Do you know what I miss?

I miss dinners in Italy. I've traveled to Italy three times, each for greater than a week. I miss the tables filled with laughter and good food. Even when the tables weren't filled with laughter, or even half-decent food, dinner was the get-together time. In Italy, dinner is the meal of the day when everyone comes together to talk and relax.

Siena was the first study abroad I did (with A, which was the start of a wonderful travel-buddy system) and the first time I'd left the country. I spoke a little Italian, and had more on my mind than just speaking it, what with the classes every day and sightseeing and the general amazement and exhaustion which comes with travel. A and I shared a host-mom, Fulvia. Fulvia was, we think, a vegetarian who ate a lot of zucchini and "melanzane", which we later found out meant eggplant. Fulvia was a great cook, though. Everything you'd imagine an Italian grandma to be, and when we went home after school, Fulvia would have dinner almost ready. Usually some pasta, some salad, and some kind of bigger dish, usually vegetable in nature, sometimes meat-related. Dinner was when we would put our new speaking skills to work. "Noi abbiamo" is probably the biggest thing I picked up from that experience. I was a horrible speaker at that point (let's be honest, I got really good and now could probably limp my way through another conversation. Maybe.) and so it was a slightly embarrassing but ultimately enjoyable way to learn the language. The three of us would talk for a long time, Fulvia would help us with our homework (oh those worksheets were brutal sometimes) and our pronunciation. All of this, though, surrounded dinner. It was dinner when we recounted our days in Italian (Fulvia being unable to understand English, it was a real learning curve!). I'll never forget the warmth and happiness, and to be honest a bit of embarrassment and consternation.

In Montepulciano, my second study abroad in another Tuscan town not far from Siena, dinner was a whole different animal. With 30 people in a restaurant, things can get loud and close, but it was still nice to get everyone together for a meal. To just sit and talk, split "un bottiglia di vino rosso" (the house red, made in the restaurant owner's family vineyards outside the city) and good bread. The food wasn't always good, I'll firmly state that. For being a restaurant, they did a good job of feeding 30 people every weekday. We had to feed ourselves breakfast and lunch, and dinner too on the weekends, but dinner was gathering time. We got announcements, saw the people with whom you did not share an apartment with. (I had 7 roommates. All girls. OH THE HUMANITY.) For some of us, it was a chance to practice our Italian as well. The owner more than once came to talk to myself and the other three more fluent students. For all of the people and the mediocre food, it was still the meal everyone was loathe to miss, not only for the fact that you'd already paid for it (in the tuition) but for the sense of solidarity it brought. Each night, full up with food, desert, and wine, we'd stumble off to our apartments and resume our small scale wars (I will never live with artists again, I swear it.) But for a while at least, the world focused on food and talk.

My third trip, this past summer's adventure, had me in the ups-and-downs of dinner in Italy. First few nights in Salerno with A, we had pathetic sandwiches, fruit, and nutella covered something for desert. Dinner was more of a signal to slow down and talk, to stop walking and just enjoy a few moments of rest. When we joined up with C and T at C's grandparent's house, dinner was more like it was with Fulvia. Wonderful food and wonderful conversation (in English mostly, but there were a few dinners held at least partly in Italian) all of which would last for hours at times. We talked about any and everything, over home made meatballs and pasta, or a spread of dishes, with each of us encouraged to eat more, since we were all obviously too skinny. The classic Italian Grandma routine. Which, I must say, is a wonderful thing to be on the receiving end of once in a while.

Dinner in Italy brings up so many images, so many feelings of happiness and warmth that I can't help but miss the closeness of it. In my house, more often than not dinner is a lonesome affair. Unless otherwise informed, everyone does their own thing, and sometimes we might not even see each other in the evenings. Dinners with friends are nice, but usually entail sitting on a couch or something similar, never really at a table. We tend to have interesting conversations, but as with the family, not everyone is eating at the same time.

I guess I just miss the camaraderie which dinner can bring, but I do miss the food like mad. ITALIAN FOOD IS AWESOME AND I'D EAT IT EVERY DAY (AGAIN) IF I COULD.