We’ve spent some time at the beach, ridden an elephant and blown a kiss to a raccoon,

Enjoyed playtime in the park

Had some fun at the Ferragosto picnic

And Luigi even invented two new dishes:

Marshmallows and peanut butter (thanks to marshmallows from Lidl and peanut butter from my friend Rosemary) – and this kid has never heard of Fluff

And ice cream and potato chips enjoyed sitting outside at the local bar.

There were some disappointments and hairy moments though. Pinocchio didn’t show up for a show one evening in the square (horrors!). And Luigi had one of those “first moments” in life that I’ll talk about a later date.

But, now, alas, vacation is over, time to get back to work. It was fun, but all the more enjoyable since we can’t do it everyday so we get to relish the small amount of time we have to just relax and do fun family things together.

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I’m often amazed by the differences between what counts as impolite here compared to back in the states and vice versa. For example, here no one seems to think twice about interrupting someone while they’re in the middle of a conversation. I have to admit, this has always been one of my pet peeves, so it never fails to get my blood boiling. No one here seems to mind much though.

I overheard a conversation at the beach today that illustrates the point. Two women were discussing the one woman’s move from Campobasso. Woman 1 asked Woman 2 about her house and every time Woman 2 would get two words out of her mouth, Woman 1 would ask another question or make a comment. If I were Woman 2, I probably would have just stopped talking and walked away or changed the subject to something that would give Woman 1 lots to talk about. But, Woman 2 didn’t mind, she just kept cheerfully talking away. Sometimes she started the same sentence over 3 or 4 times, but she kept plodding away.

The other strange thing is saying hello to people. It’s not enough to say hello if you catch they’re eye or they’re walking right towards you. No, if you see them standing next to the door to a shop or down the street, you need to shout a greeting to them. It doesn’t matter if they’re in the middle of a conversation or not, you’d better say hello and they’d better respond. I always feel bad distracting them from their conversation, especially if they give me one of those real quick “ciao, ciao” (in other words, I’m too busy to respond) kind of greetings. But I soon learned that just catching their eye and smiling isn’t enough. O would ask me why I didn’t greet someone and if I said I smiled at them he just looked at me funny. No, a smile and a wave only counts if you’re in the car and even then, you should shout ciao out the window if it’s summertime.

One time, at Easter, we went to church and were standing in the back because there were no seats left. A distant relation of O’s also happened to be standing there, not too far away from us. O went up and patted him on the shoulder. I was busy keeping Luigi in line, so I looked at him a couple of times to give him a nod hello and a silent greeting, but he was never looking my way. Afterwards, O seemed upset and wanted to know why I didn’t go and say hello to him. You see, that’s another one of those things. No one seems to care if they’re in church or not. If someone comes in they all have to say hello and may even start up a conversation.

The more time I’m here, the more I’m getting sucked into these new ideals. I find myself yelling ciao out the window and going out of my way just to greet people even though I saw them yesterday, and the day before, and the day before, and…. well, you get the idea. Now I might even get offended if someone doesn’t greet me when they’re walking down the street, but I don’t think I’ll ever get used to interrupting conversations and talking in church.

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Translating in itself is very challenging and interesting though and I enjoy it immensely. I’ve translated such a wide range of items, I couldn’t begin to list them all. Then comes the fun part when the client wants it translated in UK English. I don’t have a problem with it, especially since I’ve been buying most of my English books (for my reading pleasure) from a UK vendor so I’m used to the different terminology, and for those things I might miss, I have good old trusty spellcheck which catches anything that I actually spelled right and puts it into UK spelling. Things like colour, labour, flavour (of course, Dave mentions in his blog that I spell it wrong). Am I the only one who wants to say them co-loor, la-boor and fla-voor? Then there are the cheques (chequies) and programmes (programmies).  Why do they feel the need to add extra letters to everything? Do they get extra points that way? And don’t forget those z’s. They must be changed to s – it’s not organization, it’s organisation.

I have to say though that when speaking I understand Brits much better than I do Southern Americans. No, I don’t mean South Americans, I mean people from the southern United States. I even lived there for a while and I still don’t understand them sometimes.

Years ago I was trying to arrange for merchandise transportation with a company in Alabama. (I was in Pennsylvania). Try as I might, I could not get in touch with the right person. I was told I would have to speak to a Mr. Mower and that I would have to call back. But every time I called back I was told that there was no one there by that name. Finally someone took pity on me and told me that there was no one there by that name but that I could speak with Mr. Mower. Of course, I told her that that was what I had already said, but finally got her to spell it. The name wasn’t Mower, it was Moore. How do you manage to say Mower when reading M-o-o-r-e?  I guess the Brits add extra letters and the southerners add extra syllables. Who knows how a southerner would pronounce colour? I don’t even want to think about it.

In the meantime my son is somehow learning all sorts of accents. He says the word bell like a southerner (bay-ell) and “what’s missing” like an Italian (what’s-a meess-een). At least he says the word color correctly which is more than I can say for my dad. (With his Philly accent it comes out keller).

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My instinct is to blame it on daycare (asilo nido here in Italy). Luigi has been enrolled since September and maybe that’s what’s causing the constant infections. It seems like every time I turn around he has another cold, sometimes with a slight fever and sometimes without. He’ll be fine for a week and then it starts all over again.

Of course, I keep him home from daycare on those days, but unless he has a fever, he’s still raring to go like any other day so I have my hands full keeping him occupied (leaving me very little time to get anything else done).

Then comes the dreaded day when I realize that I too have caught whatever it was and leaves me marveling at how he was so zippy during the day when I feel so miserable.

Hopefully all these colds this year will mean that next year when he goes to preschool he’ll be less liable to catch everything…… One can always hope anyway.

In the meantime, I’d better stock up on vitamin C and hope that spring comes soon.

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Of course, that carried on into my teen years and beyond. Oh, I had friends, but I was just never good at socializing. I’m still not to this day.

Oddly enough for someone who has difficulty communicating, I worked as a manager for years and was actually quite good at it – if I do say so myself. You see, I don’t have too much trouble communicating if there’s a script, so to speak. As a manager, you know what things you have to communicate and when. But, out in real life, that’s a different story.

I’ve always been envious of those people who could strike up a conversation with anyone – the ones who know just what to say and when to say it. Instead, I’m the kind of person who sinks into that awkward silence. My mind races, desperate to come up with something catchy to start a conversation, but by the time I come up with it, the moment has passed because I keep rejecting all my ideas.

I can remember as a child actually wanting to have contact with people, but being so afraid of being rejected or laughed at that I would automatically shun any attempt that people made to get me to open up. Other kids in school actually used to think I was “stuck up” or being snobby. It’s laughable really.

Oh, I’m a lot better now – as long as someone else gets the conversation going. But, I’m still what I would call “conversationally handicapped”.

As you can imagine, my transition to Italy would have been a lot easier if I had been the free-talking type. As it was, not only could I not think of anything to say in Italian, I couldn’t think of anything to say period. Oh, to have the gift of gab…

So, whenever you’re stuck in an elevator, on an airplane, or in any kind of situation with the silent type, try to strike up a conversation. They may just be “conversationally handicapped” and you might find that they have a lot to say once you get them started.

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Coming to Italy wasn’t just about physically changing locations though. It was an entire life change for me. I left the “treadmill effect” world behind. Yes, my income dropped as did my number of possessions, but life has so much more meaning now.

Although I said I “packed everything up”, I really didn’t. You would be amazed at the number of things I left behind. At that point in my life I decided that I just didn’t need those things anymore – and oh, how liberating it was.

Up to then my life had been full of working and spending. I always wanted the newest thing and every new gadget that came along. So, I had a food dehydrator, a crock pot, a toaster oven, a fancy stainless steel retro toaster, a wine cooler, one of those gadgets for waxing your hands and feet, a foot massager, a nail buffer, various exercise gadgets and, well, the list could go on and on. Did I use them very often? Not really. I could have lived quite well without them. Plus, I had subscriptions to satellite TV and, of course, I had to go see the latest movies. Then there were the car payment and the mortgage on the 3000 square foot house that was full of things to be dusted and/or stored until the day when I might find a use for them. All of these things I purchased were supposed to make me happy. But it comes as no surprise that they didn’t. I was a slave to consumerism and kept getting more things that were supposed to bring me the happiness that I was so desperately seeking.

Then things changed. In 2006 I left most of it behind. I packed up the bare minimum, some things I didn’t want to leave behind for sentimental reasons along with my computer so that I could work, and shipped some books over on the slow boat(although nowhere near the shelves and shelves of them that I had at the house). The closets and drawers full of gadgets were left behind and I learned to live minimally. And you know what? I liked it and I still do. Now when I go to the store I talk myself out of buying things instead of into buying them. OK, to be honest, I would love to have a Kindle. But the important thing is that I don’t base my level of happiness or my own worth as a human being on material goods.

The evenings spent playing together or the days when we get together with family and friends for a few laughs and some conversation, those are the things that make me happy. Walking through town with my son and stopping to talk to the other people who live here, watching him play with his papa or hug his grandparents, singing and dancing along with him and so many of the daily events that we often take for granted are the very things that make me smile and be thankful for where I am today.

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I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. Mine was very busy, but filled with family, friends and laughter.

Wishing everyone health and happiness in 2011.

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It started snowing here on Monday night, Tuesday it melted a little bit and then we had light to heavy snowfall on and off from Wednesday evening until Thursday afternoon.

Thursday morning, our street looked like this (picture taken from my 4th floor balcony)

But the snow kept falling, so by the afternoon it looked like this

And here’s our neighbor’s persimmon tree which, starkly beautiful with its black, leafless branches and reddish-orange fruit, becomes an even more spectacular sight when covered with snow.

Here’s a close-up of the persimmon tree

In the next few days the weather is supposed to warm up and may even rain, so a white Christmas is probably out of the question. In the meantime though, I’ll enjoy the view, take a few walks in the crisp, clean air, and build a snowman with Luigi.

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There aren’t many songs about Thanksgiving and, thankfully, it’s one holiday we can enjoy without too much commercialism.

You may not realize it, but there is one famous poem that was written about Thanksgiving and later set to music. It may not immediately come to mind because the words have been somewhat changed and it is often lumped in with all of the Christmas songs today.

The poem was written by Lydia Maria Child and appeared in Flowers for Children Vol. 2 in 1844.

Over the river, and through the wood,
to Grandfather’s house we go;
the horse knows the way to carry the sleigh
through the white and drifted snow.

Over the river, and through the wood,
to Grandfather’s house away!
We would not stop for doll or top,
for ’tis Thanksgiving Day.

Over the river, and through the wood-
oh, how the wind does blow!
It stings the toes and bites the nose,
as over the ground we go.

Over the river, and through the wood
and straight through the barnyard gate.
We seem to go extremely slow-
it is so hard to wait!

Over the river, and through the wood-
when Grandmother sees us come,
She will say, “o, dear, the children are here,
bring a pie for every one.”

Over the river, and through the wood-
now Grandmothers cap I spy!
Hurrah for the fun! Is the pudding done?
Hurrah for the pumpkin pie!

Lydia Maria (Francis) Child was an interesting woman. Born in 1802, she was educated as a teacher and taught school for some time.  In 1824 her first novel, Hobomok: A Tale of Early Times, was published. From that point on, she wrote continuously and published several other works. She was a journalist; an anti-slavery, women’s rights and Indian rights activitist and an opponent of American expansionism.

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As soon as I signed up, friend requests started pouring in, many of them from people I hadn’t seen in years – and I do mean years. Some of them were people that I would have listed as acquaintances since, when we went to high school together, I wasn’t part of their group. But, people change and nostalgia leads to friends that you would never expect.

It’s definitely a mixed group though. I never know what I’ll find when I look at my News Feed. Some of my friends have political views that are completely opposite of mine and some just like to joke around. I see posts in English, Italian, French, Spanish, Swedish and German.

But, I admit, I’ve actually blocked a few friends. It sounds terrible, but there were some people who never had a single positive thing to say. One of the people I blocked was constantly complaining about something negative happening in her life. At first I felt really badly for her, but after a while I just couldn’t take it anymore. Even the silliest little things that to me might have been a mild annoyance or even something to chuckle at were broadcast as if they were major, life-threatening problems. I just couldn’t take the negativity anymore so I blocked her and others like her even though I feel a little guilty about it.

I’m a big believer in the fact that negativity feeds negativity and, obviously the reverse is true. The more positive you are, the more positive things happen in your life.

Did you ever notice how, when one thing goes wrong, everything else seems to go wrong? You wake up in the morning and stub your toe or something else happens and you think automatically that you’re day is going to be rotten because it happened. And, it usually is. Why? I truly believe that it’s because we were expecting bad things to happen from that point on so we attracted them. That’s why I always try to remain positive even when the worst happens.

I’ll admit, for a few months this year I was anything but positive and everything in my life suffered for it. But, I’m back on track and things are looking up. I take a few minutes each day to think about all of the things I’m grateful for.

The glass, once again, is half full.

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