Somehow everything I want and need withou erything erything I want and need omehow omehow my plates have without need trying. trying. have

I went home and prepared a Caprese salad, it cost three euros, one euro per ingredient, excluding olive oil because my neighbor made too much to use before it expired, (but I know she really just wanted la studentessa americana to try some).

In the most simplistic way, at that moment, I was living within my means. It was the best feeling, I felt free. My body hurt less. I spent more time in the sunlight and even more time with friends. A bottle of good wine was four euros–we would drink it on the balcony while we discussed our days, shitty ex-boyfriends, and our favorite songs while waiting for the restaurant to open at eight. It was easier to decide what to eat, I wasn’t worrying about what is “healthy” because I knew that it didn’t matter, I was eating good food. The shopkeeper told me where everything was from when I checked out. I’m pretty sure he thought I was stupid, but I didn’t mind. Somehow my plate had everything I wanted and needed without trying.

My Italian professor yelled at me and bought my croissant when I told him I hadn’t had breakfast that morning.

“Food is how you live. It’s simple.”

Our class always took a few minutes’ break to go down to the coffee shop on campus to eat and drink there, sometimes continuing the class discussion, sometimes talking about nothing – but there is an everythingness to what we talk about.

Sitting under the sun, while pieces of my croissant flaked off from biting into it, I couldn’t help but wonder why it can’t be like this at home. I knew it couldn’t. My gut ached, realizing there was no way I would be able to find food so fresh, so cheap, and so readily available in America. I knew that there will always be an assignment looming. I will always be expected to do something. That’s what aches – knowing that I would have to abandon this slow living that has given me more peace than I had ever been able to generate on my own.

This slow living is real, and it is something Italy is trying to harness, trying to push us to see that life does not have to be so painfully fast. “In Italy, 18 towns and cities presently comply with the prerequisites envisaged in the [‘Citta Slow’] statute and have thus been certified as ‘Città Slow’, many others are in the process of being certified and more are still waiting to be taken into consideration.” These “Slow Cities” have to go through various bureaucratic processes; however, they are saving people, conserving communities, and preserving a way of life that is not so incredibly plagued by capitalism.