Taking pictures of a castle tower, I saw a strange object which I could not identify completely even using the zoom on my camera. I returned the next day with my binoculars (in part simply to justify hauling the binoculars around Italy with me) and took a closer look at the item. Just as I suspected: it was a satellite dish on the tower.
There was a time when seeing a satellite dish on an ancient structure would have bothered me, but during my time in Italy I have come to appreciate the blending of old and new; and, using old and ancient structures for a purpose other than treating them as a shrine, roped off with velvet cords.
My first clue to this practice was in an apartment in Rome where I stayed with my husband before I started the Italy Internship. In the floor of the apartment was a sheet of glass that allowed us to look below to ancient steps and artifacts—old pottery, ancient coins. We marveled at how we had the privilege to dwell for a few days in what was once an ancient establishment.
Time after time during the Italy Internship, we visited towns where people lived in the old castles, and historic stone buildings. In all fairness, I guess I should consider that if Italians did not live in old buildings, they would probably have to live in a houseboat tethered to the coast, because in truth almost every building in the country is ancient. Still, it amazes me. In America it seems to me like we treat our old buildings in a couple ways…either roping them off and trekking visitors past with instructions to look but not touch, or tearing them down to build something new.
I think of structures I have seen turn into rapid decay when left vacant, and ponder on how the use of old structures surely must breathe life into them. So now as I view the satellite dish on top of a castle tower, or see television antennas on top of old tiled roofs, I think to myself, “Live on Italy, live on!”
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