Today we tried our hardest to finally go to church. We woke up at 7am to get the kids ready and
finish packing up the apartment to leave.
We walked to the train station to take a bus at 8:35 and while on the
bus we found out that the bus doesn’t even stop at the normal stops because it
was Sunday. So, we had to get off the
bus early and walk for 15 minutes to get to church and ended up arriving 5
minutes late. When we got there, there
were almost no cars in the parking lot and we thought we got there at the wrong
time. Turns out that the chapel had just
been built and dedicated the week before and they had changed meetings TODAY
and now Relief Society is first and sacrament meeting last. I don’t know if I would have dragged the kids
all the way to church if I had known we would only be going to Relief
Society. It was a nice lesson about
keeping the Sabbath day holy, which I don’t have a problem with, so I guess we
might have just needed to be there to give the missionaries some referrals or
something. Two people told me that I
looked familiar and they did too, but it’s been too long and I don’t remember
anything. We left in a hurry and then
walked a mile back to the bus stop, took the bus to the station, walked back to
our apartment. As we walked back to the
station Bea had 10 cents and there was a man without legs in a wheelchair
begging for money. I told Bea to give
him her coin and she did, but then both Henry and Bea stopped and laid down on the
ground to look at the man’s legs that looked like they were blown off. They were asking me what happened, but he
said he didn’t speak Italian, so I didn’t find out. He looked uncomfortable that my children were
trying to look at his leg stubs. I felt
bad, but kids are curious. Henry asked
me what I thought happened and I said I thought his legs got blown off by a
bomb, so the whole rest of the way home Bea was making up scenarios about what
would happen if everyone in our family got “blowed” up by a bomb and who would
be sad. It must have been like 100
degrees and 90 percent humidity. I don’t
think I’ve been that hot yet. Then, we
got all our stuff and dragged it back to the train station in the blazing
heat. I was carrying the baby and
dragging a giant luggage, bag and car seat that was ripping my arms out of
their sockets. Clementine was screaming
in her stroller, Henry wouldn’t push her, Bea hurt herself, Lucy looked like a
Sherpa and people all around us were stopping and asking if they could take
photos of our children. Ugh.
From the train station we got on our train that would take us down to Naples and from there had an amazingly seamless time catching buses going to
where we needed to go.
I have to give a shout out to the man sitting next to me on the train.
He stood up the entire time so I could put Vivi in his seat to nap and because
he had a horrible hacking cough and didn't want to give it to my children. I talked to him a lot about his life as
he stood next to me and told me how he had a good job and traveled a lot but
now he was old and he said. "You know, I thought I would love the life
of a bachelor and so I didn't get married or have any kids, and now I'm all
alone. I have nobody. I have nobody". I think about that a lot and I'm so
glad I'm taking the traditional route with having kids. I figure that I
only have to sacrifice a few years comparable to my life without kids that it's
totally worth it. When I'm 55 and have no kids at home I will have until
I die, hopefully around 90, to have all my time back to myself. And if I
keep in good shape, I'll be able to still have strength to do a lot of awesome
things. That's a long time!
Right when we arrived in Naples we walked outside and our bus pulled up 15
minutes later, which was a relief since it was like 100 degrees and humid
outside. Then after we arrived in Amalfi, which is located on the Emerald
Coast, we hopped on another bus that took us to our little town of
Praiano. Ivan, the owner of our cute little apartment drove down the very
steep hill to pick us up. If not, we would have had to take yet another
bus up to our house. Sheesh! Our apartment was right above a little
market which was heaven for Henry and also right next to to piazzas(squares)
where kids were constantly playing. It was at the end of a dead end so
people drove slowly past our house. The town we stayed in was in-between two larger
and more touristy towns so ours was more of a local scene. By the time we
got there it was dark and the kids were exhausted, so we plopped them into bed
and dreamed of what awaited us in the morning...
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