The Vatican

We got to the Vatican and back by an easy train ride from the port of Civitavecchia. It was good to trust each other and our instincts, the inherent logic of a system meant to move people around. Every time we saved ourselves a few hundred euro by not booking cruise-organized excursions I felt smug and snobby, too proud of our willingness to do things the quote-unquote real way.

hell yes I took that in manual! I am totally getting the hang of my camera!

In the Vatican itself, gilt glitter like religious shock and awe. How much wealth could one group of families possibly acquire? Enough to fund all this, at least. Apparently the Vatican is still one of the richest countries in the world. I don’t know if that’s per capita or what, but I believe it on sight alone.

In the Sistine Chapel I put one hand on my mother’s shoulder and one on my sister’s back and shuffled through like that, saying nothing, looking only up. On a gentle current of human bodies I was carried past a legend I had studied but never quite connected to; it’s hard to feel anything personal about a work so heavily reproduced and pop-ified. (Who could imagine they have a personal relationship with the Mona Lisa?)

I wanted to linger, but our excellent tour guide prodded us out after what only felt like a minute or two. When there are so many masterpieces about, there are compromises that have to be made.

On the street were several Roma beggars. For many Roma this is a lifestyle, not a temporary state of hardship. Amanda and I sort of pat each other on the back and shook our heads in fine Puritan fashion, emphatically claiming, “No! Neither of us would ever live this way! Whatever it takes, you’d never find us on the street like this!”

Is there a natural conscience that supersedes cultural and traditional strictures? Education is one way to develop a mind beyond culturally imposed boundaries, but only if society lets you and culture teaches you that education can be used to create such a personal perspective and set of values.

Or is there something innate in us that tells us how to live, and culture simply lets us make excuses? Lets us form habits that become exceptions to the unyielding internal compass indicating true north no matter what language spoken or religion practiced?

We ate pasta to the tune of a violinist ambling slowly up the alley. “Oh, how very Italian!” we thought, eagerly taking out our video cameras to capture the magical Mediterranean moment.

Our waitress warned us the violinist was a pickpocket, known for lifting tips off patio tables before the waitresses returned, and we should watch our bags when he waltzed by again.