Day dreaming and wishful thinking

This morning I was procrastinating and looking for ways to avoid starting in on the design of a rather large annual report. There it is staring at me...a pile of messy word documents in a great big manila folder, sitting next to my computer, that all somehow need to be turned into a slick, easy to read booklet complete with glossy photos and imaginative illustrations. Sipping on my coffee, and looking for ways to stall a few more moments, as per usual, I went to the internet for fun and entertainment. I head over to La Bacheca, an Italian chat group, to see what is going on. Clicking around I was disappointed to find that there were no new posts and nothing to respond to that would keep me a few moments longer from the dreaded annual report.

I guess I was really desperate for a good distraction, because I started to read the Google ads that appear on the site. And then, there it was, this big glowing banner that advertised an Italian language school in the heart of Florence, that was just beckoning for new students to come and discover the wonders of the Italian language. I couldn't resist. I clicked on the link and was quickly whisked into another world. I read through the class offerings and soon thoughts of the annual report drifted away. I began to imagine myself in Florence, surrounded by other language students, excited to be abroad and bound together by our foreigness and the desire to learn the Italian language. The photos on the site were evocative and I could smell the old building, feel the ache in my legs after having climbed to the top floor of an ancient Florentine building with a view of the Duomo where the classes are held, and see the faces of the mildly bored, but patient instructors, who have names like, Sandro and Maria Grazia.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if all I had to do in a day were to spend four hours in the morning in a classroom perfecting my Italian, and then another two hours in the afternoon making conversation one-on-one with a professor. Lunchtime would be a delightful break in the day, when I would run down the eight flights of stone steps, or risk the descent in an ancient decorative Otis elevator, to the street below and to the corner bar for a panino and an aqua frizzante. Standing at the shiny counter I would be rubbing elbows with shopkeepers, business men, artisans and harried housewives . I would be immersed in the bubbling language and able to converse with everyone I met and understand conversations overheard from patrons sitting at nearby tables. And then, after meandering through the flea market in the piazza by S. Lorenzo and admiring the leather bags and second hand books, I would find myself back at the school in one of the small classrooms with high ceilings, featuring tasteful posters of Dante and David on the walls. Each room would have it's own balcony and you could hang over the railings and with a bird's eye view watch the activity on the street below. You would see the three wheel trucks, the beat up city cars and the watch as the vespas weave erratically in and out of the traffic. As they depart down side alleys, off to pick up girlfriends or return to work, the stacatto vrooom vrooom vrooom of the motor scooters would echo crazily through caverns created by the narrowly spaced ancient buildings. Gazing up and over the red tile rooftops of the city, you would see Brunelleschi's Duomo rising above all the other bell towers and chapels, and in the distance the purple haze of Piazza Michelangelo and the suburb Bagno a Ripoli.

It would be a joy to experience the life of a carefree student in Florence again. I have an ache in my heart as I daydream about the possibility.