Life's a beach in Italy

10 JUNE CREVALCORE—Last Friday, we loaded up the car and headed for the beach. The trip out on the Autostrada A14 wasn’t too bad since most people had gone down the day before. Summer has officially started and the beach towns are brimming with vacationers. Cesenatico is nice because it is where a lot of “regular” people with families go. There are really chic areas like Rimini where all of the model wannabes and partiers go but Cesenatico is really Italian (just some German tourists) and really family oriented. It’s so Italo-German that I can’t even get an English newspaper though there are jillions of magazines and papers in German.

Franco and Vanda were waiting for us when we arrived. We had some dinner together then Stef and I took a loooong walk to the Da Vinci-designed canal to people watch and eat ice cream while her parents played cards with their friends back at the apartment. We had decided to walk down to the canal (a couple of miles) then take the bus back. This was almost our last decision as we had the bus ride from hell on the way back.

Apparently the guy driving the number one bus, our bus, was the only one who showed that night. (They usually have at least two or three of any bus on a route at a time when it’s busy.) The 11:30 bus didn’t show until 12:15. It was packed to the gills. Stefania, as well as many others, asked him what took so long. Evidently, he had been asked that question one too many times that night, slammed the door shut and took off before we could even get our tickets stamped in the little machine. We shouldn’t have paid. He drove like a madman, running over curbs, careening around roundabouts and almost getting in a wreck. People were whistling and cursing at him but he didn’t seem to care. After what seemed like an eternity we got off at our stop, walked home and crashed into the sleeper sofa.

Saturday we went to the beach, played tennis and then went to a great osteria under new management in Bellaria. The people were so nice and the food excellent. We then took a walk down to the main drag which is a really long pedestrian-only tree-covered avenue lined with shops and caffe’s. Best people watching there is. Young people rode on the handlebars of their friends’ bikes, kids with ice cream mustaches screamed in delight, old folks spoke in dialect on park benches. I know, it’s a tough job.

At any rate, my belly was so full that night that when I woke up in the morning I thought I hadn’t slept. I had those lucid dreams all night long and was convinced I wasn’t sleeping. Apparently I slept well for I felt really good when I got up.
We had breakfast on the terrace followed by a trip down to the harbor where we loaded up Franco’s sailboat and went out for a spin. The weather was perfect. Enough wind but not too much. I worked the lines of the mainsail, Stefania was responsible for keeping the jib from fowling when we tacked and Franco worked the tiller. It’s quite a workout on a small boat. You have to really watch where you sit to maintain proper trim of the boat. Then when we tack, I have to duck real low under the boom as I let go of one line then jump to the other side of the boat while pulling another line taut in order to move the jib from one side to the other as the mainsail swings overhead. You have to do it quickly and correctly because if you mess up and the sails do not remain properly oriented to the wind the boat loses power and becomes difficult to steer. I can’t believe that Franco goes out by himself sometimes. This boat is fully manual. He doesn’t have any winches or and autorolling jib. He has to coordinate this whole ballet alone. Fortunately, he isn’t allowed to go farther than three miles from shore but still, one crack of the boom against your head and you’re in the drink far from shore, hopefully wearing your life jacket. Luckily, my mom and dad forced me to learn to swim when I was little and I eventually took to it, even swimming competitively for a year or two, so I’m not afraid of the water. Stefs parents keep asking me if I know how to swim, though. Her mom doesn’t like to go on the boat because she can’t swim well. After going out a few times on the sea in a small sailboat I can definitely see that it isn’t a place for those who can’t swim or are afraid of the water. There’s alot to do, you’re really close to the water and if you make a big mistake you could capsize the boat. That is why Franco wants to buy a much bigger boat. One of those used Beneteaus that can sleep two to four. They really are much safer and ironically much easier to sail than the 420s or other small Olympic-class boats. A good used boat costs as much as a car so it’s not out of the realm of possibilities. We were drooling over the six-figure boats in port, though. Very sweet.

After the boat ride, we went back to the apartment and had to pack up. Everyone would be clogging the Autostrada back to Bologna. We left about three and took the back roads home. It took us only about three hours to get home. Good decision. The Autostrada from Cesena to Bologna turned into a parking lot. It would have taken us six hours for a normal 90-minute drive. The back roads are nice. They are two-lane SPs or Strade Provincali that have bypasses past most of the villages now. There are just a few spots where there are some lights that cause slight back ups. We’re going again this weekend. The twins will be there. Hope they don’t scream for mommy all night. I must now pay for the sins of my childhood.

In the meantime, leads for jobs have dried up. The one that I had a meeting for is looking for someone who has experience in that particular field of catalogue and brochure design. I don’t blame them. The language barrier at the professional level is a concern of mine and I’m sure of prospective employers. The design world is a world of tight deadlines and very technical discussions with printers and clients. I do fine in most contexts but have no real experience in this field even in the States. They basically told this to me to my face though not so bluntly. I could learn to do anything but most of these firms are small and probably don’t have time to hold my hand until I learn to do product layout and all of the necessary vocabulary that goes along with it. I’ve found a couple of other small design firms but don’t have any contact people. Website design seems to be a viable market although I don’t know how to do that. I’ve also noted that the firms usually have a video and a 3-d animation specialist. I sent my stuff to one, unsolicited but of course didn’t hear anything. We’ll see. In the meantime I’ve been learning another program at home and riding my bike....a lot.

I’ve been going farther and farther exploring the local countryside. I almost got hit by a car the other day but I read the play and dodged getting sacked. It was on the least-traveled road I ride going over a small bridge. I saw the guy coming and figured he didn’t see me, which he didn’t, and would try to cut the corner coming off the bridge, which he did. I saw this developing and yelled at the top of my voice. He had his window down and corrected at the last instant. I already had my foot out of the pedal and was ready to jump when he caught himself. Man, it scared him more than it did me. I think he really shit his pants. I cursed at him and continued on my way. Don’t tell my mom, but if I had a quarter for every time that’s happened to me, I’d be a rich man. I can think of worse ways to go.

Johnny’s rules of the road: The key, my causal cyclist friends, is to always pretend you’re invisible and learn to anticipate when drivers can’t see you. The most dangerous places to ride are actually the lonely country roads; drivers speed up, cut corners and aren’t paying attention. Cyclists surprise them. I actually feel safer on a rather busy two-lane highway, once you get used to cars whipping by really close. Drivers pay more attention. The next worst place is your average suburban street. People pull out from any old place without looking but they’re usually going slow, sipping a latte and talking on their stupid cell phone. The absolute worst place is when you have the right of way on any street and you see someone at a stop sign waiting to turn into your path and staring straight ahead. I will not, I repeat, will not cross in front of them unless I have made solid eye contact. I have come to a complete stop on Massachusetts Street in Lawrence when I saw some guy napping in his car at a stop. I inched right up to him and yelled and waved to snap him out of his reverie. Nice expression though. Don’t ride too close to parked cars either. Ever gotten doored before? Don’t go there. I’m not a Safety Dad but wear a helmet. My worst wreck was a self-inflicted, 5 mph-crash over an unseen speed bump. I flipped over my handlebars and landed on my head. Shattered my helmet, not my skull. Slow-speed crashes are often worse than high-speed crashes that racers get into; the full force of the blow is absorbed by the body. I saw a crash at over 40 mph in the Giro the other day and the guy got up and walked a way with just some road rash. At higher speeds, provided there isn’t a hard, immovable object in the way, you slide on the ground and dissipate the full force of the impact. Cycling can be dangerous but, with the proper precautions, it is probably less dangerous than eating a hamburger or at your local salad bar. More people die from food poisoning every year (about 9,000 in the U.S.) than get hit by cars on their bikes. It happens, but in the grand scheme of things, it is a risk I’m willing to take.

Well, I’m 39 today and I always ride my age (in miles) on my birthday. Time to suit up. See you on the roads. Keep the shiny side up.