Back to the site of my ruin
Your narrator returns to italy’s steps with rebuilt legs
I am reminded just now —by the check-in at this room in Naples where I have traveled North for the day— that I started this(…whatever this is… a blog? A teenager’s journal?) in italy, a year-ago-ish. I was on a beach, coincidentally a beach I had seen on TV, though that wasn’t why I was there, and I was contemplating the barbarian calves a life in this world would get me if I disappeared here.
I’m in Calabria now (not literally now, I just told you I’m in Naples, but I came in from Calabria, where I’m staying this month) and it’s… not the same as that rocky beach, but it’s familiar.
Italian beach towns, and I guess more importantly: Italian beaches, mostly circle mountains, and on those mountains Italy has precariously placed, over centuries, a system of Jenga homes, inscrutable by google maps, and either kryptonite or spinach to my broken leg, depending on when you ask me.I walked TWENTY THREE stories the first day. Not on purpose. I mean, I chose to walk, but I wasn’t like- going on a stair climbing expedition, I was just getting to my apartment and then looking for somewhere to buy a bottle of water. But the place has a LOT OF STAIRS. The alleys are marked in bronze plaques of the stations of the cross, and in my more melodramatic moments I feel like they’re mocking me. It’s a beautiful town. Slow and quiet, except for today on the way to the train station when an old man passed me on the outside, not in a car, just walking. That didn’t feel great, but otherwise I’ve mostly enjoyed it. (He didn’t even look very fast)
I have been eating well, lately. (The kind of “well” my cardiologist would appreciate, not the good kind). Keeping this up is a problem in Calabria, for a number of reasons. A significant one is the spots that serve breakfast, the majority are Gelaterias. My favorite southern italian custom (and maybe most hated, depending on the moment), is that they basically eat ice cream for breakfast. The most popular item in these shops, outside of coffee, is a cup of granita, flavored frozen water, basically the platonic ideal of italian ice, served with a brioche bun.
You want eggs, you need to find a supermarket. This is not unusual outside the US. Eggs aren’t breakfast foods most of the places I’ve been, and that’s fair enough. But it’s a bit of a learning curve to get from omelettes to ice cream in the morning.
Back here to Naples, I went to lunch with a couple friends and wandered the Napoli comicon watching James Harren explain a page composition to a younger artist who was really listening. They aren’t, always. Often you’re presented with a request for critique but you have to be careful. People don’t always want it, despite what they say. Sometimes they’re angling for reverence, confirmation from someone in the trade that they’re ready. And if you give them the one when they secretly expect the other, you’re both stuck in an awkward conversation that isn’t gonna help.
Somebody recognized me, despite not being there in any official capacity, it was the 2nd time that day, the first I mentioned before when the host of my stay asked me about my time in Amalfi last year. I was flattered, sorta, mostly surprised, but I think I navigated it alright. At the convention, the man asked me about friction points in collaboration, and if I had any tips for how to work with artists. I’m not gonna make a joke. Most of my friends are artists. You’re all welcome.
Anyway, my answer now is different than it would have been when I was his age, and I basically said that the most important tool you can bring if you’re trying to tell a collaborative story is humility. None of it’s about you. If everyone is earnest and straightforward and your goals are the same, and they’re about the book and not about your ego, and you keep that clear at every step? Then the rest of it will work, even when it’s hard. You can’t make the thing yourself. That’s what makes the process wonderful and terrible, you have no choice but to put your faith in someone else, or several someones, and to figure the best way to manage your piece of it so that at the end what’s relayed to the reader is the best you can all produce. Or at least that’s the idea. You can be wrong, you can all be wrong apart, or cumulatively, that’s not something you can inoculate yourself against. Sometimes you fail.
I spent the next day walking endlessly with James and Filipe Andrade, who I hadn’t met before, but who I instantly loved. Filipe is one of those guys who’s lived 100 lives in 100 places and and the 3 of us spent our day looking down streets and in windows and eating poorly together joyously. There’s no better way to travel than with a curious person. I love to share food and moments, and at the end I was full of both. But mostly pizza. There’s no way I’ve found in Naples to get around eating more pizza than you’ve ever eaten. But if I’m honest I haven’t looked so hard.
We walked something like 25 miles in 2 days, and ate enough cheese for a lifetime. I started writing today, after a few false starts. I even liked some of it.
I still have a kicstarter going, but only for another 48 hours. If you want to get involved, you can find it here: http://kck.st/4isqKog.
I took a lot of pictures in Naples. Here are the ones I liked the most.
Like I said the other day, really liking the writing / stories on your 'Stack, man.