HOLIDAY HAPPINESS

A group portrait of a mother, son and daughter on glass (c. 250 AD), once thought to be the family of Valentinian III. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I’ve been out of the UK for a week now. The weather here is hot and the sky blue. Apart from a couple of thunderstorms, this corner of Europe appears to have weather I can live with. I love being away. I love the feeling of freedom I get when I board a plane. I love holidays. Yet, what have I been doing, at least for some time every day? Watching the TV World Service to catch up on the Leveson Enquiry. Yes, I have. I should be out there, in the sunshine, turning my skin to leather, but between twelve and two I am in the cool, dark kitchen, staring at a screen and marvelling at David Cameron’s sincerity. The secret of success is sincerity. Fake that and you’re in…someone said once.

To be watching the Enquiry from another country gives me the strangest feeling. I have also watched the Jubilee celebrations and lots of hype about the Olympic Games. I am seeing the UK in a new light. My brain is a bit addled with all the rest and recuperation that comes when you are taking an enforced wind-down called a holiday, and I am eating far too much and drinking wine daily and not getting side effects – amazing. And, as I said – I am seeing the UK, my country, in a new way. It’s like being at the cinema watching a really good drama documentary in a foreign language with sub-titles.  You know bits of it are true but you are not sure which bits because it’s all been put together by someone from a different culture and even if the characters seem familiar and you try really hard to understand what is going on from the sub-titles, you constantly miss the nuances, the subtext, the hidden story…

Watching  Cameron giving evidence this morning, was a bit like that. I’m sure if I’d been watching him from my sitting room in the UK, I would never have doubted him… Or would I? Well, I might have been a little sceptical about his earnest demeanour. But watching him here, it was really hard to make sense of the person he strives so sincerely to be, if you get my drift? But then, I guess that’s politics for you…

Of course, distance has something to do with it. I am at least a thousand miles away. I am hearing a lovely and musical language being spoken all around me and I have forgotten all about the Euro Crisis because the sun is hot and the food is wonderful.  And David Cameron is another country.

In the Basilica this morning, I watched a monk using a well-known spray cleaner on a glass box behind the altar that contains a relic of a saint. Last year, I went to mass there and after the service, I followed a queue of people round the back to the relic. One after another, we either kissed the glass front or touched it. When my turn came, I chickened out and just gave the glass the briefest brush with one finger, so conscious was I of the germs that might be lingering after all those devout Catholics had done their thing. It was quite gratifying to watch the monk spray and polish this morning. I know that on Sunday, I shall be able to kiss with equanimity. Like Cameron at Leveson, all is not what it appears to be and can be wiped clean at any moment.

The campagna italiana calls me. The sun is hot. My son’s dog chases the tiny green lizards all afternoon and never manages to catch one. The fat cat snoozes under the olive tree. There has been a plague of caterpillars this year and the trees in the forest behind the villa are full of the pesky creatures. You can actually hear them chomping at the foliage! But their days are numbered as tomorrow they will be attacked by a man with a spray gun. I make my way up the stone steps to the pool and slip into the water, warmed by only the sun. Time to swim. The cares of my ordinary life slide away. David Cameron is somewhere over the horizon. No doubt he will still be there when I get home…

I apologise for the many mistakes in this blog. I had rather a lot of wine with lunch!