It’s been a long while since I penned anything whilst on a moving bus, so we shall see if I still have the knack for it.
One thing I will definitely say, the buses that take us to and from the Eternal City are certainly not rattle-traps, these are decidedly comfy.
Rome itself is, of course vast, and I’ve been lucky enough to visit at least a small portion of it. But within Rome’s boundaries is an entirely different country – literally. Although I have a deep amount of respect for the extremely high religious significance of the Vatican, I have to admit that that’s not the reason I took the tour. Not the reason I’ve been trying to get on this tour for several seasons. What draws me here? Is one of the largest art museums in the world.
Art. Historian’s. Dream.
It’s been a long time since I took the bus into Rome. It’s a long ride, and at least we’re in off season at the moment so the traffic is not as “eternal” as the rest of the city! Once our guide has finished giving us the run down of everything we need to know and what we will not be seeing (despite the fact that this tour was clearly labeled “Vatican Museum” there are still some guests who were apparently expecting a tour of Rome itself), she lets us rest for the rest of the trip in. Which is good, because were all loaded onto the bus before eight in the morning!
And when you come out of your bus-induced doze. You’re in Rome.
That’s the thing about my job, forever waking up in a difference place than you fell asleep in!
Once we’ve all collected our things together and crossed the boarded from Italy into the Vatican (the entrance to which looks much more like a hotel lobby at first) our guide hands out the tickets and reminds us to hang onto them tightly until we’ve had them stamped.
No one as low as a tour group is permitted to enter the Sistine Chapel through the front doors (which should surprise no one!) and there are no cameras allowed once inside, so we all stand shivering in the courtyard waiting while our assigned Vatican guide explains which painting is which and which things we should pay attention to when we eventually get there (my personal favourite is still the complainer who got himself painted into hell…with donkey ears no less).
Michelangelo is not after all, the only artist who’s work graces the walls of the Sistine; the works under the windows are Botticelli for one, and there are countless others whose names may never be known.
There is so much of this I don’t remember, but am aware that at one point I did know. There was a time when I could have told you where on the ceiling Michelangelo’s self-portrait was located – but those days are locked up in the filing cabinet of my memory and I can’t always figure out how to unlock them.
Moving past the lobby we find ourselves in the shadow of the famous Dome of St Peter’s, falling over the sprawling gardens that make up over a third of the Vatican’s property. Italian formal gardens do not traditionally have flowerbeds, and are green all year round – something I didn’t know before today.
The gardens here feature a labyrinthine, and I can’t help but wonder what it would be like to take a book and get lost there – a terribly sacrilegious thought I’m sure.
Until 1931 no one was ever allowed in here, but there is so much here.
And yet, so much was destroyed, or dismantled or… ‘cleaned up’. The amount of classical artwork that was altered is so famous that it is literally known as the ‘great castration’, and yes, that means precisely what you think it does. When I studied that time period in art history I often found myself wondering if somewhere in some archive there is a box…
I won’t finish that thought…you can though
It’s impossible to see the whole museum in a day, it’s impossible to see even just one piece of in it a day. Had we not had a guide to shuffle us on wards we would have gotten terribly lost. We moved too quickly to take proper pictures…and it seemed like just one corridor, but in reality I lost track of how many twists and turns and tapestries we went by before reaching our ultimate goal.
The stairway down to the Sistine is unadorned, but once you enter your eyes are overwhelmed by the colour, by the sheer visual wealth and your ears are stunned by the silence – there is no speaking allowed within the Sistine walls…
And all you can do is look up…there is no sculpting on the ceiling of the Sistine; it looks as though there is, in fact, you would swear that there are sculptures of people up there, but there aren’t, it’s an illusion. But it doesn’t matter, because that’s not what you’re looking for, or looking at…not really. Your eyes find it, they can’t help it – it draws your gaze – dominating the vast array of the rest of the ceiling; the stretching fingertip of the divine reaching down to earth. I studied that image of course, every Art History student does, but to see it, to really see it, draws tears out of your eyes before you realize you are capable of a reaction.
There is no photography allowed in the Sistine, as it is a danger to the frescos – but it doesn’t matter, a photograph could never capture this. Better to let it sear itself onto your memory. Things like this are better left to the colour palette of dreams and imagination.
Leaving the glory of the Sistine behind, we made our way thorugh the breathtaking masterpiece that is the St Peter’s basicallia. I have seen it before, a long time ago, and it’s not something you forget, but the sight of Bernini’s canopy still makes my jaw drop. Pure awe. Nothing more, nothing less. They say after all that the word “awful” used to mean something quite different than it has come to mean today – and if anything could be said to be ‘full of awe’, places like this truly are.
There is something about Italy that continually manages to heal me. Something in my soul can come here broken and come out whole. There are – of course – other places (many of which I have been fortunate enough to see) that offer other things just as amazing in their own way. New York has Broadway, London has ..countless things…Spain has amazing cathedrals …but there is something about Italy.
Would I want to live here? I don’t know – I’ve never really given it much thought – but I think it’s good for me to come back here, once in a while.
It being Italy, and life being life, there are always people I wish were here. People I wish I could grab by the hand and drag – giggling – into my world. You know who you are, and you know I’m thinking of you. Always. All of you. You’re my own personal angels (and – by your own admission, occasionally devils) – on my shoulders.
No matter whether I’m in Alaska or Italy or anywhere else in this crazy world, that will never change.