The Sublime in Sicily

I did not want to turn 50. Not at all. That number signified, to me at least, that I was now officially old. And I’d only be getting older from here on out. I know, I know, that was already happening anyway, but let’s not apply logic. To mark this milestone and make it at least a little more palatable I planned on taking a trip to Sicily as a birthday gift to myself.

I knew ahead of time it would be an emotional journey. Mostly because on the last day of the trip I’d visit my grandmother’s hometown. And that date, October 18th, was also the 30th anniversary of the day my mother died. Nothing has shaped the trajectory of my life more than her presence and subsequent absence. My mother’s unconditional love molded me into the girl I was and her imprint shaped the woman I would become. This trip was as much about me turning 50 as it was to honor her.

However, it wildly exceeded my expectations; it was revelatory in almost every way imaginable. The trip began with meeting my cousin & travel companion Jennifer in Rome; she had flown in from New York and landed a little earlier than me. We explored as much of the city as we could squeeze into the rest of that day. The next morning we caught a flight to Catania to explore the east coast of Sicily as part of a small group tour. And from the very moment our plane landed and my feet touched the ground it felt as if all the senses in my body came alive.

I was absolutely smitten with everything about Sicily. We walked to the local fruit and vegetable store to grab luscious peaches to snack on. Made daily treks to the nearby grocery store to purchase Sicilian wines to enjoy each evening on the terrace. Walked the undulating hills near our hotel and discovered the majesty of Mount Etna in the distance. Came upon local markets teaming with produce, beautifully contoured and vibrantly hued. Ate the creamiest of gelatos in town after town. Walked, explored, and walked some more. Ate meals prepared with ‘simple’ ingredients, but in the most pristine sense of that word, artfully elevating the whole experience. And beautiful and charming people were just, they were just everywhere. While we were often on the go we somehow managed to take it all in and savor it. I couldn’t help but think Sicilians do life right.

While it was a multisensory experience, it never assaulted our senses. It was some sort of symphony of sumptuous delights. Immersed in the culture and exploratory nature of these encounters I found myself catching glimpses of the girl I once was. Someone I hadn’t seen in a long time, maybe since my twenties. The girl I was before marriage, children, moving, divorce, and just … a lot … a lot of life. It felt as if I had been awakened from a deep slumber. A slumber so deep I didn’t even know I was sleeping.

The trip culminated in my family’s ancestral home of Pachino, where 90 years earlier my family had emigrated from. It sits in the southernmost tip of Sicily, where the Mediterranean and Ionian Seas meet. I stood in the waters of Marzamemi where my grandmother swam as a child. I walked along DiPietro Street contemplating which home on the 4-block stretch could’ve been hers. And I familiarized myself with the quaint town square surrounded by mom and pop shops and local eateries.

Also on the square is the church my grandmother was baptized in, Chiesa Madre Santissimo Crocifisso. Once inside the church I made my way to the transept and, overwhelmed by feelings of gratitude, I knelt, prayed, and cried. That emotion moved me to thank my mother and grandmother. It wasn’t until that precise moment, when I was thanking them, that I realized the whole experience, this trip, and everything about it, was orchestrated by them. That it was almost some sort of ancestral divine intervention.

I was suddenly incredibly self-aware and recognized that for far too long I’d put everyone else’s needs before my own. I routinely had not practiced self-care or made myself a priority. I learned a lot on this Sicilian trip, but the biggest takeaway was that I had not valued myself enough. And I know that as a career woman and mother in today’s world I am hardly alone in this.

God knows adversity has always revealed itself to be rife with personal growth opportunities for me. So much so I frequently say I’ve learned my best moves between a rock and a hard place. It’s happened so often that I’ve come to embrace change and am adept at developing novel solutions to life’s challenges.

But, I have never learned so much about myself from a series of wondrous and fortuitous events as I did on this trip. Since then I’ve been showing up for myself and make no apologies for it.  Sicily awakened me to seek the sublime in the everyday and I have no intentions of being lulled back to sleep again.