In the Santo Spirito

The church bells are already ringing when I leave my Firenze apartment at 10:15 this Sunday. The peels wash over me as I cross Piazza di Santo Spirito and climb the basilica’s stone steps.

I follow a mother and her young daughter, maybe 8 years old, as they enter the 13th century Augustinian church through a side door. The girl is wearing a white summer smock, with matching ponytail ribbon. An attendant greets them familiarly, but looks me over before nodding me through (my polka-dot dress, covering both shoulders and knees, apparently passing muster).

As we three walk down the long nave, a friar in a simple black, hooded cassock unchains the front pews to allow parishioners closer to the altar. He greets the mother and daughter, his voice warm, and chats with a group of older women up front.

I haven’t attended Mass on my own volition, well, ever.

On the Bright Side...

While sifting through the 50 photos my Italy students sent from our trip to Venice, one person kept re-appearing, a chameleon with a charming, genuine smile.
La vie de la partie.
In fact, you'll find him dancing with a street musician in my own post below.

Justin Russikoff is not a Miami University guy, but joins us from Penn State.
If I ever am privileged enough to receive the url to his blog, a requirement for my class, I'll share it here.

This week, my students are crafting scenes observed in quiet moments (and some rowdy ones) while traveling. Read them via the links at right.

I could have written a scene including Justin, but doesn't this visual - taken on a Venetian river taxi - say it all?
UPDATE: Link to Justin's blog. Someday, you may see this link on Comedy Central.

Hot and Cold in Venice

As the water taxi rounded the corner to our drop-off point in Venice, the sun beat down upon the cream, maize and faded pink of palazzos facing the Grand Canal.
In moments, that brilliant midday sun was beating down on our heads, too, as we hauled our weekend bags to the Messner Hotel, near the spectacular Santa Maria della Salute church on Venice's southeast corner.
At 95 degrees, this was a day for the beach, for an air-conditioned nap, for several glasses of something cool in the shade.
We would get none of that.

No, our 55-person group was off to tour the Doge's Palace and the Basilica di San Marco, where tour guides would ply us with rich Venetian history, with spectacular statuary, with a close look at a famous prison just steps from where the Doges lived for centuries.

And out a prison window, through the bars, comes the view of The Bridge of Sighs, that last vista a doomed prisoner might get before being hanged. Say goodbye to family and friends, waving at you from that bridge, then you are dragged to the gallows. (I love you Richard Russo!)
We mopped the sweat from our faces, necks, arms as we went.

It was a metaphor for a weekend in which Mother Nature just got in the way of treasuring a famous city.