Patting the Bunny

I had a bad case of the Monday morning grouches today. Perhaps it was because I spent three hours – until midnight- Sunday night combing through an unnamed child’s hair pulling out lice and lice eggs. Then I had to sequester stuffed animals, disinfect hairbrushes and change bedclothes. What is it with the super-snotty French school in Rome ? They claim to be teaching the kids about the French Revolution, Napoleon, Descartes and Victor Hugo– but I swear all they do is fill the kids’ heads with lice. Every blooming year, someone gets them. AARRGGHH.

(And I certainly hope that other mothers will not stick their noses up in the air in disgust when they hear about our lice nightmare, it can happen to anyone)

So when I arrived in the office this morning, I was grouchy. I was supposed to rush out to cover a public workers’ strike in front of the parliament building, stopping first at the post office to film striking employees. As my cameraman, Paolo Lucariello, was gathering up all the equipment I grabbed the microphone and started jiving around the office singing “She works hard for her money, so hard for it honey, she works hard for her money, so you better treat her right!” (Anyone remember Donna Summer? Click here to see music video) Paolo and our accountant, Marco Guerrieri, certainly did not, and looked at me strangely. “What’s that supposed to mean?” said Paolo. “That I don’t want to carry the tripod today,” I answered. Part of being an agency television producer is there is no glamour, just schlepping around the tripod all the time. Marco offered to carry the tripod as far as the post office.

At the post office there was a sign on the door saying that the workers would be striking for the three hours at the end of their shifts. But what really interested me was the graffiti beside the door to the Post Office where someone had written in rather attractive loopy handwriting, “Me Ne Frego,” translated that means “I don’t care.”

As far as I can tell that might as well be the motto for Italian postal workers in Rome. Going to the post office is often a traumatic experience. One has to punch a button on a machine that gives you a number, but you have to choose which button. Different services have different lines and different numbers. I usually go to the post office armed with newspapers, books, and blackberry, get my number and prepare to wait patiently. Once one’s number is finally called, one has to take a deep breath and enter into a zen state. The Rome Postal Worker does not care (“se ne frega”) about your postal needs and would much rather tell you that you have the wrong number, to go back and press another button and start all over again. Sigh.

But today “Me Ne Frego” seemed to sum up my mood. “I Don’t Care”. I am a week away from Christmas, I have hardly done any shopping, I have no money, I don’t know what I am going to cook and I DON’T CARE!!! This sentiment brings me back to an important childhood memory, one of my favorite books, “Pierre” by Maurice Sendak.

I can still remember the opening paragraph by heart:

“There Once was a boy named Pierre,

Who only would say, “I don’t Care”

Read his story my friend,

And you’ll find at the end,

That a suitable moral lies there.”

For anyone who does not know this charming little story, Pierre tells anyone who will ask him– his mother and his father especially– “I don’t care”. Finally he meets a hungry lion who eats him up.

You can check out the delightful version of the book sung by Carole King if you Click Here

 

I was hoping this morning that a lion would come along and eat me up and solve all my Christmas-related problems. As it is, the only lions in Rome are the many lion statues around the city, so no luck there.

And since working for a Television news agency is a non-stop, round-the-clock, never-let-up kind of job, this afternoon we decided we would do a feature story tomorrow on the Catholic organization Sant’Egidio releasing their annual guide to Rome for the homeless. The guide tells homeless people where they can find food, shelter and medical help.

A little aside here on Sant’Egidio. It is an impressive organization that does an enormous amount in Italy for the homeless, elderly, the Rom (gypsy) population and immigrants to name a few of their projects, and around the globe pushing for peace in war-torn countries, and fighting AIDS in Africa.

So this afternoon another APTN cameraman, Pietro De Cristofaro, had to go film some homeless people in the city. He asked me if I knew where to find some. Since I tend to be more conscious of women, two homeless women immediately came to mind. The first is a woman, clearly of African origin, who stands everyday in Rome’s famous Largo Torre Argentina and dances and sings cheerful songs as she begs near the Tram stop.

Another woman I have frequently noticed as I pass by on the bus, sits on a little patch of grass at the edge of Rome’s lovely Villa Borghese Park. The 160 bus goes up the chic Via Veneto – known as the center of “La Dolce Vita” – cruising past the US Embassy, the 5-star Excelsior and Regina Baglioni hotels, and the Cafe’ De Paris, and passes through the old Roman wall and on the other side of the intersection, there she is. A little homeless lady, sitting on the grass, surrounded by all sorts of bags and packages,  quietly patting a bunny. Yes, patting a a real, live bunny.

This, of course, brings another childhood book to my mind “Pat the Bunny.”

 

What is it about gently caressing a cat, dog, or bunny that has such a calming influence? Every time I see that woman I think patting that bunny must be soothing her, making her forget that she is poor, homeless and probably has no place to go and nothing to eat.

And that brings me back to Pierre: The book finally reveals its “suitable moral”

when Pierre declares loudly and clearly, “Yes, indeed, I CARE!”

 

So, to convince myself that I really do care, I am going to try to find the time to do something for those two women this week. I will ask that any of my blog readers who live in Rome do the same. They are easy to find. If you are near the Tram stop at Largo Torre Argentina, you will see the happy, singing African woman. And if you are at the top of Via Veneto, cross over to Villa Borghese and you will see the bunny-patter. Stop by, give these women some spare change, some Christmas chocolates or cookies and maybe ask them their names, where they are from and perhaps also the name of the bunny.