Roma!

Dear Wilson, 
It was only after we had made it across theTiber that I got the first whiff of urine. "Do people really pee right here on the bridge right in the heart of Rome, and in broad daylight?" I wondered. You see evidence of that occasionally in Seattle, but not to this degree. 

Then Ann explained that it was the starlings.
 

Above the Tiber River, thousands upon thousands of starlings swarm prior to their winter migration.

Ah, the starlings. The United States has only had a taste of this avian pestilence. But in Rome at this time of year uncounted hordes of them gather and disperse, swoop and rise like the fluids in a lava lamp. The clouds of starlings clump, merge and dissolve, flowing back and forth across the Tiber as children watch wide-eyed, point, chatter and laugh. The murmurations of the starlings grab your attention visually and audibly.Trees are thick with them, issuing the rustling sound of an endless waterfall. And as they swarm this time of year -- as they must have since the times of the Caesars, they scent the air with their downpour prior to their winter departure across the Roman Empire's sea of "middle earth"-- the Mediterranean-- for Africa.
 

Why settle for just urine, when you can have it all-- which is what the starlings left on this whitewashed auto.

Why Rome?

I am in Rome to keep a promise. It is time to distribute the balls that Team Wilson raised this past year, and there is no greater need than for the armies of refugees, fleeing drought and war for safe haven in Europe. Many have tempted--and even confronted--death, leaving everything they have behind. They could use an opportunity to simply play.
 
I have arranged with One World Fubol Project to ship 20 balls to the Rome Center, where my friend, Ann Anagnost, is staying while she teaches a food anthropology course to visiting University of Washington students during their fall quarter. The balls will be shipped from a distribution point in Germany. The donors -- readers of the Wilson Chronicles-- will, I hope, get a first-hand view of how their kindness is shared and received. (And this news just in at 10 p.m. Tuesday evening --the futbols have arrived! We will pick them up in the morning.)

A lingering question, of course, is whether Europe will continue to serve as a safe haven, or turn hostile toward refugees as a result of the recent terrorist attacks in Paris. With that in mind, there is irony in how I arrived here. On the heels of the bloodshed in Paris, I flew from Seattle to Amsterdam and then to Rome. In Amsterdam's airport, I merged with a thick clutch of fellow travelers, inching ahead like so many squirming spermatoza swimming toward the promised land. Well, OK, we were really just trying to make our connecting flights.

What security checks?

On a more magnum scale, I wanted to make mooing noises as we pressed forward, but thought better of it. Under the circumstances, my fellow amblers might not have shared my sense of humor, or metaphor. Finally I reached the security checkpoint. An official young enough to be my son looked at my passport, asked me why I was going to Rome, and waved me through. It took all of 30 seconds.
 
In Rome I deplaned, rolled my carry-on to the baggage carousel, and exited baggage claim to join the tall white-haired lady with the large sunglasses who awaited me. There was no customs check. No looking into my carry-on. No encounter with a human being. Maybe they X-rayed my checked baggage someplace between Seattle and Rome, but you couldn't prove it by me. In the European Union, it's still like going from Washington to Oregon. All right. Of course, returning home will not be that efficient. But where was there even a hint of security when I arrived here? There must be  something I'm not understanding...
 
It's been a while since I've written, Wilson. 

Quite a while. 

It must be lonely up there on Mount Adams. At this time of year, you don't get a lot of company because of the weather. Fortunately, being unbreakable, you're ready for the wind and the chill. But there is much to share about the gifting of the futbols. And I'll start in the next dispatch with the story of a garbage dump that is home for a community of refugees in a place called Mae Sot. Until then...


Love,
Robert