Moving

Of course, one of the most stressful parts of my return to the US is the fact that I have to move. I've been in Italy for almost four years, so this means that I have a lot of stuff - from t-shirts to dishes to the records of my Italian bank account - and I have to somehow move it across the ocean. That is, some of it will move across the ocean, and some of it will end up in a trash can. It's a stressful mess and I don't wish it on anyone!

The only positive part of this moving experience is that I'm enjoying getting to know the post office workers; the best way to transfer my stuff is by ship, which is less exorbitantly priced and customs-officer-harassed than the UPS/airplane method. I've collected various boxes from the supermarket (every time I do my food shopping, the cashiers now ask me how my move is going and if I've managed to deal with all my books), filled them, taped them up and wrapped them in packaging paper, and sent them off. My obsessive taping has garnered many compliments from the postal workers (not one, but ALL of them), that "THIS is how a package is prepared"; here we are talking about truly ugly, masking tape covered boxes, but apparently security trumps neatness. My taping, and my equally anxious compilation of customs forms ("23 pairs of socks, 3 photographs, 2 pairs of jeans, etc") has made me a fast friend of the Italian post office.

Yesterday this burgeoning love affair was further promoted by one of the stranger employees, a woman who resembles a forest elf and has the corresponding voice and slightly antisocial air about her. As we settled my payment for the package (about sixty euros), she peered up at me from under her gray bangs and said that she wanted to attach the full tariff in the form of postage stamps (!!) to the package instead of simply printing out the mailing label. This, she informed me, was the most picturesque way to send a package, and August being a slow month, she could take the time to attach each of the 100 necessary stamps in order to render my box a bit more attractive. As her supervisor glared at her, I nodded my assent (what else could I do?) and headed home to pick up the next box and fill out the next set of forms. When I came back 40 minutes later, there she was, still attaching each stamp individually with a glue stick.

This woman's desire to pay attention to the details and make even the most boring items look pretty is pretty much the most Italian characteristic ever. I will miss this country so much.