Sisterchicks in Gondolas! (4 page)

“Wait, wait, wait,” Sue said, going for a pen in her bag. “I have to write this down.”

Steph laughed. “Are you serious?”

“It’s research,” Sue said with a straight face. She opened to the first page of the simple, small spiral notebook and suddenly started to cry.

“Sue, what’s wrong?”

“The pages are blank,” she said in a tight voice.

I gave Steph an apologetic look. I had no idea what my companion was talking about.

“I’m sorry.” Sue sniffed back the few tears that had escaped. “It’s just that I have another notebook like this at home. That notebook is filled with doctors’ numbers, pharmacy hours, and all of my relatives’ cell phone numbers. This notebook is new. It’s blank. It just hit me that I’m about to make a fresh start.”

“And you’re using the first page to list gelato flavors,” I reminded her. “How’s that for evidence of goodness and mercy?”

Sue handed the notebook to Steph. “Could you write down those flavors you mentioned?”

“Okay.”

“She likes details,” I explained.

“Not a problem.” Steph grinned. “My mom is exactly the same way. If she doesn’t write things down, she forgets everything. She even has a notepad by the phone to take notes during conversations.”

Suddenly I felt small again. For a few glorious hours that morning I’d felt young and free, as if the world were
my oyster. (Whatever that saying means.) We were riding vaporettos with young Italian chefs, eating ice cream for breakfast, and being set up by lovely Steph for future flirting.

Then, boom! There it was. The striking reminder that Sue and I were old enough to be this young woman’s mother. While Sue might have been having a hard time realizing where she was, I think I was having a hard time remembering how old I was.

Seemingly unfazed by the “like my mom” comment, Sue explained to Steph, “I’m doing an independent study of all the gelato in Venice.”

“
All
the gelato in Venezia? That’s quite an undertaking.”

“I realize that. It’s grueling work, but I’m dedicated to my research, and I will see this project through to its conclusion.”

“Plus she has an assistant,” I added brightly.

Steph looked at us as if trying to decide if we were playing a joke on her. A smile grew on her rosy lips. “You two are hilarious.”

“No,” I said. “You don’t know my sister-in-law. She’s serious about this.”

Steph laughed and then leaned forward, as if we were best friends sharing confessions over our coffee. “I have to tell you something. When I first heard the renters were two women over fifty, no offense, but I didn’t expect two women like you.”

“What did you expect?” I wanted to know.

“Well, you know. Older women. Over fifty. Gray-haired ladies like my mom.” She hesitated and added, “I thought I’d have to carry your luggage for you and do your grocery shopping. But you two are nothing like my mom. She never could make a trip like this. You two rock! You’re definitely a couple of Sisterchicks.”

The term was new to us, but Sue and I exchanged favorable glances and embraced the title. I hoped the word carried the connotation that we were women who were younger on the inside than we appeared to be on the outside.

Paolo approached with our perfectly frothed cappuccinos. We leaned back in our patio chairs and leisurely sipped the satisfying brew.

“This is nice,” I said. I mostly was referring to the leisurely pace of the morning and the way we were able to sit enjoying conversation with this young American woman. Steph must have thought I was referring to the cappuccino.

“I’ll warn you now,” she said. “It will be difficult to go home and try to find coffee like this. The Italians treat their barista skills as a serious art form. You probably already know this, since so many of the coffee terms in the U.S. are in Italian, but ‘espresso’ is an Italian term.”

Sue and I nodded, but honestly, I hadn’t paid much attention before. Although I did love ordering a caramel
macchiato
every now and then, just so I could say the lilting word aloud. Especially if I decided to have the
venti
size.

“Are you ready for me to try to impress you with my Italian?” Steph asked.

“Of course we are,” Sue said sweetly.

“Espresso
comes from the phrase,
espressamente preparato per chi lo richiede
, and that means, ‘expressly prepared for the one who requests it.’ Paolo holds to that tradition. Each cup is made expressly for you. It’s an Italian hospitality thing.”

“It’s a wonderful hospitality thing.” I returned to my cup for another sip.

Across from the café, a young man stepped into the shade of one of the four-story buildings and opened a violin case. He tuned up and began to play out in the open, as if this were a great concert hall and today was first audition. We were the only audience sitting and listening.

“How beautiful,” I murmured.

“Vivaldi.
Four Seasons.”
Sue hummed along with the tune that was only slightly familiar to me. “He’s very good. And look at him, just standing out there in the middle of the street, playing his heart out. You would never see something like that where we live.”

“You’ll see musicians everywhere in Venezia,” Steph said. “And you’ll hear a lot of Vivaldi while you’re here. Vivaldi lived in Venezia, you know. Venetians love to perform his work. Make sure you go to San Marco at least one
night while you’re here. My favorite orchestra is at the Florian, but all of them are good. You’ll be charged a lot just to sit and listen, but that’s part of being in Venezia, right?”

I wasn’t sure what Steph was talking about, but I was sure that Sue’s tour book would explain what the Florian was and why we should go listen to the orchestra playing there.

Steph pulled a few coins from her purse, and Sue and I did the same. We managed to come up with enough euros to cover the bill Paolo had left on the table.

“What about the tip?” Sue asked.

Steph brushed off the notion. “You can round up the total if you like. Locals don’t tip at the small cafés and
trattorias
. Only tourists.”

“At the cafés and what?” Sue asked.

“Trattorias. They’re the small lunch places. They look like bars and have simple menus with sandwiches and some pasta dishes. Some are called
osterias.”

Sue gave Steph a confused look.

“You’ll figure it out. There are lots of places to eat here. All you have to remember is that if you want to be treated like a local, don’t leave a big tip at a small place like this. It’s practically an insult. You can tip at the nicer restaurants if you want, but the service fee usually is included.”

“That’s a change from home,” Sue said.

“A lot of the men here who work as waiters do this as a
career choice. They’re not working their way through school. This is their dream job. They love to serve and to socialize. Paolo, for instance, is the fourth-generation owner of this café. His great-grandfather, also named Paolo, started the café more than a hundred years ago. And most Venetians would consider this a ‘new’ café. Venezia is a tight, traditional community. They still see themselves as pretty independent from the rest of Italy.”

We all called out our farewells to Paolo. He blew a kiss at us. Well, I’m sure the kiss was aimed at Steph, but it still was nice to be next to her when the kiss came her direction.

Steph pretended to ignore the attention and led us across the Campo Apostoli in the opposite direction from the lone violinist. Her skirt swished with each step she took down an alleyway in her clicking, low-heeled sandals. Sue and I trotted behind, coaxing our wheeled luggage over the uneven pavement and trying to prove that for a couple of “mature” women, we still rocked. Well, rocked according to Steph’s definition and not rocked as in about to trip and fall on our faces.

I glanced at Sue as she tried to keep up. Both of us seemed determined to prove we had whatever it took to be Sisterchicks.

S
teph walked down one alley,
then another, then turned and led us past a small sidewalk café with green umbrellas and planters spilling fragrant white alyssum over the edge.

“They have a pretty good breakfast,” she said. “When they’re open. It’s a neighborhood café, so that means they don’t always adhere to set hours.”

“This is the nearest grocery market,” Steph said, as we rumbled past a closed-up building that looked like any other old building on that street.

“Are they open whenever they want to be, too?” I asked.

“No, the market has more normal hours. I don’t know if this one closes during the afternoon or not.”

“Sounds like they take a siesta,” Sue said.

“That’s right. Venetians shut down everything in the
heat of the day. They go home for lunch and a nap and then open again in the cooler part of the evening. At least that’s how it is in the summer. Things change a little when it gets cold.”

“How cold does it get?” By my guess the temperature already was in the low eighties, and it wasn’t even eleven in the morning.

“Very cold. It snowed last winter off and on for two days. The rains are what make a mess of everything, though. When the canals flood, the only way to get around by foot is on raised wooden walkways that really make me nervous. But it shouldn’t rain much while you’re here. At least not pour the way it does in the spring.”

“What about grocery shopping on Sunday?” Sue asked.

“Closed. Almost all local vendors close on the Sabbath. They’ll be open tomorrow.”

Sue gave me a sideways glance as we toted our luggage over a wide footbridge. “We could have a problem finding food for the group before they arrive tonight.”

“I hadn’t thought about that.”

“Take them out to dinner,” Steph suggested. “The restaurants are open on Sundays. I really like a place not far from the apartment that’s on the water. They have great calamari. I’ll make a map for you.”

Sue and I had slowed our pace considerably. Having given up trying to roll our battered luggage over the footbridge, we lifted the heavy beasts by their top handles.

“How much farther is it?” I tried to catch up and not sound as winded as I was feeling.

Steph stopped on the other side of the bridge. A young man in a rowboat in the canal we had just walked over called out to her. She ignored him. “This is your street.
Ca’Zen
. The apartment you’re renting is to the left in the middle of the palace.”

I put down my suitcase and noticed Sue scowled when Steph used the term “palace.” Nothing appeared palatial about the outward appearance of our accommodations. The only bright feature was the balcony that overlooked the canal. But the balcony looked wide enough to fit only a chair. Maybe two chairs. I figured if we could just sit outside and gaze up and down the canal at the other balconies brimming with flowers and watch the world of Venezia float by on the placid water, it wouldn’t matter how medieval the quarters were inside. We could use our imaginations and pretend it was a palace.

At least that’s what I thought until I saw what was inside.

Steph stopped in front of a large, double wooden door. “I guess I should justify my comment about this being a palace.”

Sue gave me a raised-eyebrow look.

“Only the home of the Doge—the ruler of Venice—could be called a palace. All the other mansions were known as a Ca’. So this is Ca’Zen. But I call it a palace.”

Sue continued to look dubious as Steph inserted a long metal key and jiggled it in the keyhole.

“You have to be persuasive with this key sometimes. Come on,
bambino
. Open for me. Here we go.” Steph pushed the door inward, and we stepped into darkness. The flooring felt like uneven dirt as we found our footing and pulled our suitcases in behind us.

“The light is here,” she said with a snap that illuminated our surroundings. The large dirt floor area was empty. It felt like a stall for horses, only no horses plodded the narrow streets of Venice, as they once had long, long ago.

“When you come in, if the light doesn’t turn on automatically, you have to come over to this wall to turn it on. This is the only switch.”

I glanced at Sue and wondered how she was doing with all this. She had relaxed at the café, but if our accommodations turned out to be as dilapidated on the inside as this unluxurious entrance, I didn’t know how she would take it. I had stayed in some pretty primitive locations in my younger days, so this place didn’t frighten me—even with the dirt floors, cracked walls, and a game of blindman’s bluff to find the stairs if the lights didn’t turn on.

“Don’t worry,” Steph added. “The lights usually work. All the other people in this building are pretty understanding if you can’t get the key to work or if you need assistance. None of them speaks English, but they’re all nice people. Watch the first step here. It’s unusually high.”

“It’s marble.” Sue stared at where her feet had landed on the first few steps.

“Yes,” Steph said without stopping her ascent. “The place is filled with marble. All the floors, countertops, even the kitchen sink. I hope you like marble.”

Sue looked as if she were trying to catch her breath. I guessed the shock of so much marble had caught her off guard. When she and Jack moved to a one-story house a few years ago, the kitchen had to be remodeled to accommodate his wheelchair. Sue had dreamed of using marble on one of the smallest counter spaces, but they couldn’t afford to stretch the budget that far. Here, the luminous Italian marble was so plentiful we were walking on it. Walking up three flights of marble stairs.