“Then how come you do?”
“Your great-grandfather took me there when I was your age.”
“And how did he know about it?”
“When he was in the navy, he landed one day in this area and scouted the whole coast.”
I show him the little cove we’re heading for on Google Maps on my iPhone. He seems convinced.
“Is the water shallow?” he asks me. His number one enemy is deep water. I reassure him.
“Yes, there’s a little beach with some rocks, but you can touch bottom.”
He seems satisfied. We walk at a good pace under a blazing sun. We take a trail that runs along the cliff edge. A place for mountain goats.
“Be careful, watch where you put your feet, and keep your hand on the rock face.”
The path starts heading downhill, with a series of hairpin curves. The pebbly dirt is slippery and dangerous. The footing is precarious. We proceed slowly and cautiously. Every so often I cough, but I do my best to conceal my difficulties. I feel empty, drained.
My photographic memory flickers on, and suddenly I remember everything. The roles are reversed: I’m Lorenzo, and Grandpa is me. I even remember that once or twice I almost slipped and fell. Lorenzo is more surefooted, or maybe his shoes are better than the Mecap sneakers I wore thirty years ago.
“Can I ask you a question, Papà?”
“Yes, of course you can.”
“Who is this buddy Fritz you talk about sometimes with Mamma? Is he a friend of yours I’ve never met?”
“That’s right, you’ve never met him. He’s not a very nice person and I hope you never do meet him.”
“Then why do you say he’s your buddy?”
“It’s an ironic figure of speech. Sort of like when Eva tells you that you’re the head of the class.”
“So that’s like making fun of somebody?”
“Not exactly. Irony is something a little more subtle. To mean one thing, you say something else that means the opposite. For example, last week, when you broke that picture frame with a soccer ball, what did I say to you?”
“You said: ‘Nice work, congratulations!’”
“That’s right, I was being ironic.”
Lorenzo smiles. He understands.
I smile back at him. It’s a shame we didn’t have more of these men-only days. A real shame.
By now we’re close to the water. I think we’re here. I remember that there’s one last section through the trees, and then we’ll see the wonderful cove.
But when we get there, the cove is overrun by a horde of vacationers, conveyed there by two large boats anchored a short way offshore, just a hundred feet or so from the beach. Beach umbrellas, noise, the scent of tanning creams, beach tennis, bikinis, water fights, tomato-and-mozzarella panini. An inlet with fifty yards of rocky beach, as crowded as a department store during a fire sale.
Lorenzo stares at me and exclaims: “This unspoiled beach is magnificent, nice work, Papà.”
I see that he has a firm grip on the concept of irony. I can’t keep myself from laughing.
We find a rocky corner of the cove where we leave our towels and backpacks.
“They aren’t going to steal our things, are they?” Lorenzo asks.
“We’ll keep an eye on them. . . . Come on, let’s go in the water.”
I pull off my T-shirt and gesture for him to follow. He hesitates. Then he follows.
I run into the water and then launch headlong into a dive. Lorenzo takes a few steps then stands there, water lapping at his waist. The reassuring contact with the sandy seabed is like Linus’s blanket for him.
I go over to him.
“You want to try the dead man’s float? I’ll hold you up.”
He agrees and lets me pick him up. One hand under his head, the other under his hips.
“Take a deep breath. The human body is like a piece of wood. It floats. It can’t sink.”
“Not even if I swallow five gallons of water?”
“What does that have to do with anything? Of course you could sink if you swallow enough water. But if you go underwater, just keep your mouth closed, and that way you won’t swallow.”
Lorenzo relaxes. He shuts his eyes and allows himself to be lulled by the ebb and flow of the waves. I support him easily, thanks to Archimedes’ principle. Slowly, very slowly, I release him. Then I let him float free, but stay close. He doesn’t even notice. His waterline is perfect, allowing him to bob easily until he opens his eyes and it dawns on him that I’m no longer holding him up. He starts to thrash and flail, trying to touch bottom, but the current has taken us out a short way and the water is too deep for him.
“Papà, I’m drowning!”
“Don’t worry . . . you’re not drowning,” I say from six feet away, and it’s enough to reassure him. “Try moving your legs the way you do when you ride a bike.”
He does as he’s told. But his flailing arms keep him from maintaining a proper balance.
“That’s enough, Papà. Help me!”
“The more you relax the more you tend to stay on the surface. Come on, pedal your legs and sweep the surface with your arms, as if you were trying to dig a hole in the water.”
Pedaling with his feet, digging with his arms . . . He’s already doing better.
“Let’s get back to the sand. I can’t do this!”
“You can do it! Come on . . . pedal your legs down below, move your arms together up top, like a frog.”
At last he starts to keep a regular pace. He relaxes. He’s floating.
“You see, you can do it.”
He smiles, amazed that he’s swimming.
Legs, arms, legs, arms.
Lorenzo has just learned to swim. There’ll be plenty of time for him to pick up the strokes and styles later.
I pick him up and hug him tight. He collapses, exhausted, in my arms. I carry him a few yards closer in, where he can touch bottom.
“You did great!” I exclaim.
“Are you being ironic?” he asks me as he catches his breath.
“No, I’m being perfectly serious. Here’s something for later, son. Trust yourself. Even if you’re really, really scared, never let on that you are.”
“Why?”
“You’re showing your game, you see? There’s no need to let anyone have the upper hand, and by showing you’re scared, you let an opponent think he’s got one over you. He doesn’t, but he thinks he does. And that might actually help him win.”
“Um . . . what if you’re so scared, you really fail? Like when you can’t remember the answers to the questions the teacher asks you about history in front of the whole class? Or when you can’t speak the truth because you know it’ll get you in trouble?”
“Well, that can be a problem. That’s true. But when you fail at something, you can actually learn from it. I failed at so many things before I learned to do them well. And some I had to give up on completely because I hurt my knee.”
“Like what?”
“Well, all competitive sports were out. And in the end, I learned water polo . . .”
“Where you’re a star!”
I can’t help the smile that covers my face when my boy says that. “No star, Lorenzo. Good, maybe. Star, no. But I’m happy with that. See, you have to be happy.”
We stretch out in the sun to dry off and eat the sandwiches we had the hotel make for us. We stay there until the boats sail away and the sun has almost sunk to the horizon. The beach is covered with trash, the remnants of the invasion of swimmers. We set out to clean it up. We make two huge piles of garbage and hope that one of the two pilots is shamed into taking it away tomorrow.
It’s dark by the time we get back to our women, and we’re so tired we don’t even have the strength to eat dinner.
“How did it go?�
� Paola asks me as soon as we’re alone.
“I should have spent more time with him.” Sadness forms pools in my eyes.
“I know,” is my wife’s pained reply. “I know.”
−11
We’re driving along the Via Aurelia at moderate speed, with the windows rolled down. I feel like Vittorio Gassman as Bruno Cortona in Dino Risi’s masterpiece, Il sorpasso, the archetype of all road movies. I drive doing my best to ignore the stabbing pain in my ribs that leaves me breathless. Paola is by my side dozing off while we leave Tuscany behind and triumphantly enter Liguria. Eva’s asleep too, slumped against Lorenzo, who sits alertly watching the road and the signage.
“Don’t speed, Papà, they have speed cameras here.”
“Thanks.”
Just then we see a car coming toward us in the opposite direction. It flashes its brights.
“What did that man want?”
“He was just warning us that there’s a speed trap farther on, a highway patrol squad car. You slow down because you see the speed camera, then you speed up right afterward. And the highway patrol is waiting to give you a ticket.”
“But why did that guy warn you? Do you know him?”
“It’s an old Italian tradition. Everyone united against the police and the Carabinieri.”
“But why?”
“Good question. Because we’re Italian. And we all have something to hide. Breaking the law really is the only thing we all have in common.”
“Do you break the law too, Papà?”
As usual, I’ve wandered heedlessly into a minefield. Even if it may prove to be less than edifying, I decide to tell the truth as we sail past a checkpoint where the police ignore us.
“Sometimes. But I try not to.”
“What crimes do you commit?”
“Crimes may be overstating it. Let’s just say transgressions. There are all kinds of transgressions; for instance, this morning when the proprietor of the hotel asked me if I wanted an official receipt and I said no. He gave us a discount.”
“But a discount is a good thing, isn’t it?”
“Sure, but that means he was trying to avoid paying taxes, and I was his accomplice.”
“That doesn’t seem like a very serious crime.”
“That’s the problem with Italy, Lorenzo. Crimes that don’t seem serious. For example, bootleg movies. How many of those do you download?”
“Lots. Just cartoons, though. Why, is that a crime?”
“A very serious one. It’s called theft. It’s as if you were shoplifting at the supermarket.”
“If I shoplift at the supermarket, the alarm will go off when I try to leave. But at home no one can see me.”
“Correct answer. That’s why everyone downloads movies and very few people steal from the supermarket. Because no one can see you. Do you know how you can tell the difference between an honest man and a criminal? By how they act when no one can see them. Don’t forget that.”
I’m proud of my impromptu civics lesson. Only now do I notice that Paola is awake and heard the whole thing. She can’t wait for a chance to put in a little lesson of her own.
“For example, when no one’s looking, Papà sneaks into the kitchen and eats some Parmesan cheese.”
“That might have happened once,” I defend myself.
“And when you were little, he also used to steal your baby food.”
“It was good . . .”
“And your teething biscuits.”
“Delicious. Even though it wasn’t technically stealing because I paid for them in the first place.”
“But you bought them for me,” Lorenzo points out.
“I was just tasting them to make sure they were good—I’m a protective father.”
“You tasted them because you’re a gluttonous piggy,” says my wife.
“What are you talking about? At the very most I might have eaten one or two.”
“One or two? You had a secret box all your own hidden in your sock drawer.”
“You knew about that?”
“Who did you think was washing your socks? The Holy Ghost?”
I wish this conversation could go on forever. One of the finest things in life is a family argument. The kind that drips intimacy and love. The Via Aurelia continues to slide past beneath us like a conveyor belt, and I’m one happy driver.
−10
I watch Paola and the kids walking ahead of me through the narrow lanes, or caruggi, of Genoa. There is a special, untouchable bond linking the three of them together. It’s been clear to me for years that I’m strictly on the sidelines, accepted, maybe even beloved, but excluded from that magical umbilical cord that never breaks between mother and children. By now all the tests on child psychology, widely published in summer editions of popular magazines, make it clear that during a pregnancy, a mother nourishes the fetus not only from the culinary point of view but also spiritually, creating an eternal and affectionate elective affinity. Their souls share nine months of life, their hearts synchronized to their joys and sorrows. Two human beings living together, exchanging feelings, memories, and dreams. But also, maybe I didn’t try hard enough.
How can a papà who shows up after nine months of this continual imprinting hope to compete? The English word for this prenatal relationship is bonding and doctors urge mothers to nourish the little candidate for birth with fresh air, classical music, plenty of art, and pleasant emotions.
I go on watching the trio from a distance. Paola stops at a stall that sells focaccia from Recco, possibly the world’s finest cheese focaccia, though my naturopath considers it the world’s most lethal. Paola gestures to me from afar, asking if I’d like some. I nod yes. Lorenzo is saying something to Eva, who in turn laughs. Suddenly it strikes me that what I’m looking at is, quite simply, the future. I’ve just caught a glimpse for a few minutes of my family without me.
My family without me.
It sounds like the title of a terrible song.
I head over to the focaccia stall, doing a natural zoom on my wife’s face as she offers me a piece of hot focaccia. I bite into it and savor the taste. The melted cheese drips down my chin and T-shirt. This snack gives me time to think things over and size up the situation.
Is there anything I want to do in the ten days that remain of this journey?
I don’t know. The kids are having fun but I still have no idea of how I’m going to win back Paola.
Paola says something to me but I can’t hear her. So she says it again.
“Everything okay?”
I reply promptly: “Of course, amore mio. Shall we go to the aquarium?”
Eva’s shouts of joy make it clear that the decision has been made.
−9
“Today we’re going to complete the ‘maritime explorer’ phase of the journey and visit the cetacean sanctuary.”
“What’s that? A church for whales?” Eva asks, looking up at me as we walk along, hand in hand. She’s still excited after our visit to the aquarium yesterday. She has a point—it’s a confusing name.
“No, it’s an area of the Ligurian Sea populated by dolphins, whales, and turtles.”
“I want a turtle at home! Like the one we saw yesterday.”
“We can’t take it away from its natural habitat. It’s a sea turtle.”
“They’ve already taken it away. It’s in an aquarium!”
Again, that’s a solid point. We’re out on a mission, to buy morning pastries—cornetti—for the rest of the family. They aren’t as good as the ones my father-in-law makes, but they’ll do. Yesterday’s hotel breakfast was so depressing that today we’re hunting for something yummy in the area.
* * *
Two hours later we, and thirty others, board a small vessel for a whale-watching tour.
Lorenzo is more passionately interest
ed in the workings of the boat than in our impending encounter with the Mediterranean Sea’s largest cetaceans. Paola is unusually relaxed. These days, I feel like a tour operator eager to amuse his customers with novel and original treats. Today, everyone understands, the excursion is designed to appeal to Eva’s love of nature and animals.
* * *
The first ones to come and call on us are the dolphins. They pirouette in the water, chasing after our boat like performers in Cirque du Soleil who’ve been practicing their routine for years. It’s all so beautiful that it hardly seems real.
The sun and salt air are baking me, but today I don’t find it quite so tiring. I make an effort to breathe in slowly, while my daughter squeals with joy as she runs along the ship’s railing. I inhale and exhale, and repeat. I listen to the ragged breath that’s like a giant spray filling my damaged lungs.
I turn around and I’m greeted by a simply incredible spectacle: an enormous whale is swimming alongside the ship, spouting seawater like a geyser. I’m all alone on this side of the vessel; everyone else has hurried over to watch the highly entertaining dolphins on the far side. I feel the urge to pull my Polaroid out of my backpack, but I seem to have fallen into a trance. The huge mammal watches me. Its mastodonic eye stares at me with determination. I smile at it but it doesn’t understand. It seems to want to tell me something. We study each other with care, to the background sound of chattering acrobatic dolphins. It bobs along next to the boat with no apparent effort. I can clearly hear it breathing. It’s a moment of infinite peace.
For a few minutes I consider the idea of leaping into the water beside him and vanishing forever. It might be a more elegant way to go. Eva then comes running, the second passenger to spot our fellow traveler. She shouts: “A whale! Over here!”
Everyone rushes to the other side of the boat, making it roll dangerously. So long, infinite peace.
The timid cetacean promptly submerges, putting an end to the show. We encounter no other denizens of the deep for the rest of the morning. By the time we get back to port, it’s long past lunchtime. Eva’s happy: she’s counted twelve dolphins, four seagulls, and a whale. I feel calmer, as if the giant cetacean had transmitted some of its Zen serenity to me.
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