column

So, the next night, we met him under Trajan’s Column, we proceeded to the Parthenon, and then, crossing the Piazza Venezia and the National Museum, where Mussolini made his speeches from his balcony to the gathered masses, we mounted the Spanish Stairs and loitered outside a Roman apartment building. We walked a Roman street under the Commune di Church. We crossed the Tiber on the Ponte Fabricio, again on the Ponte Cestio, and again on the Ponte Sisto, finishing our tour at the Fountain of Neptune in the Piazza Navarro.

David informed us that if we were thinking of touring the Vatican, he was taking names. Why not, we thought, and signed up for that tour, too. Then he brought us to his favourite restaurant a couple blocks outside the piazza, where we had the best pizza of our lives. David gave us two more tips before he left us: never eat in the piazzas, he said, they’re overpriced; and never rent rooms in a hotel if you are staying a week, when you can rent an apartment for a quarter the price.

Vatican City

The Vatican was full, but not as full as it could be, we were informed. We were also informed that if we wished to skip the crowds when visiting the Vatican, February was the best time to come, when tourism was at its lowest and there were only five thousand visitors per day, and not twenty- or fifty-thousand. We shuffled along with those twenty thousand others, following our guide’s raised baton and listening to her lectures by earphone.

Bev lagged behind for a moment. Only a moment. Try as she might, she couldn’t close the gap between us, again, no matter how many times she said “excuse me.” I had to reach through the gap and haul her back next to me.

The Sistine Chapel

We inched through the Borgias apartments, finally allowed to sit in the Sistine Chapel for five minutes before being ushered out. We were the lucky ones, the last allowed in that day, for security reasons. The Pope was going to lead a prayer vigil and the Vatican had to be cleared, for some reason.
We were not denied St. Peter’s Basilica. We were told to take our time, in fact. And we did, marveling at sheer size of it, at the majesty of the domes and the chapels, lingering before the statuary (most notably, Michelangelo’s Pieta) and the altar(s), before buying a few religious trinkets in the gift shop, all blessed by the Pope, apparently (I had the rosaries I bought blessed by Father Pat, just to be on the safe side).

Our final day was spent at Pompeii. I had to go--Classical Studies, and all that—to see the famed city with my own eyes, its cobbled streets, its frescos and its gladiator school. Let’s not forget its brothels; the frescos there were only slightly more risqué than those in people’s homes.

We remembered, our last night, that we wouldn't be allowed to bring the bottles of wine we’d bought with us. Airport security, and all that. So we partook of a bottle, leaving the one that remained for our cleaning lady, with a note, thanking her for her attention during our stay.

And with that, it was time to be on our way.

Roman Holiday, Piazza della Verita

One last thing: Have you ever seen Roman Holiday? You have? Then you know where I’m going with this. Everyone ought to go to the Piazza della Verita. Gregory Peck did, after all, and he brought Audry Hepburn with him. We went, too. There’s a little church called the Church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin there. There’s a marble face at its entrance, the face of the sea god Oceanus. Why’s it there? Who knows why? But it’s been there since the seventeenth century. It’s not called the face of Oceanus anymore, though; it’s called the Bocca della Verita, the Mouth of Truth. Go ahead. Stick your hand in its mouth.

Maybe not. Not if you lie. Not if you want to keep you hand, that is. Rumour has it that it bites a liar’s hand off.

I risked it. I put my hand in its mouth. So did Bev. And look...we both walked away with our hands still attached.

So yeah, you can trust me…can’t you?

Tuscany

Casagrande

Chef Claudio picked us up at 9:30 am. That gave me ample time to have breakfast and get to the farmacia to buy my orange cheaters and get back to the Casagrande lobby in time for the pick-up. Breakfast always took place in the covered courtyard of the hotel. It’s a great space. Flagstones under pillared arches, the hedged garden in view. Draped vines cascade from the terrace above. It’s cool in the sunken space, a marked contrast to the heat that each day would bring.

A mother and daughter waited with us, the daughter illustrated by a tattoo for each trip she’d taken. The van darted in and picked us up, winding about the country roads, climbing the Tuscan landscape until we came upon Claudio’s place, where we’d had our welcome meal. But this time we saw it in the light of day. Typically Tuscan, whitewashed and clay-shingled, it set atop the hill, overseeing the neat tiers of olive trees below it. The surrounding grounds looked arid, in spite of how green the landscape appeared. Ditches were non-existent, the occasional clay half pipe leading to grated manholes here and there. We spilled out into a comfortable heat, directed by his wife to a low-lying structure opposite the house. A small, yet varied garden lay at the base of the stair that led to where we’d spend the next few days preparing our own meals. Rows of herbs flavoured the air. From the ground, from varied potted plants. Beyond that lay a long, rectangular swimming pool surrounded by tables.

We descended into the pleasant coolness of a cellar, but it’s not a cellar. A kitchen filled most of the lower building, the unseen bits storage. Not there wasn’t enough storage in the main room. The left wall boasted shelves from floor to ceiling. The rest of the room was sinks and islands and stovetops. There was only one oven, surprisingly small in the expansive space. I was fascinated by it. I was fascinated by how many knives there were, some long, some small, some narrow, some quite wide. One or two as heavy as a mallet.

“I am not going to teach you to cook,” Claudio told us that first day. “Anyone can cook. That’s just following a recipe. I’m going to teach you technique.” And so he did.

We began with a custard, eggplant parmesan, and ravioli stuffed with ricotta. He taught us how to debone and season a chicken. He explained how white wine was better for a sauce. White wine cooks to a golden glow. Add butter and a dusting of flour. Red wine invariably browns.

It was a great experience. We were reticent at first, eager not to appear foolish or display a lack of skill. But familiarity loosens one up. We were all learning, after all, regardless whether some were more experienced than others. One must begin somewhere. Lunch as per our efforts.

We spent the afternoon strolling about Figline, browsing the shops and street vendors until we were picked up for supper, an odd supper at that: wine and cheese tasting. It was more informative than I might have imagined. You hear about perfect pairing, but you have no idea unless you’ve experienced it. We had four wines displayed on the table. An assortment of cheese was brought and we tried each with each wine in turn. Cow cheese, goat cheese, sheep cheese. This variety and that. Some wines fell flat with this type, but the cheese burst forth again with a sip of another. I nibbled. I should have gobbled. I was still starved upon completion, so Claudio brought me a pasta carbonara and desert. Coffee was invariably espresso. Always rich. Always perfectly flavourful, with a proper bitterness that did not overwhelm.

The next morning, I did not have coffee at the hotel, preferring to wait to have Claudio’s perfect coffee. We cooked wild boar, biscotti, a type of flatbread pasta, gnocchi, and a soufflé. Does that sound like a lot of food? It was. We never ate supper until 8 or 9 pm after a five-course lunch. Mind you, we never ate lunch until about 1 pm, either.

I took a swim in the hotel pool before the afternoon excursion to Arezzo. The pool was open to the garden, very cold, but very comfortable once in. Soft conversation echoed off the tile fresco.
It took the better part of an hour to get to Arezzo, where we were met by Stephanie, our guide, outside the Duomo, a Tuscan Gothic Cathedral. She was an Art History prof from Florence U, eager to relate the history and significance of all we saw, beginning with the statue set right outside the Duomo, a statue that said, “You are a conquered city, and I, the Medici of Florence, am your master. Behold me, and be afraid.”

Arezzo

We toured cathedral, treated to a lecture on its stained glass and portrait of Mary Magdalene, we toured the public park Il Prato, with its massive statue, commissioned by Mussolini. We made our way to the Piazza Francesca where “Life is Beautiful” was filmed, where we discovered that Arezzo is a steep city built on a steep hill, and like in Figline, where people still congregated in the market and square, as they have for hundreds of years. Here, too, a mediaeval festival was in progress, or was; it was being dismantled as we rounded the square. More churches followed, one very old, almost Roman, sparse and unadorned except for its painted panels at its entrance and alter, the crypt below the altar, exposed to the nave; the next not so old. The tour culminated in the Basilica Piero della Francesca, a famed Franciscan cathedral, known for its frescos.

Steep Azezzo

We had dinner at the Tattoria il Cantuccio, at the base of the very steep decline that led to it. Bev bought an antique on the way down, a small leather disk box, probably the only thing in the shop we could afford and carry.

We returned in time to catch the end of Figline’s festival. Claudio met us there. We experience fireworks closer than I’ve ever seen, or will again. They were fired off no more than thirty feet from us. The Catherine wheels and flares and floral bursts. The smoke enveloped us, swirled about us, the ash from the spent fireworks falling amid us, landing on us, if not burning us or our clothing. We smelled of sulphur, we reeked of it. We had to shower before bed. We lay our clothes out to air overnight. It didn’t help that much. They still smelled like a spent match the next day.

We had our final cooking class with Claudio the next day: lasagna, peppered beef, focaccia bread, and a something I requested, steak stuffed with prosciutto and sage (delightful, by the way).

San Gimignano

Our afternoon was spent on a driving tour of the Chianti Classico country, San Gimignano and Monteoliveto, visiting a winery while there. We spent time in the piazza before touring the vineyard where we bought a couple bottles. More wine was drank, more food eaten. More trinkets bought.
Bev went straight to bed upon returning. I had to walk the meal off. I walked around the Piazza Figlini a couple times, surprised to see so many people still out at that hour, their children with them, no matter their ages.

Time for bed. We had to repack and make our way to the train station the next day.

Cooking compete, we were on our way to Rome.