Without fail, every time Dan and I start the morning with a cappuccino at Matucci’s, we run into Egle. I want to say she’s a “very sweet old” Italian lady, but in truth, she’s likely younger than I am. Let’s just say she and I are mutual “elderly friends.”
Egle is a wonderful chatterbox who doesn’t speak a word of English. I cannot yet converse in Italian, though I study it enough that I recognize words here and there and try to understand the overall context of what’s being said. Sometimes, I’ve pieced together conversations that Egle has with me enough to convince her I know more than I do, and she rejoices when she realizes I’ve actually learned some more words in Italian. Regardless, we greet each other with a hug whenever we see each other, and she always seems genuinely happy to see me, especially each time we return to Italy and she sees me again for the first time.
Being the optimistic extrovert that she is, she frequently meets up with her friends when she comes into the cafe (a coffeeshop is called a “bar” in Italy), but sometimes she will pull up a chair with Dan and me and chatter away with such pleasant, cheerful enthusiasm. If I really can’t understand her, we both pull out our phones and translate our conversation back and forth.
“Ogni giorno, sei felice!” I told her in my halting Italian. “Every day, you’re happy.” And it’s true. She always seems optimistic, pleasant, and happy. It was only through another bilingual mutual friend that I found out her husband is quite disabled (perhaps with dementia) and she cares for him faithfully with patience and perseverance. Yet she never feels sorry for herself.
Since we had to cut our trip to Italy short this time, I tried to tell her why we were leaving so soon. “Devo tornare in America per un intervento al cuore,” I stumbled through my explanation that I must return to America for heart surgery. She understood, and was genuinely concerned. Grabbing a scrap of paper, she wrote down her phone number so I could WhatsApp her, as she told me (in Italian, of course) to make sure and let her know how it goes.
We’re back in America now, but from that point on, Egle has regularly texted me cheerful notes, photos of colorful flowers, and comments to brighten my day. I wrote to her (in Italian) that my surgery will be next week. Immediately, she sent me another lovely photo of a beautiful plant under which she wrote, “Ti pensavo in questo giorni –un abbraccio forte,” “I’ve been thinking about you lately– sending you a big hug!”
I don’t know if I will ever know enough Italian to have a proper conversation with Egle, but that’s definitely my goal. Life certainly brings about such a wonderful variety of friends– some comically unlikely– in so many different forms. And just like the photos of flowers that Egle sends to me, each of them is unique, varied– and yet every one of them, like Egle herself, is uniquely beautiful.