One day we figured out we had traveled by Lancia rental car,
plane, bus, train and metro, not to mention our blistered feet, all before our
afternoon panini.
But the journey wasn’t all rush-rush.
There were the hours spent luxuriating at sidewalk cafés,
sipping latte macchiato (warm milk “stained” with coffee), Prosecco or Mort
Subite Kriek Lambic, and watching the world saunter by.
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| Marina and her au pair family, Denise, Emelie and little Jeanne |
Our student-turned-graduate spent much of her time coaching
Mom on the finer points of living in the center of the European universe. Marina
was on constant pickpocket alert, reminding me to zip my purse completely closed and to tuck it tightly under my arm. Yet those moments
of mistrust dissipated completely each time Marina stepped into a crosswalk,
fearless in her confidence that motorists would indeed brake in time.
Others continued the instruction. When Ziggy, Marina’s
significant, took Richard and I to our first Brussels café, he discreetly slid
the 15% euro tip I placed on the pewter-covered table back to me, explaining
that our wait person was a professional, and the large tip would be considered
an insult. Upon meeting his mother Thea for the first time, as we leaned in for
welcoming bisous, she whispered in her shy English, “In Belgium, we do it three
times,” and so we switched cheeks from right to left to right again.
With Marina’s French and Flemish, and Richard’s Portuguese
and Italian, I was in good company. Marina gave me a Flemish cheat-sheet to
study on the train to dinner with Ziggy’s family in Antwerp, with please
(alstublieft) and thank you (danku) and a few other essential words. Richard interpreted stories and translated
directions from my father’s 86-year-old Italian cousin as we navigated seven
sharp turns up the mountainside beyond Fregona.
I could handle a “bonjour” to greet a ticket-taker in a
Brussels museum, but after a while, the revolving doors of languages totally
befuddled me. As I was leaving a shop in Venice where the personable young
women told me in perfect English that I looked like a Northern Italian (talk
about Brownie points!), I was so flustered and giddy that when I opened my
mouth to say good-bye, out came “muy bien’’ (very well) from high school
Spanish class. Both of my kids rolled their eyes on that one. And, in the fog
of too many tongues that settled on me, I know at least one time I intended to
go to the women’s (vrouwen or donne) restroom but ended up in the men’s (mensen
or uomini). Oops!
Faux pas aside, as we traveled around Belgium I was truly
inspired by the women who bicycle to work each day. I decided their example would be my take-home
souvenir. I don’t have their native panache, the way they knot their scarves
and wear their business clothes astride a bicycle. I can’t walk in high
heels let alone pedal in them. But I could just do it–ride to work as often as
possible—even if it meant wearing sweats and carrying a change of clothes in
a knapsack.
So, first workday back, I did just that.
The ride was exhilarating. My Northern Italian face flushed.
I paced the office, cooling down. Then I went into the women’s room to towel
off and change. I slid on my sophisticated black-and-white dress, stepped into
a sandal. And froze. In my haste to pack
for the ride, I brought two different sandals.
I spent my jet-lagged return to reality in mismatched shoes.
At least luck was on my side. I brought a right and a left. Bisous, three
times. Laurie Lynch
