A Spontaneous Day in Rome
Dan Morey
I was walking around Rome with my mother. We stopped at the Piazza Navona to listen to a gypsy string band and view a truly striking scaffold. It was a tall, wobbly-looking exoskeleton, composed primarily of steel piping and wooden planks. Loose canvas hung about it, flapping in the breeze and blocking any view of the monument beneath.
“What’s that?” said Mother.
“This is the Scaffolding of the Fountain of the Four Rivers,” I said. “It’s a modern structure, with wood dating to the first term of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. The canvas, while appearing quite ancient, is in fact less than a decade old, having been replaced after the great windstorm of 2007. Most of the piping is original, though certain substitutions have been made due to rust.”
“The fountain must be huge,” said Mother.
“It contains an obelisk, which would account for the extreme height of the scaffolding.”
Mother expressed some frustration at finding so much of the beauty of Rome in dispose.
“Not to worry,” I said. “There are two more fountains in the Piazza Navona.”
We walked to both ends of the square and admired the Fountain of Moro and the Fountain of Neptune. Mother said they were nice, but wanted the Baedeker guide’s opinion. I read: “‘Neither the Fountain of Moro nor the Fountain of Neptune can compare to the Fountain of the Four Rivers in terms of beauty and artistic quality.’”
“Figures,” said Mother.
“Yes. Well, let’s go find some more scaffolding, shall we?”
I had decided to make this a spontaneous day, with no specific destinations and no map. As we meandered the muddle of confusing streets that surround the Piazza Navona, I began to second-guess my plan.
“I love all the little workshops and things. It’s like stepping back in time,” said Mother.
I took her deeper into the maze of cobbled streets. The further we went, the more residential they became. Soon all evidence of commercial activity had vanished.
“Where are we going?” said Mother.
“Nowhere in particular. We’re having a spontaneous day. Rick Steves said we should be sure to schedule at least one spontaneous day in Rome.”
“If you schedule it, how is it spontaneous?” She leaned against a stucco wall, under a wrought-iron balcony dripping with bougainvillea. “I’m tired. Let’s go back to the piazza.”
Though I had no idea where we were, I led on, exuding what I hoped to be a comforting degree of mock confidence. One road twisted into another, and we dead-ended at a deserted church.
“Baroque,” I said, examining the façade. “Possibly by Boromini.”
Mother sat on the steps, visibly wilted. “I don’t want to see any more churches. I thought we were going back to the piazza. Do you know what you’re doing?”
“I think if we bear left that alley will funnel us down to the Corso—”
“Get the map out.”
I informed her as delicately as I could that we had no map.
“What do you mean we have no map?”
“It’s a spontaneous day. Rick Steves would never bring a map on a spontaneous day.”
“Of course he would. Do you know why?”
“Why?”
“Because Rick Steves isn’t an idiot.”
Mother harped, rather sarcastically, on this topic for an extended period. Her unpoetic argument was based primarily on the practical, though quite boring, assumption that finding your way around a strange city with a medieval street plan requires some sort of directional aid.
“But just look at the wonderful things you can stumble on when you don’t know where you’re going,” I said.
Mother glanced at the church. “It ain’t that wonderful. Let’s go.”
We walked a few blocks, made a turn, and miraculously popped out on the Corso Vittorio.
“Ha!” I said. “And you doubted me.”
Mother bowed to the superiority of my internal compass and requested that we take a rest at a sidewalk café. After a coffee for her and a bracing Campari for me, we recommenced our ramble.
“There’s the Piazza Navona,” she said.
“We’re not going back there. I’ve seen enough of the Scaffolding of the Fountain of the Four Rivers.”
She agreed to follow me if I promised to stick to the main arteries and not get us lost again. Within five minutes I got us lost again.
“Daniel—”
“One more block,” I said. “I know there’s something good around here—look at all the people.”
Two kilometres and a substantial amount of cursing later, we entered a small square and gasped in unison. Before us stood the peerless Pantheon, the best-preserved piece of ancient Roman architecture in the world.
I began to clap. People stared. They probably thought Mother had checked her special son out of the sanatorium for a day of sightseeing.
“Clap, damn you,” I said.
“Why?” said Mother.
“Great architecture deserves to be applauded.”
This was a reference to the Peter Greenaway film Belly of an Architect. In it, Brian Dennehy applauds the Pantheon. Mother should’ve known this since we’d recently watched the movie together. I ceased clapping.
“It’s a line from Belly of an Architect,” I said. “‘Great architecture deserves to be applauded.’ Remember?”
“No. What’s Belly of an Architect?”
“Let’s go inside.”
We passed between the grand Corinthian columns and through the bronze doors. The interior was dim, with a single beam of sunlight descending from the open oculus of the dome to the center of the floor. Looking up at the coffered ceiling and its illuminating eye was like gazing on architectural heaven.
“It’s beautiful,” said Mother.
There were pews and crosses and various other Christian bric-a-brac present, but I preferred to picture the Pantheon in its original pagan glory, when Marcus Agrippa had dedicated it to the most holy planetary gods. I asked Mother if she had anything to leave as an offering.
“I have half a candy bar,” she said.
“It isn’t a Mars bar, is it?”
“Snickers.”
She set the chocolate on the floor, in the middle of the oculus’ ray, where a pigeon promptly devoured it.
From the Pantheon, we took the Via Seminario to the Via del Corso. A quartet of snazzily clad Roman businessmen stood at the intersection, waiting to cross. One of them dropped a cigarette butt on the sidewalk, snuffing it with a twist of his loafer.
“Should we go for it?” said Mother, after the light had changed.
“Let’s see if these guys make it first,” I said.
The men slipped into the crosswalk en masse. They hadn’t taken five steps when a gang of lawless scooter girls came screaming through the red light. They bore down on the businessmen like leather-clad archangels, out to avenge some corporate misdeed. The man in the shiniest suit jumped out of the way, spun around, and let loose a roundhouse kick that grazed a scooter girl’s bum.
“Puttana!” he yelled. “Porca!”
She paused to flip him the bird before racing off to join her crew.
“That was awesome,” I said. “I should be hanging out with those chicks.”
We jogged across the street behind the ruffled businessmen, barely beating the light.
“Okay,” said Mother. “Now where are we?”
It was a fair question, but without the benefit of a map I had no way of answering it with any accuracy.
“We are moving east,” I said. “Or possibly west or north, from the Via del Corso toward some very famous stuff.”
“What famous stuff?”
“Famous Roman stuff. Known to centuries of travelers.”
We walked for a considerable distance without seeing anything remotely famous. I started making things up to entertain Mother.
“This building,” I said, “was once home to Mussolini’s favorite prostitute, Tosca Traviatta. Tosca weighed over three hundred pounds and was completely bald. She used to strap Benito to the bed and beat his buttocks with a bicycle pump.”
We turned onto a pedestrian street covered with a red carpet. I would’ve felt quite regal had it not been for the abundance of tacky tourist stands and souvenir peddlers. Though they made me cringe, their presence was not unwelcome, for I knew them to be harbingers of the beauty of Rome.
“What’s that?” said Mother.
“What’s what?”
“Don’t you hear it? Listen.”
I detected a faint rumbling; the further we progressed, the louder it grew.
“Water,” I said.
By the time we reached the end of the street and rounded the corner the rumble had intensified to a roar. Then, all of a sudden, we were face to face with the Trevi Fountain. At least I was face to face with the Trevi Fountain. Mother was staring at the backside of a large German tourist. I pulled her around him and up to the thundering waters.
“It’s the Trevi!” she said. “And there’s no scaffolding!”
Mother first saw Three Coins in the Fountain at the Dipson Plaza Theatre in Erie, PA in 1954, which meant she’d been longing to see the Trevi for over half a century. She gazed raptly at the nude statue of Oceanus, and I asked her if she was fantasizing about Louis Jourdan.
“Of course!”
People sat along the rim of the basin, tossing coins over their shoulders and posing for pictures.
“There’s a space,” I said. “Squeeze in.”
Mother got into position and dug a two-euro piece out of her purse. I snatched it away and handed her a dime.
“Cheapskate,” she said.
She let fly, and the coin plunked into the limpid water. Oceanus looked down with approval. Gods, despite their reputation for extravagance, are not incapable of appreciating thrift.
“Aren’t you going to throw one in?” said Mother.
I told her that I intended to abide by the original tradition. “In the days of Henry James, travelers used to drink from the fountain to ensure their return to the Eternal City.”
“Drink? Out of that?”
“Of course. These waters are pure. They originate at a virgin spring and flow through an ancient aqueduct.”
“But it’s filled with coins. Nothing’s filthier than money.”
Mother always knows how to appeal to the germaphobe in me. I took out a nickel and flipped it in.
“Okay,” she said. “Let’s go back to the apartment. I’m hungry.”
“Right. I think there’s a Metro station just around this corner…”
Mother had begun to walk in the opposite direction.
“Where are you going?” I said.
“Back to the souvenir stands. I saw a guy selling maps.”
Dan Morey is a freelance writer in Pennsylvania. He’s worked as a book critic, nightlife columnist, travel correspondent and outdoor journalist. His writing has appeared in Hobart, Harpur Palate, McSweeney's Quarterly, decomP and elsewhere. He was recently nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Find him at danmorey.weebly.com