“Other than that I’m perfectly healthy,” Mom cheerfully told me.
“Are you sure?” I asked as we discussed our trip.
“Absolutely,” she said.
Most women my age planning a six-week holiday to Italy would be conducting forensic online research into the precise location of every Ferragamo or Prada outlet in the country. My research consisted of figuring out how much room a package of incontinence diapers would take up in a suitcase and whether a smorgasbord of medication and asthma puffers would be an issue at customs.
Travelling with a senior is not much different from travelling with a small child. Same preparation time, same cargo-ship’s worth of paraphernalia in anticipation of every manner of disaster, same dashing-back-into-the-house routine to retrieve a forgotten item. The gear is essentially the same; a pale blue or pink carrying bag is replaced by one in a more dignified sage or black. Walkers or wheelchairs replace strollers, books and magazines replace toys, peppermint candies replace cookies, sweaters and shawls replace blankies, eyeglasses and hearing aids replace pacifiers—and diapers are replaced by, well, bigger diapers.
Then there is the medication.
I dropped in one day to help Mom with her packing. Her bed was heaped with bottles and jars and crinkly packages. It looked as if she and her neighbors had taken the contents of their medicine cabinets and dumped them.
“What’s all this?” I said with mild horror.
“My medication,” she replied matter-of-factly.
I’ll admit, not proudly either, that whenever Mom launched into a description of her health problems and prescriptions the information waltzed in one ear and out the other. As soon as she uttered the words “I was at the doctor’s the other day,” I would politely say, “Keep talking,” and leave the room to pour myself a large glass of wine.
That behavior ended when I became the person who would be carrying her luggage to, through, and back from Italy.
I looked down at the array of pills on her bed and shook my head. There was a prescription for everything short of leprosy.
“Don’t worry,” said Mom. “The pharmacist is making up dose-ettes for me.”
“What?”
“Like this.” She held out a cardboard platform with small plastic bubblelike compartments arranged in a grid, containing all the pills to be consumed that day. Across the top row was marked, in large type, the days of the week; down the left side was the time of day—morning, noon, evening—the medication was to be taken.
“Why do you need a prescription for vitamins?” I asked, peering at the label of one medicine bottle I had picked up at random.
“Because the doctor gave it to me,” she said in a tone of voice reserved for addressing morons.
“You should check whether your doctor isn’t getting a kickback from the pharmacist,” I said. “You can buy this stuff over the counter and save yourself the dispensing fee.”
“Don’t interfere,” she said petulantly. “I know what I’m doing. Besides, it’s hard to get a doctor these days.”
My packing required less attention to health concerns; I am, touch wood, in good health. I don’t believe in taking medication of any sort—not even vitamins—except when something like sudden depression or a freak infection hits me, and then I am all for prescription drugs.
Without the worry of drugs and walking aids, I loaded my suitcase with clothes and makeup. And shoes. I seem to require a lot of shoes whenever I travel. I also cannot leave home without a small arsenal of face creams, cleansers, shower gels, hair conditioners, and body lotions to fend off dry weather. Whenever I pack and review my heaving case of toiletries, I realize with a heavy heart that I was born in the wrong part of the world. My skin and hair are at their best in tropical climates.
All the guidebooks and Web sites I had perused before heading to Italy mentioned that during the winter months the weather was moderate and mostly warm, especially in the south. I happily packed light skirts, sandals, T-shirts, and—because there would be a pool at one place we had booked—bathing suits and silky pareos.
Mom left all the arrangements and decisions about the trip in my hands (“Wherever you want to go is fine with me”) and then insisted on seeing a printed itinerary of the sort found in travel brochures or issued by tour operators.
Rarely do I travel with a plan. I’m like Robert Louis Stevenson, who once said, “I travel not to go anywhere, but to go.” But since Mom was expecting something more than “Get on plane; fly to London, then to Bari. Rent car,” I cobbled together a basic plan to keep her happy.
This was it: We would f ly from Toronto to London, transfer to a flight to Bari, rent a car; and drive from Bari to Alberobello, where we would stay for two weeks. From there we would drive to Sorrento and stay for four days, then drive from Sorrento to Viterbo, our base for three weeks. Our flight home would begin in Rome, with a connecting flight in London.
I was especially proud of the accommodations I had booked.
In Alberobello we would be staying in a renovated trullo. Trulli are the traditional small shelters built about eight hundred years ago by field workers in Italy’s Apulia region. They look like little white stucco beehives with conical slate roofs. As a field worker’s family grew, so did the trullo, and more beehive-shaped units were added. Eventually some trulli consisted of three or four buildings, each cone serving as a room. Trulli are the latest real-estate craze, especially among the Brits, who are flocking to the area and snapping them up as income properties. One of those Brits happens to be the brother of my beau, Colin. Mom and I would be his first clients.
In Sorrento we had booked a family-run hotel that had been recommended by an acquaintance.
Our Viterbo digs consisted of a medieval town house I came across on the Internet. It was located in the center of the old quarter, and its Web site promised antique stores and cafés right outside the front door. It would be perfect for my antique-loving mom, and for me since I love soaking up the historical atmosphere in out-of-the-way places.
“And of course we’re going to Tuscany and Venice,” said Mom as she scrupulously reviewed my itinerary.
Neither of those places was part of my plan. I was so sick of clichés about Tuscany and its amber-colored, manufactured romanticism that I had lost interest in the place long before preparing for this trip to Italy. As for Venice, a friend who had recently returned from a visit had told me it was dirty and dismal. I nixed Venice, too.
“We’re not going to Tuscany or Venice?” Mom asked loudly. “What’s Italy without Tuscany or Venice?”
“Exactly,” I replied firmly. “We are not going near the tourist traps.”
“Look,” she said, fixing me with a dark, penetrating stare. “I’ve never been to Italy, and this is the one and only time I’ll be there. This is my last trip to Europe. Make no mistake: We are going to Tuscany and Venice!”
“Well, we might go into Tuscany a bit,” I allowed.
“And Florence,” she said emphatically, not quite grabbing me with both hands by the lapels, but you get the picture. “We have to go to Florence.”
“Yes, of course,” I sputtered.
I felt myself shrinking into a ten-year-old version of myself, so I squared my shoulders, straightened what remained of my backbone, and said, “Listen here. This isn’t going to be one of those holidays where we’re rushing from one end of the country to the other. I am not going to be forced to drive like a lunatic all over the place. Do you understand?”
“I know,” she said, her eyes refusing to meet my gaze. “That won’t happen.”