My Happy Place (Part I)

Lower Bunk Woman was right.  Venice is magical.  In Venice, I could breathe.  I don't know if it's because we got there just as the sun was coming up, and the air was still cool and light, or if it was the place itself, but once I set foot off the train, I realized I could take a full breath, and more importantly, that I wanted to.

It sounds crazy, but if you have lost a child, I have no doubt you will know exactly what I mean when I say that I hadn't taken a full breath in over a year.  The last real fill-my-lungs-to-their-intended-capacity was taken with my hands clasped tightly over my face, my knees against the grit of the concrete, the hot smell of asphalt in my lungs.  I had just been told by a man I didn't know, "I'm sorry, ma'am.  She is gone."  There was the slightest emphasis on the word is, as if he knew my brain would refuse to process the statement, and he half-feared I would begin pummeling him with my fists in argument.  I didn't hit him, but took the deepest breath and began screaming like I had quite lost my mind.

That was the last full breath I remember taking, until I got to Venice.  I know it sounds trite, but I have promised to tell the truth, and it is true.  We arrived just as sun rose over the water, a glorious configuration of pink, salmon, yellow, and orange.  The sky was the sort of glorious blue I will never be able to achieve with the prussion blue half-pan in my watercolor set. 

Mom and I felt like the only ones in the city for the first couple of hours as we wandered around, goggling up at the beautiful old buildings, the waterline, the shop fronts that were closed up tight- much like old ladies buttoned up snugly against the chill of the winter wind, all standing in a silent row.  We sat on a bench in front of a church and chatted, while I sketched, most pathetically.  As the city woke up, I noticed a wondrous and lovely thing...there was only foot traffic in this place!  I would never glance over to see a careless, but fortunate person cross in front of a car without looking...and make it safely to the other side.  Never.

At home, I saw that type of thing at least four or five times a week.  It made my blood run hot, and my brain turn to thoughts of messy homicide.  Why my girl? was the tired question my brain drug out for examination time and time again.

Here, in this magical place, no such question would ever be asked.  There was a cool breeze.  There was quiet.  Could it be I had finally found a place where the ambulance sirens did not wail and the fire truck horns did not blat their death call all through the day and night?  I barely restrained myself from calling Dr. Z to tell him I was moving to Venice, effective immediately.

I watched the city come alive as people began walking their dogs, and the street sweepers began working on the empty square inch by patient inch.  Mom and I sat enjoying the calm after the noisy bustle of Rome.  I told her I was going to move to Venice, a statement she indulged with the smile of a mother who wishes her children to have their heart's desire.  Trying to bring me down to reality, she posed the question, "What would you do for work?  How would you afford to live?"

I grinned at her through a shaft of sunshine, and met her eyes.  "Work?  I'm not gonna work.  I'll write.  Maybe make art.  And I know Mimo and Mimmo are only waiters, but if they pooled their resources, I'm pretty sure that together they could afford to feed me."  I laughed, a pleasant, almost musical sound in the empty square.  Startled, I looked around.  Who was that?  I wondered.  She sounds happy.

Mom laughed in response, "Oh yeah?  You got it all figured out?"

I smiled.  That I did not.  But I knew this much.  I could breathe in this place.  Somehow, someway, my feet would find their way back to this ground.  It was magic, and we hadn't even seen it from the water yet.

--To Be Continued