Corn Nuts, and Salty Thoughts

 

Corn Nuts

I’m eating corn nuts and I can’t stop. Are they made from Italian corn, mais?  (Not mais, the French word for but, but mais the Italian word for corn!) I hope so.  If not I feel really gross about eating GMO corn from somewhere halfway around the world… but that wouldn’t be much more gross than I already feel in this heat. The corn nuts are salty and so incredibly crunchy that I can’t stop popping them into my mouth. I use the small spoon the bartender has provided for our salatini, and I try not to dip into the bowl with my fingers. We’re masquerading as fancy resort guests, my six-year old son and I, and I’m trying to appear as civilized as possible. It’s not easy; my sandals are dusty from walking up the trail from our rented apartment, and he looks pretty scruffy too. It’s after 5:30 pm and still as hot as the lower deck of an old ferry. I’m sipping a Campari and soda with a slice of arancia, looking out over the hillsides of Tuscany- somewhere south of Montepulciano and north of San Casciano di Bagni. Lap of luxury, Tuscany in summer. This place is really more of a cliché I’d say. Luxury to me is many things: floating in cool water on a quiet beach; not having to wait for a table at your favorite trattoria; being able to spend as much time as you like staring at a Caravaggio before someone stands so close to you that you can smell her shampoo. San Gimigniano was hellacious- wall to wall tourists (like us), wandering in a daze in the heatwave. But most other days we do pretty well, finding our own quiet places for retreating from the world.

Wow- Amazing! Everyone says to me: it must be so incredible to be in Italy for seven months. You’re so lucky!!!  (I always note the envy between the lines and hide my grimace). And yes it is incredible. Amazing, wonderful and special. Also, really challenging, disorienting and alienating. But on balance there is more to be gained than lost, for sure.  I encourage anyone who has the opportunity to change things up and live for a while in another place to do it. You don’t need to be in mourning like we are… grieving for our wonderful son and groping around for answers on how to live our lives. In fact, we were thinking of doing this before Lucian, our nine-year old son was killed by a reckless driver on a Brooklyn sidewalk.  How I would have loved to see him absorb the beauty of Italy, and the lessons inherent in its ruins! I have seen through his eyes everywhere we go, without him to help me do it. He taught me so many things, not least of them how to be enthusiastic about the world around me. Also: the geological layers that make up our planet, the order of our solar system, the hierarchies of the world’s tallest buildings, and the intricacies of a well-assembled sandwich.  The heroics of the Roman and Greek myths had recently captured his imagination. I wish he could tell me those stories every time I look at a sculpture. He was funny and smart and ever curious. Why can’t Lucian be here with us? Did we need to lose him in order to give ourselves this experience, this time to be close together and revel in sensory beauty? I don’t think that should be a necessary trade.

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Lucian steering the tugboat John J. Harvey, age 5