"Vino e Pane" (Reading as trip prep)

Half of my brain is trained on preparing for my trip to Florence, which as I said in previous posts, will be my first return to the city I once called home in a decade.

Much of the preparation is mental (though there is a suitcase permanently open on the floor of my bedroom).

I'm listening to music (see below), reading books in Italian (or simply more than usual) and re-reading a few books.

One book is a travelogue by the great Italian novelist, Antonio Tabucchi.Mike brought it back on his last visit to Florence.

For a long while, I left it in the dining room, along with the other ricordini and gifts he'd hauled back, per our ritual.

Before I began reading it, I would look at it from across the room, and there’s no other way to say it. I got my jollies. Just from looking at it.

I'd think, 'Yup, it’s still there on the dining room table, still in Italian, still waiting for me to pick up.'

Looking at it, I felt almost a form of lust – literary lust, I guess.

Essentially Italian books get my motor running, send my heart racing, not all that differently than how a man would.

It sounds weird -- but I suspect only because I externalized a thought most bookworms have, even if only on an unconscious level.

Anyhoo, I'm also re-reading a lot of books. Like "Vino e Pane" by Ignazio Silone.

And I'm packing books for the airplane and to read while in Florence (because the books I buy there, I will first have to set on the dining room table and lust over for a few weeks. Ma e' chiaro, no?)

So as I pack, I'm asking myself: is this the trip I finally read “L’Ultimo Brigatista” about Italian terrorism? We’ll see. The book’s tone has always struck me as a bit too self-important, as if it doesn’t have to sell me on the topic.

Of course, I may just wind up staring at it from across the room. And I'll enjoy that, too.