In general, the MO that guides my life is to be as prepared and organized as possible during moments of calm. Kind of like squirreling nuts away for the winter, I try to visualize eventualities and then see what can be done to produce results that aren’t so frenzied. I do all of this, of course, with the understanding that plans never completely cooperate with one’s preparation; there is always some element of chaos that creeps in as you bump along the trajectory you’re heading in.
The trick, as I see it, is aiming to minimize all the chaos that is residing on the sidelines. We all know it’s there, just waiting for some random opportunity to grant it a personal intersection. Kind of like those runners who jog in place while at traffic lights—once given the appropriate signal, they will suddenly be with you there in the street, doing their own thing. Hopefully, pedestrians and cars stick to the rules and maximize the chance of avoiding disaster; it doesn’t always happen. And so with this in mind, I seize upon my quieter moments to make small adjustments. Tick things off my mental list. Reject the idea that things are always going to be statically calm and so I don’t need to do anything at all to shape the future.
On a somewhat related note, the plants in Rome are simultaneously blooming and growing up super tall right now. For weeks already, city workers have been pruning the trees leaning out into the streets. Folks are clearing out their yards, or indeed sowing their gardens to allow for a summer of fresh produce picked daily off the vine. It’s an understatement to say that gardening is a full-time job—and at least in the case of Rome, there is more to tame than there are available hands.
Every spring while walking the city streets, I notice that the dandelions grow menacingly high. Never in my life have I seen such aggressive dandelions—they challenge my own height and make me kind of understand while the Italian word is “dente di leone”, or lion’s tooth. Not far behind them in terms of height are another batch of weeds that I enjoy far less- le ortiche.
Ortiche is the Italian word for nettles. Or stinging nettles as they were termed when I first encountered them in Rwanda. I am probably the last person to be aware of these things, but they are fairly soft looking plants with jagged leaves. Jagged like each tip, each stalk, is holding hundreds of tiny invisible needles that can’t wait for you to touch them.
If you’ve ever placed your hand around a nettle plant, then you don’t need me to explain what happens. The sensation is that you’ve got all of these needles now embedded in your skin—even if you can’t feel them. They’re a pain in the ass, second only to poison ivy or perhaps poison oak. The nice thing about the nettles is that the sensation doesn’t last too long—unlike skin rashes that come from poison ivy which, as I discovered last year, takes at least a week to go away and has no good treatment to take away the misery. Suffice to say, I am not a gardener and have no eye to pinpoint those plants that are looking to thwart my desired path of work.
But the ortiche—the nettles—seem to be growing everywhere around the city right now. Anywhere that they have trees planted in nice open squares in the sidewalks, you have them filling the bottom spaces where they should really just be dirt. Once you know what to look for, you see them everywhere. And if I’m being honest, between the nettles and the dog crap everywhere, I’ve got little good reason to look up while walking to where I need to go.
I made the mistake and complained about the city center nettles to some Italians recently. One of them has a house in the countryside—more like a farm. I already knew that he spent most of his weekends doing work outdoors to maintain things. (It is clear that almost all of us are using our spare and quiet moments to set ourselves up for a future of relative calm). He laughed when I mentioned the nettles—telling me that I needed to come out to the countryside and see what he had to deal with. “But don’t worry,” he told me, “After a certain amount of time you don’t even feel them anymore.” Hoo boy.
I also learned that there is a cluster of Italian expressions around the nettle plant – all of which I’ve found to make complete sense now that I’ve seen the ortiche in action. The idiom includes saying things like, “Mandare/gettare tutto alle ortiche”—basically throwing something away or abandoning it so that the nettles grow up around it. But the “something” is more figurative rather than literal—it can be an opportunity, a relationship, time or yes, even money.
There are other Italian expressions involving nettles: “Conosciuto come l’ortica” – being infamous or notorious like a nettle. Also one can say, “Ci crescono le ortiche” – nettles grow there; it is a godforsaken place. As it turns out, I’m not the only one with disdain for these weeds—around here they seem to have a better turn of phrase for making use out of them in terms of language. In English, all I can think of is when we say that a child is “Growing like a weed.”
Once I read more about what the expression of “mandare tutto alle ortiche” meant, I tried to think of some occasions where I’d done something that would fit into this expression. For sure I have some that might come to mind, but on the whole I think that I try not to waste my time and opportunities as they come to me. As I said from the start, I aim to head things off before they become a problem—like uprooting the nettles before they grow large and obnoxious. As for right now in Rome, there are simply too many of them sprouting up in the city. For those Romans who complain about the imperfections of this city, to them it might be a perfect embodiment of what is wrong. “Rome has literally gone to the nettles!”
As for me, I now know what they are, and they’ve taught me a lesson or two. I’ll keep the expressions in mind, but no way am I going to be touching these things anymore.