Hard

The drilling and pounding starts just after the clock hits 8:30am.  I hear the shuffling of work boots making their way across my ceiling already at 8am, and I think, here in Florence - legally - they are allowed to start with the pandemonium even then, but 8:30 seems to be their norm.  That’s when they start to blast their way through cement and brick with pneumatic hammers that rain down 25 blows per second and to gouge out trenches for pipes and cables with hammers hitting chisels in a steady rhythm that seems to ring out at a rate of one blow per second.  Maybe if they were in synch with their pounding, over these past 2-1/2 months, I could have tweaked my perception of it into the percussive beat of a favorite song.  But they weren’t in synch, they were just doing their job, and by virtue of being in the apartment directly underneath them, I get to be subjected to the amplified version of their noise and vibrations which have me feeling like someone is trying to drill a hole in my skull. 

Aiuto! (Help)!

And of course this has to be happening this COVID year when no tourists means no work and no work means no money and no money means, yeah, just stay home. 

Except I can’t.  Not only because the sound is truly deafening (sometimes I get so frustrated that I just yell at the top of my lungs in exasperation, knowing full well that no one can hear me -  I suppose it’s therapeutic), but because I can’t stand the anger welling up in me, that I’m becoming one of those haters that gonna hate. 

Like I said, the workmen are just doing their job.  And obviously they can’t do it any other place.  Actually they are perfectly nice people.  They respect the quiet hours between 12 and 2pm and even taped a note to my door explaining that they’d replace the glass panelling they accidentally broke on my terrazza while lowering debris down from above.  I’m not actually angry at THEM (though hearing their trucks roll into the cortile immediately raises my hackles).

I’m mad at the responsible party: il proprietario (the owner). 

I can hardly begrudge her for redoing the apartment she inherited from her zio (uncle).  Of course not.  But… even though (or maybe because) I’m a relative newcomer to the building, a little heads-up before it all started and a “Mi dispiace, I’m so sorry about the noise and the inconvenience” once it got going would have been all I needed to keep my feathers from getting ruffled.  I would have been frustrated with the noise, sure.  But I would have felt seen and wouldn’t have been spending these 2-1/2 months fantasizing about the less-than-noble idea of gaining access to the apartment above hers once she’s moved in to take revenge.  

The whole building already knows she’s difficile, a very self-centered person, a bully (she grew up in this building, her elderly parents live next to me) and when I try to get some extra info from long time residents that might help soothe the savage beast rising in me, they just shake their heads. “With a padre like that, what can you expect?”

I’d had a run in with her elderly father a few years back.  He kept parking in my spot.  I’d have parked in his, but given the limited parking space available to the building, the big van I used for work would only fit in MY space.  When I pleaded with him, saying “Mi scusi, ma… I’m sorry, but I have this big vehicle because it’s how I make a living as a single mom of three kids” he didn’t miss a beat, retorting 

“Well, I’m sorry but I’m a retired 91 year old surgeon and I have to enjoy my life.” 

What does one say to that?

So everyone in the building has got her number and they know that I - for the most part - am pretty easy-going (ok…conflict-avoidant). So it’s not such a good combo. For me at least. Seems like I can hardly look forward to a future where I won’t be hearing Elton John singing “The Bitch is Back” each time she drives in.  

Which leaves me wondering how to manage (other than moving).

It’s said that vengeance is a lazy form of grief.  And frankly, frustration, anger, even plotting to get even gets me nowhere.  So vengeance looks to be of little use.  

Grief, then.

(This is when things get really… 

    really… 

    really…

            quiet, for some time

                  while I ponder this).

there are things

these days 

that

have me

bursting into tears

It happens when I stumble onto a video of someone being kind to someone else in need. 

It happens when I hear a leader say “we can do this together.”

It happens when I hear musicians come together in harmony with messages of hope. 

It happens when I see a small child can still be mesmerized by the natural beauty of the earth. 

I feel that I cry because what I really want is connection and it moves me to see it in action.

And I’d guess that I grieve for all the situations where that connection is lost, where the opposite is played out, where division is sown. 

So instead of being mad at my neighbor… I think the call is to remember my own grief over whatever connection is missing, thank her for the reminder, and get to work. Maybe throw a little loving kindness her way. 

Because it must be really hard to be her.

Notes: Top photo is of a sculpture of a Sleeping Ariadne carved in the 16th century, Uffizi Gallery, Florence

For an example of a video that makes me cry, check out R.A.K.E (Random Acts of Kindness Everywhere): https://twitter.com/bbcworldservice/status/1295747261847216128