1. That Night
We tired ourselves out, me more than her, because I had blisters, which as I have said made us nervous about our plans for Alpine hiking. So after dinner and hanging out around Il Duomo, we found a place to sit in the Piazza della Repubblica not far from an old fashioned carousel that lit up the plaza.
As we sat, we listened to a guy with an electric guitar play five year old American pop tunes, and we bought an etching and a water color from a couple artists who were sitting nearby at their easels making their art and comiserating about the loud music.
And then we walked slowly back across old Florence to our room.
2. The Next Morning
For breakfast the next day, we went down the (cobblestone) street to a place Guiseppe had suggested. He understood what we needed, which makes me think we must have shared some sense of desperation we had years ago on our trip to France when we daily found ourselves in a desperate search for sustenance and coffee. Of course on that trip, we were often catching an early morning train every day, whereas our pace on this trip was substantially more relaxed, perhaps giving places like this a chance to …you know… open?
So we sat at a table on the corner eating our breakfast. They had omelettes. They had yogurt. They had toast. Trudy said, “OMG the yogurt is so good.” David said, “OMG the butter is so good. Are you going to finish yours?” And they had cappuccino in (and this was key) big cups.
We sat. We ate. We drank. And we smiled contented smiles.
And then we were ready to proceed with the day.