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This morning I slipped on my airy white dress, flung my camera into a rather large purse, and savored a prosciutto and arugula sandwich as I walked to the train station.
The stone streets and rugged walls are so seductive. I can't help but want to run up to the sun-warmed, jagged edges and press my skin against it. I restrain myself to a gentle drag of my fingers across the stones instead. If I were to give in to my strange wall-caressing tendencies I'd have never make it to Pisa today.
After a short train trip, I stepped out of Pisa Centrale. I quickly found a map to the Leaning Tower which could just have well screamed WALK FORWARD. Apparently it was a couple kilometers straight ahead.
On my leisurely walk that crossed a river and passed by several pizzerias, I just had to stop for some gelato. I'm a real sucker for that sweet, smooth frozen treat. So, whenever I can find a shop that doesn't pipe in the pre-made goop into their tins but paddles in home-churned creaminess, I stop in for just a taste. I rationalized these indulgences with I may never again have the chance to waltz down the streets of Pisa, or any other city here in Italy, on such a hot day with such a good cone of gelato. Once in my hands the ice cream melted at what seemed an especially speedy rate so I quickly consumed the cone before it dripped down to my elbows. I ended up sharing a fountain with some fellow bathing pigeons.
Refreshed and just a little damp, I went on my way down the twisting streets. Just then, a very tall dark man in a trench coat approached me. Sometimes I think things here in Italy are so postcard, but then it's like I have to go back to reality by receiving a strange shot of odd comedic theatrics . . . I guess I should just be glad I don't get shots of horror and hysterics. HA! Back to trench coat man, so as he looked down the street toward me and slowly stepped closer. His arms began to move and in a vampire-like swoop. He grasped the center of his coat and began to pull it open (Dramatic jaws-like music builds) A mild and strongly twangy "hello" escaped his lips as I gave what I think was a wince. Then, I realized the inside of his coat was filled with watches and he was merely one of what I soon learned was many watch-pawning guys around here. Jeepers. You'd think that after a few thousand tourists wincing they'd have come up with a better way of approaching tourists with watches.
Past the many carnival type stands and strange men in trench coats there it was. The slightlycock-eyed tower I had stared at in history books was right there in front of me. Now it looked like pop-up book with a page where the paper just wasn't quite long enough to make the piece stand straight up. If you squinted it sorta looked real.
With a few steps closer, I could tell that this was't paper. There was the tilted shadow and the duomo and that strange statue with the babies drinking milk from some weird-looking animal. The architecture was so incredibly intricate, and in some places even glossy. Everything together was seamlessly gorgeous, the thousands of people and strange salesman included ;)
Lingering in the strange chapel was pleasant and peaceful. The wooden pews were worn to smooth perfection by the many hands and tushies that had rested on them. Although some of the sculptures depicted the fall of man and terrors of life, other were soothing and emotional, my favorite being that of a mother and two children. The milky white complexion and smooth fluid shape of the curves lead my eyes into a long, dance of glances. It was beautiful, striking, and a somewhat unexpected pleasure of the day.
Once my tour group reached the top, all fears and worries were blown away by the endless blue sky, tall mountains and clay-colored scallops that formed the canopy of Pisa. The breeze cooled out warm bodies. Everyone seemed to just beam with the kind of smiles that make your cheeks hurt, even the Indian couple that had been fighting in Hindi and English the whole way up.
The stone streets and rugged walls are so seductive. I can't help but want to run up to the sun-warmed, jagged edges and press my skin against it. I restrain myself to a gentle drag of my fingers across the stones instead. If I were to give in to my strange wall-caressing tendencies I'd have never make it to Pisa today.
After a short train trip, I stepped out of Pisa Centrale. I quickly found a map to the Leaning Tower which could just have well screamed WALK FORWARD. Apparently it was a couple kilometers straight ahead.
On my leisurely walk that crossed a river and passed by several pizzerias, I just had to stop for some gelato. I'm a real sucker for that sweet, smooth frozen treat. So, whenever I can find a shop that doesn't pipe in the pre-made goop into their tins but paddles in home-churned creaminess, I stop in for just a taste. I rationalized these indulgences with I may never again have the chance to waltz down the streets of Pisa, or any other city here in Italy, on such a hot day with such a good cone of gelato. Once in my hands the ice cream melted at what seemed an especially speedy rate so I quickly consumed the cone before it dripped down to my elbows. I ended up sharing a fountain with some fellow bathing pigeons.
Refreshed and just a little damp, I went on my way down the twisting streets. Just then, a very tall dark man in a trench coat approached me. Sometimes I think things here in Italy are so postcard, but then it's like I have to go back to reality by receiving a strange shot of odd comedic theatrics . . . I guess I should just be glad I don't get shots of horror and hysterics. HA! Back to trench coat man, so as he looked down the street toward me and slowly stepped closer. His arms began to move and in a vampire-like swoop. He grasped the center of his coat and began to pull it open (Dramatic jaws-like music builds) A mild and strongly twangy "hello" escaped his lips as I gave what I think was a wince. Then, I realized the inside of his coat was filled with watches and he was merely one of what I soon learned was many watch-pawning guys around here. Jeepers. You'd think that after a few thousand tourists wincing they'd have come up with a better way of approaching tourists with watches.
Past the many carnival type stands and strange men in trench coats there it was. The slightlycock-eyed tower I had stared at in history books was right there in front of me. Now it looked like pop-up book with a page where the paper just wasn't quite long enough to make the piece stand straight up. If you squinted it sorta looked real.
With a few steps closer, I could tell that this was't paper. There was the tilted shadow and the duomo and that strange statue with the babies drinking milk from some weird-looking animal. The architecture was so incredibly intricate, and in some places even glossy. Everything together was seamlessly gorgeous, the thousands of people and strange salesman included ;)
As I walked the wide gravel pathways, I watched tuckered-out little ones find rest in patches of shade on the lush green squares of grass. The beeps and clicks of cameras surrounded me as if I had walked into paparazzi. Except here the people were smiling and sweetly swapping cameras for pictures. Some poses were simple smiles while hanging onto their loves ones, while other more ambitious travelers were posing for the "look-ma-I'm-holding-up-the-tower" shot as their counterparts hollered "to the left dear."
Like a good little tourist, I wove through the crowds, purchased my tickets to walk up in the newly and permanently sturdied tower, and of course got a ticket to the duomo.
BELOW: photographs from inside the Duomo
BELOW: photographs from inside the Duomo
After about an hour of holding my camera to my eye and throwing my head back to gawk at intricate designs on ceilings, it was my time to head into the tower.
I can't even tell you how surreal this was. I have always been intrigued by this building. I remember researching Pisa and Pizza and staring at the many pictures of this wonder. Now I was here. I was about to go inside those photographs and make my own.
I never realized how just a few degrees to the right and an extremely worn and slippery spiral staircase could make such a difficult climb. It was almost nauseating. The higher we got, the teenier the stairwell. Not just teeny tight spirals, but small steps with deep worn footprints that made slipping inevitable. No matter the language we spoke, everyone knew what the one ahead and behind them was thinking, "Dear God, don't let them slip!"
Once my tour group reached the top, all fears and worries were blown away by the endless blue sky, tall mountains and clay-colored scallops that formed the canopy of Pisa. The breeze cooled out warm bodies. Everyone seemed to just beam with the kind of smiles that make your cheeks hurt, even the Indian couple that had been fighting in Hindi and English the whole way up. I really wish I had a pause button in life, or just something to capture the fullness of this moment. I felt somehow outstandingly accomplished to have made it here. In some way ,my addition to the thousands of people in Pisa today was significant, if only to me. Maybe it was the childlike awe that came back to me, or just that the long-haired girl everyone joke is Rapunzel incarnate finally made it into a tower . . .Whatever the reason, the feat of making it to the top of such an ancient tower held a sense of belonging and destiny that no book, story, sentence or picture could ever convey.
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