Reflections on My 40 Years in Umbria

AGAIN, TO MY FELLOW GRATITUDE FRIDAY BLOGGERS, I APOLOGIZE FOR BEING LATE.

My time is more and more often NOT my own, my energy level is too often depleted and my battery often needs recharging.

While I mentally "wrote" my Friday entry, only today am I finding the time to literally write and post it.

I am extremely grateful for having LIVED in two countries, for having experienced Italy in the most authentic way: through marrying an Italian in Umbria and being part of his traditional ways. Nothing could have contributed any more fully to what I see as my "deeper awareness" of myriad aspects of culture, mores, mentality, history, art, national character or of politics than this dichotomy of "modes".

The aspects are too many and too complex, the nuances are multiple, the self-enrichment is too far-reaching... AND the frustrations and difficulties are ever-present and challenging...to even attempt to address in this entry.

The value of this dichotomy, of this "faceted" experience, however, is INFINITE, affording me a deeper awareness of almost everything, allowing me a better understandiing and a fuller objectivity. The social historian, Barzini, once said, referring to the split loyalties , "those with two nationalities actually have no nationality". True in a way! But IF blind loyalty, lack of objectivity, "empty" nationalism are signs of having ONE nationality instead of TWO... then, having "none" would be a gain rather than a loss.

While not always easy, I am nevertheless, grateful for my two nationalities and for the ensuing deeper awareness and enrichment they have afforded me!