Arriving in Turin

Hello, everyone! It took me about five full minutes with the family's housekeeper, Rodica, an Italian-speaking Romanian girl, to compose the heading correctly in italiano. I have forgotten so much since I was last here in Italy, but it's coming back slowly. Piano, piano, as they say.

I will update this as frequently and comprehensively as I can. No photos
yet, but the apartment is gorgeous! Very IKEA/Pottery Barn-esque. The family inhabits the entire top floor of this apartment building, with four bedrooms and two bathrooms, two long terraces (one on each side), a neat little kitchen, and a roomy common area where everyone sits/plays/lives when everyone comes together in the evenings. Hardwood floors, high ceilings, lots of windows. They take the elevator up and down since it's the topmost, and today I thought I would try the stairs just out of curiosity-- 120 steps to the top! Whew! My buns burned, to say the least. I'll stick to the elevator.

Yesterday I flew from SFO to Denver, Denver to Frankfurt, without hitch. The first flight was a little over two hours, very easy, and I read Jane Eyre, wrote a postcard or two. Connection was close by, so I hopped right onto the Frankfurt flight. It was hard for me to comprehend that this flight was leaving the continent, leaving my country... too tremendous for my exhausted mind. I'd stayed up way, way past my bedtime for the past two or three nights, poor judgment on my part, so I was glassy-eyed for my entire day traveling. The movie screens on the Lufthansa flight kept me up all night - I think I dozed for about two hours, but only lightly - and when I landed in Torino at 2.30pm enough adrenaline kicked in, from meeting the whole family and retrieving my (obscenely heavy) luggage, that I decided to stick it out and stay up until they went to bed. I made it through playtime, unpacking, a driving tour of downtown Torino, pizza dinner and gelato, but by the time we drove home my eyes were closing mid-sentence. Alb and Patri laughed and sent me straight to bed! Fil, 10, the older boy, knocked on my door to see if I needed anything, some water, perhaps? I said yes, he could bring me some water. Frizzante o naturale? Naturale, naturally. He returned with an entire unopened liter of water! Said, "But you can drink it all night!" Very sweet. He and his younger brother, 5, are very sweet and get along like any other young boys do - not too well when one or both is tired and cranky, but fairly well during the day, as long as Fil doesn't provoke Ruggi and Ruggi doesn't annoy Fil. I've seen worse.

Now, although it's 11.30am here, and despite my solid 11 hours of sleep last night, I need to nap. In Italian, faccio un riposino. Next time I will post photos of the apartment, and hopefully will have walked more around the city. The weather is supposed to be the most beautiful of the year, but lately has been foggy and rainy. The Italians complain, "Where is our summer?," but the overcast skies remind me of home.