“I have a proposal for you…”
“…Ok…?”
“What would you think about…for your vacation time…of…going with me to…Rome?”
“Yes.”
It was out of my mouth as soon as I heard the word.
Rome. The Eternal City.
My response, was, what they would say in French, une évidence. Of course, I would go to Rome with Christophe. If I had travelled the world, – lucky me – and yet had never been, the reason was quite simple. I had been waiting to go with him.
He has come into my life like something like a fire-bomb, one that burns in the very best way. The first night that we spoke on the phone, it was until 2am. The second? 5:30. Rooster-crowing time. And so the connection began.
He lives in Paris. I live in Provence. And yet we somehow see each other nearly once a week. Or try our best to do so. I am broke from the train tickets and yet grateful. That was the word I used this morning, in speaking to the owner of my studio flat. She is one of my guardian angels. “Grateful to the Universe?” she asked. “Yes. Exactly,” I replied.
And so to Rome.
He doesn’t travel like I do, preferring to get up when I usually go to bed in order to take the first flight out. And so I felt a little blurred around the edges as I stepped out of the Termini Train station. Walking head held high because this is Rome after all, and realising with the turning of gazes that the weight that I have put back on (yes, its true, all of it) is actually a good thing in Italy if not in stick straight France. Mamma mia.
And somehow that bubble of non-reality never quite popped. Arrival on the morning of the 22nd, departure on the evening of the 26th. Four quick nights, and no, I won’t tell you about those nights. Those are mine. Those are ours.
But the evenings? They were my favorite. It had been my hunch, somehow, but how could I have known? Maybe I have been to la bella Roma before after all, another lifetime ago. To walk and walk those cobblestone streets. To turn a corner and find the Pantheon looming above me, Jack and the Beanstalk-like as tears of surprise rose like the columns lit in a pale golden light. We leaned on each other when we got tired. We kissed and never got gelato.
He planned it all, having lived there last year and only very recently haven given up trying to start a business, too complicated, too frustrating. So he knew what he enjoyed and suspected where I would feel the same. It is amazing how right he was.
The Eternal City.
One could say that Love, with the big L, is the true Eternal City and Rome is an expression of that. Love in all its deep complexities, Rome in love with itself. Christophe and I were in the midst of all that, bouncing around in taxis through numerous piazzas, politely ignoring the well-intentioned texts declaring what we “must” do, knowing that each Rome is personal. In my photo dispatches my beautiful Mother and Sister exhaled, “you look blissfully happy,” just as my friend Gérard responded, “you have a glass of wine in your hand in every single one.” Both were right.
My joy, my love and my gratitude to Christophe. And to Rome.
For there is only one first time for everything, and this first felt both newer and older than the monuments, full of nothing but beauty and absolutely all that is good.
Grazie, grazie mille.
Yes, yes, yes…such memories. Thank you for your very generous compliment!
Exactly! What a cool comment…this pleased me to no end. 🙂 In Provence we call Arles "the little Rome of Gaul" and so I think that I did form my way of seeing through Arles' heavily patina-ed streets. I didn't really spend time taking photos in Rome because I still haven't figured out how to do that and remain present with another person but the things that did catch my eye? Oweeeee. Such incredibly Beauty!
Thaank you so much Joyce!
Reading you Happy is awesome beyond words
big sense!!!
Such majestic awe inspiring photographs. Beautiful memories.
We both surface, from different places and ways, but wonderfully. I was fascinated by how many echoes of Arles you found in Rome; maybe a way of looking …seeing.
Dear Needlessly Cruel and Spiteful "Anonymous",
Just because Frank is "Dead" to you does not mean that he is dead to this increasingly aged, predictably lonesome homosexualist. I can put on "Only the Lonely" at anytime, and it's just like our first date……all over again…..as though the years had never gone by. Frank's still here for me whenever I summon him.
That said?…….the guy DID rack up an impressively-long list of supposed retirements and "Farewell" concerts. I'll admit that, yes, I am pretty certain he's dead (just as I'm equally sure that Liza Minnelli and Cher will never be dead). Amsuingly enough, a bunch of folks at dinner party at my house last year started bickering over whether Liza Minelli was dead, fifteen or so years ago, or still high-kicking her way around stages. I told everyone that they had to think and told them they couldn't google the matter on their telephones. It was an amusing evening, as we wenton to consider Joan Collins and other, similarly well-preserved celebrities. The best comment was "Well, if Joan collins WERE dead?….How would you know?"
Sincerely, david Terry
OMG, I'm so happy for you! And for me, because seeing your lushly beautiful photos is such a treat. Grazie, indeed 😉
Dear David Terry,
I hate to break it to you but Frank is dead.
All my best…