O Muse, How Fair Thou Art!

I found this picture online while looking through fine arts posters. If I may be so bold, I would like to offer up the opinion that the girl in this painting resembles me slightly in profile. Of course now my hair is shorter and not straight like it is in my picture, so in currently I probably resemble the painting more than my own picture.

This painting, Juliette, was painted in 1898 by an English painter John William Waterhouse, who is one of my all-time favorite artists of the Pre-Raphaelite Era. After further research I discovered that Waterhouse was actually born in Italy and lived there for a few years in the mid to late 19th century. Just to make things interesting, I will note that I still had ancestors in Italy around that time.

So I suggest that since the image in this picture closely resembles me and seeing its Italian subject, Juliette was from Verona, I’d like to propose that the model for this image is a distant relation of mine. Of course this is completely fictitious and has no historical evidence to back up my claim, but nevertheless, I would like to create a small history in pieces for her.

The sun was low in the sky that morning as I head out with my older sister Maria to the market. The humidity in the air clings to our clothing as the fog has not yet been cleared by the awakening sun. The city is already awake as we enter the main thoroughfare. Shopkeepers, merchants, farmers, and fishermen have their shops set up along both sides of the street. As Maria and I proceed down the road, the crowd thickened with people.

I like the hum of the streets. The smell of them not so much, but the movement and energy I love. There are so many things to see and hear. I would like to stop and look, but Maria drags me along next to her. Guided by Maria, I let my mind wander down pathways to the spice tents and over the seas to their birthplaces in the Far East.

We finally stop at our first destination, the Convent of Santa Cecilia, to drop off our packages to the nuns who dwell there. Our mother bakes about half a dozen loaves of bread. All of them go to the sisters of Santa Cecilia. Mama says that God smiles on those who give food to those who have little. God must have a huge grin for us, because everyday rain or shine, Maria and I make our pilgrimage to the convent to drop off the bread.

By all means, please do not think that I am being disrespectful. I have no qualms about bringing bread to the sisters. In fact, I enjoy the walk and the convent. Inside the walls, there are fountains and rose gardens to which the sisters tend. It is cool and refreshing, especially in the hot summer months when the entire city bakes in the cruel and unrelenting sun.

Today the roses are beautiful. Their sweet perfume permeates throughout the piazza. I bend over to smell one, taking a deep breath to draw in their scent. Then, as if evaporated from thin air, Sister Pietro Maria appears. Sister Pietro Maria never speak, she has taken a vow of silence like a few of the other nuns in the convent. Nevertheless, she is always kind to me and says more with a smile than many people can say in an hour long lecture, hint, hint Gianna Cavelli.

I would like to stay and walk with Sister among the roses for a bit, but my real sister is giving me that “come here now, we’re ready to go look” followed by much snapping and gesticulating for me to follow her. I sigh and shrug my shoulders at Sister Pietro who smiles a little knowing smile. Before I leave, she snips a rose from one of the bushes and gives it to me. I thank her and hastily pursue my extremely impatient sister.

We make the remainder of our stop around the city. Bargaining, buying, and trading with different merchants and shop owners. Around noon, we stop to rest near a wall that was once part of an ancient Roman building of some sort. As I stand, mulling things over in my mind smelling the rose that Sister Pietro gave me, I notice that I am being watched by a strange man. I look around to see if maybe he is looking at something else. But no, he is definitely staring at me. Apparently he does not know that it’s rude to stare. My eyebrows draw close together and my lips purse in displeasure. I mention the man to Maria. She doesn’t like him either, and we decide to move and continue our chores.

Later we return home to help Mama with dinner. Papa and our brothers come home from the shop. With them, they have a guest: it’s the man from the street who was so rudely staring at me today!