a little slice of me part II: the more things change, the less they stay the same

Every little kid is vaguely cognisant of his or her surroundings growing up, but I have come to realize that I took true delight in seeing other cities and what made them different from where I lived even as a kid-o. And being keenly aware of this intangible "sense of space" I was deeply affected by the changes that were made in my city, be they for good or bad, even when I no longer lived there.

When I was in the third grade I went on my first trip (that I could remember) to a big city. I remember being enamoured with the city that is Minneapolis and being in awe of their skywalks, an ingenious invention in a city that is colder than it has any right to be in winter.

My passion for cities grew when I visited New York City for the first time as a high schooler when we moved out to CT. I had always wanted to visit New York and to be swept up into the hustle and bustle of the pre-holidays season was fantastic. But I loved it that much more when I visited in college on my own, for a job interview, and was able to navigate it based on its simple, and frankly intuitive, grid plan. This is coming from someone who can get lost in her own town with just two missed turns and no idea how to "just retrace her steps."

My interest in downtown revitalization, another key focus of mine, was sparked when my dad took me to the Historic Third Ward in Milwaukee. I've mentioned this before ("Gentrification," Tuesday, August 12, 2008)and Milwaukee is definitely the sweet, but dowdy cousin of chic, sophisticated Chicago, but that didn't stop them from creating a Historic Third Ward, which has created its own little flair in a charming city.

Another turn of events that affected my understanding of cities was when the city of Wausau, home of the majority of my childhood, location of the the beloved Franklin Street, and the "eh" library tore out a huge section of the downtown to make a downtown park (see John Michlig's blog, "Sprawled Out: the Search for Community in the American Suburb) for a picture of what it looks like now). I won't be back there until Christmas and when I do it'll be covered in snow, so, please enjoy his pictures (and hard work).

My dad, I think, is a latent, amateur architecture buff too and certainly a lover of beautiful things and we would go "downtown" on Saturdays and have coffee and donuts and look at the old pre-war buildings that have stood the test of time- and frankly had been immune to the need for historic preservation as rarely did anyone ever want to demo a building. And if so it'd be like wanting to send grandma out into the cold world with nothing but the clothes on her back- you just don't do it 'cause why would you?!

Even for the people of Wausau who have no idea what urban planning is, this was a change and a shock. We had moved away by the time this restructuring of the downtown occurred, but upon coming back it was a sliver of what it must be like to come home to one's house having burned to the ground or waking up after a car accident and seeing that you have lost a limb. I, in no way wish to diminish the unspeakable tragedy that such circumstances are to those who have experienced them personally. But I will say that seeing the downtown looking everything and nothing like how it used to is like losing a part of yourself. It did drive home the point that every place has a "sense of place" and if you change one thing, you change everything, no matter how subtlely.

I won't even go into detail about how my beloved high school was turned into apartments/condos. It was an ingenious move on the city developers' part, but it literally meant that one can't go home, or back to school, again. I'd be less affected if I'd attended Wausau West, an ugly relic of 1970's architecture- grey masonry globbed together in a vaguely circular form with little to no windows. But I attended a beautiful pre-war building that even served as a city bomb shelter owing to the fact that the walls were three feet thick! I haven't seen the new apartment complex so I have no aesthetic judgment regarding the renovation. Suffice to say I hope that the people who live there now enjoy living in a part of history.

I attended college in Savannah, GA, which constantly harps on its "Jewel Plan" to anyone within shouting distance. And while it was aurally fatiguing to hear, it is a beautiful city that I highly recommend to anyone. Each square is unique and beautiful, ugh, like a jewel. But it was previous events, experienced much earlier, that really made me aware of a city and its impact on a person, no matter how small the change, or the person that is affected by it.

My favorite place in the whole world

I am constantly searching for "home." Having moved around a lot as a kid, I never really put down roots. I tried one time then had to leave for another place. But when I returned 3 years later I found that too much had changed for it to still feel familiar. Check out John Michlig's blog, Sprawled Out: the Search for Community in the American Suburb, and his post, "Re-visiting my hometown: Wausau, Wisconsin through new eyes" to see what I'm talking about. Man, it's surreal seeing your old, old hometown on someone else's blog.

But then I found "home" in the most unlikely place ever, Rome.

I'd dreamed of going to Rome ever since I was young. And I had the chance to go when I was between my junior and senior years of college. I was able to live in Venice (Venezia), Florence (Firenze), and Rome (Roma) for 1 week each. Unfortunately, I was there for school credit and my professors insisted on getting us up at what felt like the crack of dawn and dragging us all around these magnificent cities. While this process was exhilirating at first, after all who wants to sleep when one can see the canals of Venice in person!? The cradle of the Renaissance, Florence?! By the time I got to Rome I thought I was going to fall over from exhaustion.

Unfortunately, I partook of many a siesta during our free time while in the Eternal City. I was bone-tired, I didn't speak the language, and I was running low on film and suitcase space- the two things I compulsively do when on vacation- take a million pictures and buy stuff. Actually, I do that every day, but it's really bad when I'm in another country :-)

However, I could navigate myself to the Piazza Navona from our hotel, the Alberge del Sole, which was crammed in a little alley just downwind from the Campo de Fiori. I loved the Piazza Navona with Bernini's magnificent personifications of four of the known rivers at that time, the Nile, the Ganges, the Danube, and the Rio de la Plata, housed in his magnificent work, the Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi or "Fountain of the Four Rivers," as they cower beneath the frontal facade of Borromini's church, Sant'Agnese in Agone. (Forgive me, once an art history dork, always an art history dork.)

I love how wide the space felt, like one is standing in a Baroque football field. And I loved the street artists, selling their works and the modest storefronts who deferred to the artistic creations that filled the square.

Then, a few years later, my grandparents offered to take my mom and myself to Italy with them. I lept at the change, though acutely distressed at the thought that I would not past muster in regards to navigating as we would spend the majority of our time in Rome, the city with which I was the least familiar. Though if you want a quiet bed, I know just the place, double entendres aside.

But somehow I did it. Downtown Rome is actually not terribly difficult to navigate, there are several main streets that wind around this magnificent city and this makes orienting one's self significantly easier, even if you don't speak the language, which I still didn't the second time around.

And I felt such a rush taking them from the Campo dei Fiori where we were dropped off, and pointing out with pride the restaurant, Heartbreakers, where I enjoyed a delectable spaghetti carbonara and then walking down the small, cramped alley in which my old hotel was still wedged, then crossing the Vittorio Emmanuele and making my way back "home. "

It was all still there, the Church, the Fountain, the other fountains, the restaurants, etc., It's funny, something in Italy is always under construction and when I was there the first time Sant'Agnese in Agone was covered under plastic and scaffolding. The second time it was the Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi that was shrouded. This couldn't take away from the gorgeous site that is and hopefully will always be the Piazza Navona.

It's hard to explain, but it just felt like home to me. I suppose it's like true love, when you find it, you just know. Or that's what Hollywood would like me to believe.

For anyone who cares, yes, the Piazza Navona was cited in Dan Brown's book, Angels and Demons. According to Wikipedia, it will also be used in the forthcoming movie. You can also see it in Mike Nichols' cinematic adaptation of Catch-22 and it was in the 1990 version of Coins in the Fountain. The 1954 version used the Trevi Fountain. (information provided by Wikipedia)

But please see it in person! You will not regret it! And try not to think about how your taxi driver probably took you on the most roundabout, i.e. unnecessarily expensive, taxi ride to get you there. This isn't NY, it's Italy! You may never return- cough up that euro and go see some art!