oggi in italia

Breathing a long, deep sigh of relief. First phase of midterms? Over. Not great, but done.

Afterwards, I stopped in at PlanetCopia to run a few color copies (super secret, can't tell, don't ask), and apparently forgot every word of Italian I've ever learned. But the boy just laughed at my fumbling sentences and his own limited English, and with a few hand gestures we got the message across and he headed to the printer.

So I'm just waiting there, chatting with Erin about the Humanities essays that we completely aced (thank you, Wales), when he returns with the copy, which is perfetto. I'm pulling out my wallet when I realise he's saying much more than needs to be said when quoting a price. I try to listen a little harder. And then it turns out he was wondering how long I'd be in Siena, and if I might maybe may want to teach him a little English? He could help me with my Italian, and it would be like a trade!

I don't know how Peter would feel about that, but at this point, I would give anything to get a better grasp on this language. This morning? Turns out, Italians have two futures. Here I was, thinking I had andrò, andrai, andrà down---but it will never be enough. In Italian, when you want to talk about things that will happen, you have to choose between two different tenses for very specific situations. I was lost from the get-go, and when I returned the lesson with a blank stare, Muzzi* just sighed and started all over again. At least she tried to make me feel a bit better about things; "Don't worry about it," she said, "they don't have this in America."

Still, I think we're winning on the haves and haves not scale. Italy can take their dual destinies---right now I'm wanting white chili and dill pickle paint and Sunday interviews on the couch with Dad. It smells like school days and space heaters today**, and I am thinking of home.

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*This is my professor's last name, but did anyone else just think of the language monster Muzzy? And something about eating parking meters? A, e, i, o, u, je t'aime . . .

**This could be another post entirely, but it won't be. I just love that the seasons feel the same here, that I can smell and hear and feel a piece of home simply by opening a window.