“I know I shall be homesick for you, even in Heaven,” said Beth to Jo as she lay on her deathbed in Little Women (the movie).
Homesickness is a strange and powerful phenomenon associated with travel in this world, and apparently the next as well, according to Beth. I won’t endeavour to address the theological controversies raised by her poetic sentiment, but I will stop to ponder homesickness for a moment. I must admit that it’s not a condition I have been afflicted with much in my life. Well… at least not since I was very young. My parents separated before I was three-years-old, so I had to learn pretty early on to get over being homesick for people and places because it was too torturous to feel that way all the time.
Though it started out in a pretty negative way, I think that over the years this aspect of my story has turned out to be a positive trait in my personality. It’s not that I don’t miss the people I love, it’s that I realise life sometimes takes us in different directions, but it doesn’t mean that we are not still connected. Also, in this day and age where technology is so multi-faceted, it hardly seems like I am out of the loop when there is email, skype, facebook, sms and of course the classic means of communication for travellers everywhere– the postcard!
Anyway, the reason I raise this topic is that, while I was in Bologna (the weekend before last), and also while I was in Slovenia for the past 5 days, I developed a mutated form of the homesickness virus. I’ve only been away from Melbourne for two months, and don’t feel homesick for it yet, however during my last few short trips I experienced something completely unexpected…
I was homesick for Siena!
This is new and unusual for me, not only because I haven’t felt homesick since I was a kid, but because Siena isn’t even really my hometown! I mean, I am living here for four months, but still… Even though I really enjoyed myself in Slovenia, I could not wait to get back ‘home’. When I awoke on my return train, and was greeted by both daylight and the familiar Italian landscape, I felt myself breath a little sigh of relief.
I still can’t explain it, but maybe it has something to do with the fact that I love this place and I am dreading leaving at the end of August. I remember the first time I sat at this desk, where I am sitting now, and looking out the window at the sun-bathed roof tops, I just knew that Siena was seeping into a little portion of my heart which, for the rest of my life, will feel at home… here.
Now I am totally at ease. I have cleaned the house and given – especially my room – the mopping it needed; my fantastic roommate is watching lame Italian game shows in the next room; and the streets below are alive with the sounds of locals singing traditional songs and merrily anticipating the Palio which takes place the day after tomorrow. Bliss.
What’s the Palio, you ask? Google it. If you can’t be bothered doing that, just wait a couple of days and I’m sure I’ll have something to say about it. For now, all you need to know is that il nicchio is the contrada you should be barracking for because that’s where I live. For the short time that I live here, I may as well be as patriotic as I can! Viva il nicchio!
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