Mom, Dad, Paul and I spent Easter weekend walking Rome. I think the bottom of my feet have bruises. All of the major sites were more crowded then I’ve ever seen them before, but St. Peter’s and the Vatican Museum were the only two that really affected us. We waited in line for two hours to get into St. Peter’s. Many of you have been there and remember being able to wander about the basilica freely. The entire center isle was filled with chairs for the service, so we were limited to the outer edges. Michelangelo’s Pieta was separated by a curtain and the area within was clogged with people. Nevertheless, the place was awesome.
The square in front of the church was also filled with chairs, and the line was four deep and ran along the columns in a nearly complete circle of the piazza. The line for the Vatican Museum was equally impressive, snaking along two walls, and all the way to the side entrance to the basilica’s piazza. No, we did not attend the service. We basked in pagan Rome at the Colosseum and Forum instead.
I needed the walking and standing to counter my indulgence in gelato every day and delicious pasta and wine every night. Along with the ‘must see’ sites, we wandered through neighborhoods that were new to me.
I’ve seen enough churches to last me a while. As always, I leave Rome wanting to know art and architecture better but feeling like I’ve learned a bit more through osmosis.
I’ve had two weeks off from school and don’t mind going back on Monday. It’s a downhill slide until the end of the year now. The seniors have one week of classes and then are dismissed to prepare for their IB exams. The tenth graders are going to Verdun and some other places in France and Belgium for a week at the end of April. The ninth graders are spending a day with the Royal Shakespeare Company and watching Macbeth. I will teach Hamlet, The Taming of the Shrew, and Romeo and Juliet at the same time. Work doesn’t get much better.
And of course there’s more traveling to do. We’re hitting the north for England’s bank holidays: Norway, Iceland, and Denmark.
