A World Ago
Page 34
To sleep in a real bed, between real sheets, is a privilege not enjoyed since Paris—the night the boats stopped running won’t count because it was only for four hours. The buzzing of the phone woke us at 8:00. Peter Paul answered it: “Yeah, he’s getting up now” and hung up. I sat up and said “Who was that?” Nonchalantly putting on his socks, Peter Paul said “I dunno; I couldn’t understand him anyway.”
Why I bother taking my electric shaver along I don’t know—it was one of those triangle-of-holes affairs. We washed and dressed and went down to breakfast—two eggs with a strip of bacon dead in the center, cocoa, and bread. From what I could gather by looking out into the street, shady anyway, it was a beautiful day. A notice at the desk said we were to have an audience with the Pope at 0930.
The busses came at 9, and I, my pockets jammed with two rolls of film, two rosaries and a crucifix for the Chief, climbed on board. We drove first to the USO, on the Via della Conseliazione, which looks directly on St. Peters. A block or two behind us on the same street is the round Castle de San Angelo, better known as the Tomb of Adrian
While we waited outside the USO, an American woman working there came on the bus and explained the protocol of the audience, and to give us all special tickets, to allow us to enter. It was wonderful to see an American, and to hear her talk to us in a language we could understand. She was very friendly and cheerful, and made us feel much better. She said we had until ten fifteen, and suggested we come into the USO for coffee. “Is it American coffee?” someone asked; the stuff they serve over here is nothing but melted coffee beans.
An American away from Americans is as lost as a week-old puppy; you can’t possibly imagine what it’s like until you’re in that position—and then you wish you weren’t. That’s why such little things as an American cup of coffee, or hearing an ordinary American voice can mean so much.
Inside, since I don’t care for coffee, I went into the USO. A red-headed woman was there with her three children—one of them the cutest little blond I’ve seen in ages, and a lot of other people, in and out of uniform.
Another group was to leave the USO and walk to the Vatican—we were to drive down and meet them in St. Peter’s Square.
When we arrived in the Square, we had to leave our cameras on the bus. The other group of about forty came along shortly, and we walked to the right-hand arcade. Audience is the correct word for it—there were already over a hundred and fifty people, with more coming all the time. Our guide, another American girl, took us around on a sort of flanking movement, and brought us up near the head of the line. The group of people we were standing near looked familiar. They were. Americans, naturally. I got to talking with a woman from Detroit.
“We’ve been here two weeks now; we’re going back next week, and I’ll certainly be glad to go.” I was saying how it seemed like you could spot an American six blocks away—she agreed. “You know, the other night my friend and I were looking for a nice place to eat, and we stopped in this small restaurant. Well, we’d no sooner gotten in the door when a waiter came over and said ‘Good evening, ladies’ and he showed us to a table and they brought over a little American flag.— And we hadn’t even opened our mouths!”
Ahead of us, standing in the entrance to the building, were the fabled Swiss Guards, dressed in orange and black pantaloons, and carrying a spear as they did 300 years ago—really a sight. Behind them were a flight of stairs to rival anything Hollywood has ever produced.
Suddenly someone must have given some sort of signal and everyone began rushing toward the entrance, swarming past the guards and up the stairs—young priests running pell-mell up the stairs, their cloaks puffing out behind them. The long corridor echoed with the scuffling of hundreds of feet. Nuns, Italian women all in black, Americans—two sailors hurried by carrying the kids I’d seen in the USO. Men, young women, old women,—all scurrying up the long steps, like citizens flying from a Sodom, or toward a paradise.
The stairs turned a sharp corner and ended in a large room, heavy hung with Cyclopean tapestries and red velvet curtains. Men in red velvet robes took our tickets, and we headed into penned-in enclosures—the wooden railings were the only thing that kept us from completely flooding the room. On either long wall were immense tapestries depicting various battles—rather incongruous, I thought. Though we’d been told to stay together, we were spread all over. To the right, another door led somewhere I couldn’t see, being masked by heavy green drapes.
A troop of guards, in blue and gold, came marching from a large door center, past me, and out the door to the right. People, among them the woman I’d been talking with, followed the guards.
“Where are they going?” someone asked.
“I don’t know—maybe they’ve got a private audience.”
But when a few sailors from our party started drifting after them, I began to suspect that somebody was fouled up somewhere. Our guide came hurrying up, gathering everybody together and told us to follow the stream.
“Now, when you get in the next room, stand by the railing—don’t let anybody shove past you; some of these little nuns and priests get carried away with enthusiasm sometimes and go charging in like football players—but don’t you let them. Hurry, now—everyone else will be going in there in a moment.” And with that she vanished into the crowd.
The main audience chamber is a long, narrow room, the vaulted ceiling in gold as in St. Peter’s. We entered through the green curtains I’d seen from the other room, and were ushered into another “corral” just to the right of the door. Far up at the other end of the room, on a raised dais surrounded by red velvet, stood the Papal throne.
Directly across from us was a huge painting—showing a woman with a sword holding the severed head of a man, while the blood poured from his neck over her feet. This struck me as being slightly out of place in the Vatican, even if it was, as I found out later, supposed to represent Ruth slaying the leader of the Philistines.
The room was rapidly filling up, and a solid mass of people choked the aisle. Into the “pen” across from us, beneath the picture, came a group of young nuns, all looking excited and happy. They wore the tight-fitting headdress that showed plainly their heads must have been shaven.
Still they came—into our enclosure came all sorts of Americans and English, as well as a few French. Three-quarters of the entire Italian Army came pouring in—some wearing the red tasseled caps of the mountain fighters—generals, enlisted men, and all ranks in between. Civilians—women with black lace handkerchiefs on their heads, from all classes and walks of life.
I can’t imagine where they put them all—more nuns, with huge white Dutch-looking hats, Italian sailors and airmen. A Japanese priest in black and a monk in brown-and-white—more and more and more.
At long last (after an hour and fifteen minutes) the green curtains were drawn and lights went on over the thrown. A hush fell on the people—a quiet, expectant murmur.
The curtains were drawn open and the soldiers in blue and gold entered again—everyone burst into applause. I turned around to see—the Pope, dressed all in white, carried on a sedan-chair by men in red velvet. He was smiling and giving the scooping-upward movement of his hands. He looked old, but not his eighty years.
People holding up rosaries and crucifixes—one of the sailors further down held up the little blond, and the Pope patted him on the head. The soldiers with the red-tasseled hats waved them in the air and yelled something in Italian. Then someone started singing a Latin hymn, and soon everyone took it up. For some reason, it reminded me of the early Christian martyrs being thrown to the lions, singing.
He at last reached the throne, and descended from the sedan-chair and climbed the steps to the throne.
Two cardinals appeared from somewhere on either side of him, and someone else placed a microphone before him.
All this I saw by standing on tip-toe and craning my neck, for he was a good half-block away.
When he began to speak, everyone fell silent—he has a soft but powerful voice and, speaking first in Italian, I notice the way he slurred the R’s, as most Italians do. He spoke to each group represented; you could tell which one by the applause. The soldiers waved their caps and chanted again, and the nuns across the way hopped up and down and clutched their rosaries when he spoke to them. Since it was a predominantly Italian gathering, he spoke at great length to them.
During this time, I got to speaking with an American in civilian clothes—found out he’s in the army stationed somewhere in Germany and was on his way to Naples to visit the grave of his uncle, who was killed during the war. We were getting along quite well when we heard the Pope say: “And now, the Americans….” His English, I am sorry to say, is so broken it was almost impossible to understand him—of course, when one speaks as many languages as the Pope, it is difficult to be perfect in all of them. He welcomed us to Rome, and gave his blessings to all—Catholic and Protestant. And that, unfortunately, is all I was able to understand or remember.
Then he lapsed into French.
After the audience was officially over, with the Papal blessing upon us all, there was a great delay from the time he descended from the throne until I saw him again. Since I couldn’t see what he was doing, I hadn’t the slightest idea what was going on.
At last he got into his sedan-chair and was carried back down the aisle, while the people sang the Latin hymn. He was carried past me, and the green curtains closed behind him. When they re-opened, we all filed out.
I and the soldier (his name is Joe Golden) almost got lost in the maze of stairways and passages (we left somehow differently than we’d come in).
When we got outside, I went to the bus and got my camera, and Joe and I went back into St. Peter’s. Had I mentioned that Pope Leo X’s body lies embalmed in a glass coffin in one part of the church?
We left St. Peter’s and walked to the USO for dinner, then decided to go to the Forum to take pictures. It had become quite cloudy as we took a bus (No. 64—cost 25 Lire: 4 cents) to Victor Emanuel Square, which is crowned by the first Italian King’s magnificent monument—the most beautiful building in Rome—in classic style.
By the time we got there, it had started to rain. We got thoroughly soaked running back and forth wondering what to do. Finally settled on going into a bar until it let up.
About an hour later, we decided to try again—we got all the way to the Forum walls (it lies, as I said, in a valley—on one end is a street, quite high above it, and with a wall on one side and the Palatine hill on the other). This time we really got wet. We ran into a building near the head of the Forum and found it was the Carcere Marmitine—the ancient cistern-like jail in which Peter and Paul had been held nine months—we saw the post to which they had been chained and the two-foot hole (there were no stairs in it in those days) through which they’d been lowered—two levels below the street.
Made our way back to the USO for something to eat, and went to the show—someone I’d seen before, but wanted to see again. After the show we found a Restaurant-Bar called The Californian. Very modern and very good food—all American; even the menu had American prices on it. By now it was one a.m., and I was tired.
We agreed to meet at 1:00 the next day at the USO and went our respective ways….
Love
Roge
P.S. More tomorrow—I have an acute case of writer’s cramp at the moment.
The Navy’s sponsorship of low-cost, 3- and 4-day guided tours enabled me to visit Paris in November of 1955 and, as shown here, in Rome.
28 February 1956
Dear Folks
This one will probably be mailed before the one I started yesterday, because it has the second day in Rome—I’ve got three pages and we haven’t even seen the Pope yet. Do you mind my writing in such detail? I figure that that way, you know everything that went on and it’s sort of like being there yourselves.
Got a very cold, impersonal letter from Northwestern today—not even a letter, just some pamphlets. Tuition, it seems, is $765 a year, and room (you must live on campus) runs from $600 to $900 a year. So I wrote a letter to Northern—I think I’ll go back there. Ask Lief if he’d care to join me?
About the razing I’ve been getting—it isn’t any particular reason, just that this is the Navy and I take it better than most guys. It definitely isn’t because of the Valentine, mother—they got it and appreciated it very much, and as I’ve said before, every letter I get from home they ask you have to say about them. Still no sign of the brownies—the food boxes lasted two nights. Speaking of food….
Mailing a box of stuff home tonite—I only hope it has enough postage to go air mail. Fortunately, they can’t weigh every package. As for the movies being sent home—yes, I guess I’d better—but I’ll have to write detailed descriptions of everything so you won’t miss out. I’ll send them two at a time so they don’t all get lost together. Store them in a cool, dry place.
Come to think of it, I’ll save myself six cents and mail this along with the rest. Did you ever get those other pictures of the Ti? If not, let me know. The one with the C on it was taken of Augusta bay. Also included is a bunch of stuff on the different ports we’ve hit, some postcards from the Cannes Tour and Sicily, some sugar from the San Remo, etc.
Oh, yes, the other picture was taken just as we left the dear old U.S. and A.
Well, enough for now.
Love,
Roge
1 March 1956
Dear Folks
Just been talking over “old times” with a kid who wants to join the NavCads. I have an awful lot to be proud of—things most other guys would never dream of doing. Up to the point, that is, where they ask “Well how come you quit?”
In my locker I still have a box of stationery from Pensacola and in it an unfinished letter saying I didn’t think I’d be with the NavCads very long.
July 15—that’s an awful long time, Mom—it will have been over a year since I saw you last—that’s a year too long.
I hope you’ve received (probably one with this letter) the two large envelopes I sent yesterday and the day before. You know, at times I think: “Now suppose you got off the boat at Fleet Landing and there were Mom and Dad.” Then I think of all the things I’d show you and everything we could do—and wonder if you’d be as thrilled with it all as I’d want you to be.
Let’s face it, parents—you have a weird son. But personally, I’d be bored green to be average.
Chief Sewell and I spent a good two hours today hotly debating whether, if war came and we were cut off in the Mediterranean (it would be very easy—there are only two ways out—Gibraltar and the Suez), and if we had expended our bombs, planes, and fuel, we would surrender the ship intact or scuttle. I claimed that rather give the enemy a potential weapon to be used against us somewhere else, we would most definitely sink ourselves. The Chief contended that we wouldn’t dare sink 200,000,000 dollars of the taxpayer’s money—that we should put into port and surrender, having first disabled all our guns and instruments, in hopes that we’d be able to take it back by force or it would sit in port till the American armies (victorious as ever) should come and recapture it. He claimed I was very stubborn because I couldn’t agree. What do you think?
“What in hell good reason would we have for sinking it?”
“So they couldn’t get it.”
“There are 3,000 men on this thing—what are they supposed to do?”
“We have lifeboats and life jackets.”
“You know how long they’d last in that water? We haven’t got that many lifeboats to begin with.”
“So you’d going to sail blissfully into port and say: ‘Here we are, take us’? Oh, no, Chief. If you were kicking me in the fac
e, I wouldn’t offer you my shoes.”
And so on into the night. We finally agreed that we would make a run for it, even if we knew we could never make it, and go down fighting.
The United States Sixth Fleet—consisting entirely of thirty-five ships, including two submarines, and two aircraft carriers, is right now in the awkward position of a sacrificial lamb.
But we only have 107 days until we get back to the good old U.S.; and only 163 until I get out.
Still plowing through poetry—I’m some 746 pages deep now, reading Shelly. I especially like his
Ozymandius
I met a traveler from an antique land,
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well that visage read,
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings.
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!:”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
And on that cheerful note, I leave you with
Love
Roge
161 Days
3 March 1956
Dear Folks
Excuse me for not writing yesterday but, with one thing and another, I just didn’t get time. Tonite being Saturday, I’ll no doubt stay up quite late.
We pulled into Rhodes, Greece, today—or rather, we came within a mile of it—that’s how far out we’re anchored. I’ll be able to tell you more about it tomorrow, when I run over to take a quick look. I won’t be able to do much, that’s for sure—I haven’t got a drachma to my name. They were changing money here on ship, but only in multiples of $10.00—and I most certainly can’t afford that. In fact, I have just ten dollars to last me through both Rhodes and Beirut.