We wake up at 1 AM, flying into the dawn and are somewhere between Lyons and
Grenoble, at the southern end of the Alps in France. The snow-covered peaks float
serenely with cloud pillows wrapped about them. They look as if they are floating in
the sky. The jagged peaks speak of crevices and icy passes that daunted travelers for
eons. Hannibal really did try to come through that pass? With elephants. What a
bozo!

A few minutes later, we are watching a huge island I never saw before in the
Mediterranean slip beneath us. I have to look it up when I get home. We are not far
from the coast of Italy, the sky is gorgeous, the day is perfecto.

We land at DaVinci, also called Fumciano?. We are on the ground, I am walking
through the terminal, following the signs for baggage. After a bit, I locate the
caravelle and watch for my brown bag. The only brown bag on the entire dadgummed
flight. What an original! Now, I try to find a cambio. I use my credit card to
withdraw 200 Euros. Let’s see, that’s about $300 American dollars.
Because we are doing terrible in the money markets. Our trade deficit is ridiculous.
Why is it that GM is doing poorly? Should be beating the ass off Japanese
automakers.

Now, I have to find a bus to Ostia. Go to the tobacconist. He sells bus tickets. I
ask for a ticket to Ostia. He sells me an express ticket to Rome, via train. But I do
not realize this until much later.

Someone sends me to wait for the bus outside terminal C. Many people assure me
that the bus comes there. No, it does not. Besides, I examine the ticket and realize
that it is a train ticket. Back I go to the tobacconist. I now reek of cigarette
smoke, having stood in Terminal C’s outside smoking area for the nonexistent
bus. I ask for the bus to Ostia. There are no tickets, he said. “They are
finito.”

Fortunately, a fellow (who it turns out is a former tour guide with a peculiar
fondness for Americans) tells me that it’s okay to get on the bus, even if I
don’t have a ticket. He has to do the same thing since the tobacconist is out
of tickets. He guides me down through a maze to an obscure sign that says autobus,
then out the doors, through another set of steps, back outside, and voila, there is
another terminal C with a bus area. He leads me to it, then unfolds his paper, steps
away, checks the timetable, says it will come in 20 minutes and begins reading. When
the bus comes, I struggle to put my pack on, hang onto the laptop and disentangle it
from the shaft of the brown suitcase. I cannot get it off. I am running to the bus,
jouncing the back pack and trying to not fall over on my elevated, sensible Dutch
clogs. I am stumbling onto the bus and the nice young man grabs the suitcase and
hauls it up the steps. I am a grandmother of three, I tell myself. It is okay for
young men to look after old dowagers. At the end of the line, I struggle to pick up
all three things again and marshall the strength to either haul or throw the suitcase
down the steps. The driver looks at me and says, “Do you want help?” Do I
want help? “Oh, si, grazie, grazie,” I say. He unfolds his legs from
beneath the steering wheel, picks up the suitcase and hefts it down the steps, I
follow, meekly. Am I really a revolutionary? I don’t think I want to travel
without my husband ever again. Either that, or I want to have an entourage of
captains, tour guides, and others willing to treat me like the senior citizen I
am.

In Ostia Centrale, I haul my bags over to the taxi stand while the drivers lounge
against cabs, trees, racks, and the taxi building (labeled “Taxi.”) there
is a rotund man sitting inside, with the kiosk window closed, playing solitaire. One
of the drivers, the first in line, stares at the taxi manager, waits a few moments,
and says “let’s go.” We get into the car and drive off, non con
permisso. We are at the camp. I stand at the window waiting for someone to show up at
the reception desk. A worker approaches and is really helpful, even though he is not
the receptionist. He finds my “bungalow.” This is an optimistic
description. The building is supposed to be able to house two people, with a bath and
hot water. It is after all, a camp, so I expect rustic. We walk paste latrines,
showers, open air laundry, tents, campers, and there are these little brown boxes
sitting up on concrete blocks. It looks like, looks like: I know, like a sauna! Same
kind of wood. A bit bigger, but a sauna with a window. And a bathroom with a toilet
that has no seat. A little sink, a shower. It is good I am not seriously overweight.
Most Americans could not get into that shower.

I inquire as to whether one can rent a toilet seat. No, one cannot.
“It’s okay, the receptionist tells me. It’s just you.” I
decide to eat some lunch. I drink two glasses of red wine. Soft red wine. I go to
bed. When I awaken, it is four o’clock and I’m thinking about going into
town to try to find internet access.

Isaac and Marlene arrive. Here is Luigi DiPaoli! Heaven. Suddenly, in the eyes of
the receptionist, I become legitimate. A real person, not a weeny little American
with a terrible president. I tell her that we are preparing for a big meeting in Rome
and we need to do some media work, need the internet for that. Is there anyway we can
get on the internet? She says the computer is broken and they have a lot of problems
with it. Doesn’t look too hopeful for the morning, but she’s impressed
about the media part so she offers the office computer. Now we’re getting
somewhere. I send out an urgent message to the rest of the conclave team: bring
towels, none are furnished! Suddenly, the manager is handing out toilet paper. She
promises to turn on the heat at night. The restaurant will open at 7. We are working!
The papal conclave project will take off, on schedule as planned some 5 years ago. I
am here, Cardinal Law is in Rome, looking sad and embarrassed. Maybe I will go visit
him and tell him that God wants him to do something about how messed up the church is
and he can play an important role, restoring the church to it’s meaningfulness
once more to a jaded society that is really, truly hungry for a vision that makes
sense in today’s war-torn, miserable world where sex is not obscene, but
starving children, people living in tiny shacks beside railroad tracks and
superhighways, in caves on river banks, and leaving their children so they can work
as garbagewomen 12 hours a day are obscenities.

Good night!