Seven Seasons in Siena (22 page)

But after another moment's reflection, I regain some composure. After all, Giovanna has just cooked me an absolutely lovely dinner and waved away Dario's wallet when he had the temerity to produce it, which means that in addition to being delicious it was a gift; so if she wants to find me appalling, I'm more than willing to grant her the privilege. Also, I'm sufficiently familiar with the Tuscan character to know that declarations made in the heat of argument are seldom deeply felt. And in fact twenty minutes later—when we've moved on to some after-dinner shots of grappa—she sits by my side and, her mood now lightened by a good smoke and a rousing argument (two great Tuscan pleasures), shows me some photos stored on her cellphone. They're of a recent Panther victory, which was apparently made all the sweeter by the radio announcer having first called the race for Eagle, the Panther's
bitter enemy—only to have a video replay alter the verdict for the Panther. This kind of thing—not only winning but tearing the victory away from your already celebrating rival—is, for a Sienese, the purest joy imaginable. And in fact Giovanna mentions that this was, in her opinion, the victory of the century.

“I wasn't there,” she says. “I was at a wedding, so at first I heard only that the Eagle had won. I cried all through the ceremony. Then afterward—well, you can imagine how I felt when I heard the news!” She's beaming, showing me photo after photo of the festivities that followed.

I tell her, “Giovanna, look at what you're doing. You've just been saying ‘The Palio is dead,' but here you are sharing with me this extraordinary moment in your life, and
it's a Palio.
” She gives me a look—one that I encounter often in these parts—that clearly conveys,
What has that got to do with it?
There are obviously subtleties at work here that I don't—and may never—understand.

It's become rather clear that any disdain Giovanna feels for me is due to my having signed my soul over to the Caterpillar without even getting to know the alternatives. Whatever the case, one more shot of grappa is poured. Dani and I go back to discussing the Sienese. I say, with the passionate conviction that only the truly visionary or the truly drunk can summon forth, “In every society, there are frictions, passions, turbulent emotions—yet here they're organized.” Actually, the word I used is
sistemati
—which doesn't have an exact English analogue. It means not merely organized but arranged—managed. It's a difficult word for an American to comprehend in all its nuances. I don't think I really got it myself till I came to Siena.

Eventually I find myself at the door with Dario, donning my coat and saying goodbye to Giovanna and Dani and Gnagno. I'm a bit unsteady on my feet, but I wouldn't have said no to another grappa—or even one after that. Never mind that it would be wrong and evil and harmful to my future prospects; I'm feeling … 
headlong
. Happy to be back and contemptuous of all restraint.

And thus ready for my return to the contrada, tomorrow night.

…

 
I'VE BARELY RECOVERED
—
FROM EITHER THE JET LAG
or the grappa—yet I find myself back in Società L'Alba for another Dinner with the Captain. It is, I learn, the last such; I thought it was an ongoing series, but no, it's been a special program, and tonight Gianni retires from his hosting duties. It's time for him to turn his attention to the coming Palio.

The menu for the night comes as a surprise: it's heavy on tripe, which is something you just don't see in America, given our general squeamishness. But this is one of the ways in which I feel definitely more European than Yank; I can't gobble up the stuff fast enough. Not only is it thoroughly delicious, it's a matter of principle. Any responsible carnivore will consume
everything
edible on an animal; to do any less is wasteful, disrespectful, and—dare I say it?—unnatural.

As if the tripe weren't enough, there's a risotto made with lampredotto, a Tuscan specialty. Tripe comes from the first three chambers of the cow's stomach; lampredotto from the fourth. It has a wonderfully pungent flavor, and I'm an immediate fan. Dario tells me that there are lampredotto vendors who ply their wares in carts between Siena and Florence, serving the delicacy on slabs of bread.

I'm seated at a table with some of Dario's friends—Luigi, Luciano, Katia. I feel much more at ease around them than I used to, and the feeling seems increasingly reciprocal. Just across the table from me is Daniele, a very tall, very handsome, casually elegant type whose clothes look as though they were sewn onto his body. It doesn't surprise me to learn that he's from Milan. He's here because he married a brucaiola—though she seems to be seated elsewhere. Very nice guy, though I wonder that I seem suddenly to be talking to so many non-Sienese. Maybe Giovanna has a point; maybe the incursion of people like Daniele and me has permanently altered the whole tone of contrada life, and by extension the Palio.

While I'm stewing over this, Gianni seems to be enjoying himself tremendously, possibly from relief at knowing that this is the last dinner he'll have to host. All his reserve has melted away; he's relaxed, funny, charming. I'm glad for him; he deserves one night of pure pleasure in the spotlight, because the weeks and months ahead are going to be grueling.

Already, there's a hint of winter exhaustion hanging over the room and a kind of valedictory air to the dinner, as though afterward we're all going to go home, climb under the covers, and hibernate till spring. That's not really an option for me. I'm here for only a limited time, I have to make the most of it. I don't want to seem like a voyeur—though I sometimes feel like one—but observation is the first step to integration. Otherwise I'll remain a strange man in a strange land. And so the next day, despite a steady downpour, I have Dario drop me back in Siena.

The rain doesn't let up all day, so that I'm driven to take refuge in one after another of the city's museums, churches,
and civic buildings; none of which lacks beauty or interest, but I've seen them all before. What I've come for is
life
—the present tense, the vital, urgent, turbulent surge forward; the communal experience, so passionate in all its particulars, that differentiates this city, these people, from any I've ever encountered elsewhere. What I've come for is to tap the wellspring of Sienese-ness that I've missed in my American life. What I've come for is to drench myself in Siena; and instead Siena is drenching me with rain.

But I'm not giving up; I still have Giovanna in my back pocket. She offered to take me around the Panther today—perhaps with the intention of making me regret my quick adoption of the Caterpillar—but we didn't really settle on when. Alas, a few minutes later I receive a text; she has to cancel. Her little dog has died.

These unhappy tidings set a pall over the day—a day that's worked rather hard at being appalling. Cold, gray, wet, and lonely; and now tinged with bereavement. I look at my watch; it's not even close to cocktail hour—but what the hell. In such circumstances as these, a glass of wine is medicinal.

I don't want to have it on the Campo, however. I'll see only tourists. I'll go to the nameless bar in the Bruco, and even if no one else is there,
I
will be.

The rain is still falling with depressing steadiness; it's not exactly violent—that would be preferable, because a violent storm would eventually exhaust itself. My boots hold out against the onslaught, but my glasses fog and my pants legs dampen. I've made it nearly to the bar when I spot Nikke, the clothier, seated in his shop reading a newspaper. I decide to duck in and say hello, and give myself a brief respite from the rain.

“Ciao, Nikke,” I say, and he looks up with a grin and gestures for me to sit, never mind how wet I am. The first time I met him, when I stopped into his store and grandly introduced myself as an American Palio enthusiast and a dues-paying Protector of the Caterpillar, his welcome wasn't quite so ready; in fact, he regarded me with something just a hair shy of suspicion and kept me standing in his doorway for the better part of half an hour. But gradually his reserve melted away; possibly the genuineness of my interest (or the endearing clumsiness of my Italian) put him off his guard. By the time I took my leave of him he was so firmly one of my well-wishers that he got up and shook my hand and walked me out, and seemed almost ready to follow me back up the street—as a kind of protector's protector. Saint Catherine once said, “If there are people in the world whom you can win over with love, they are the Sienese.”

Now, back in Nikke's store, I nod my head toward the bleak weather beyond the window and say, “Sorry you left Rome now?” Nikke is a native Sienese, but he lived in Rome for forty years, returning to his hometown only at sixty. He shrugs and says, “It rains in Rome too”—clearly implying that when it rains in Rome it's worse, because … well, you're in Rome.
Campanilismo
is an Italian term, derived from the word
campanile
, or bell tower, that describes the average Italian's passionate devotion to his own city, town, or region—for which said bell tower serves as a symbol. Tuscans are especially prone to campanilismo, not only in reference to faraway cities like Rome but to other Tuscan towns just a few miles up the road. And of course the Sienese practice campanilismo on an even more localized scale, with fierce rivalries between the seventeen contrade. Something else: passionate
allegiance to your own campanile goes hand in hand with disparaging everyone else's. Pisa seems to take the brunt of this; there's an old saying known to every Tuscan,
Meglio avere un morto in casa che un Pisano alla porta
—“Better a corpse in your house than a Pisano on your doorstep.”

As Nikke and I continue to chat about nothing much in particular, I realize that this is in fact a very Sienese thing to do: stop and pass the time of day. I've done it only to get out of the rain for a few minutes, but it doesn't matter. For a brief moment, without even realizing it, I've fallen into the pattern of life here; instead of bolting around with my eyes bugging out, calling attention to myself, I've quietly, unthinkingly blended in.

I feel a little glow of pride in my breast as I shake Nikke's hand and depart. I feel almost native.

Forget about the glass of wine … 
this
is the fix I needed.

…

 
MY WINTER SOJOURN AMONG THE CATERPILLAR
—
MARKED
by stillness, marred by rain, but made memorable by brief encounters and small moments that might have passed unnoticed at a more bustling time of year—is drawing to an end. By sheer good fortune, there's another dinner at the Società a few days before I depart, so I can once again view the brucaioli in the aggregate and say my goodbyes. I'm expecting another quiet, amiable evening like Gianni's final Dinner with the Captain.

In fact, it proves to be something entirely different. Lent has begun, so this Friday repast is to be all seafood, and it's to be prepared by the young people of the contrada—the teens and twentysomethings. The principal chef seems to be Alessio, nicknamed Ciancha because he's the son of Cianchino, the jockey who ended the Bruco's long losing streak in 1996 and thus became an instant hero. Cianchino responded by having his sons baptized in the contrada, and Alessio certainly appears at home here. A dark-eyed, jet-haired young man, he manages somehow to give off an aura of both frenetic energy and laserlike focus. He doesn't so much exit the kitchen as burst out of it, to work the crowd or grab a quick
smoke, or to make some announcement in so heightened a state of excitement that I can't understand a word of it.

When I was a kid, my dad bought me an LP record called
501 Sound Effects
, and for some reason I loved to just sit with my eyes closed and play it all the way through. The sounds emanating from the kitchen remind me a little of that now. I expect at any moment a hail of pots and pans to erupt from the doorway, or a small mushroom cloud. At intervals, young people in smocks and aprons come rocketing out. The first course is late, but there seems to be no apprehension or impatience; people—Dario and I included—just keep opening more bottles of wine, with the result that the mood in the place keeps getting livelier and happier. Suddenly, without warning, the February doldrums begin to take on the character of sun-dazzled July.