A Rose-Tinted Reverie

What I thought I would do with my time in Florence: Find my Prince Charming, experience an event that would unfold in a spiral of self-discovery, and purchase a pair of Italian leather boots that were to fit as snug as Cinderella’s glass slipper.

What I actually did with my time in Florence: Attract the unwanted attention of the waiter beneath my apartment who now has a four-minute video of me singing Mamma Mia at karaoke, and break my nose as a result of falling unconscious on cobblestone after not

seeing something slipped into my drink.

My time in Florence can be split up into two major phases, and one might say that these phases are similar to the stages of grief one experiences after having their heart broken. First, I went through denial. I experienced denial in terms of being in Florence at all. How can a place as enchanting as Firenze exist anywhere outside of my imagination? I then experienced denial when I had to face the fact that my perspective of the city was largely blinded by the rose-tinted glasses that were cemented to my face.

The second phase of my Florentine adventure was characterized by acceptance. I wiped clean my glasses of the rosy-hue that had accumulated with time, and saw life in Florence as it was, not as what I had dreamt it up to be. I also learned that while I did not find myself by securing a Prince Charming or purchasing the perfect pair of boots, I did in many other ways.

I arrived in Florence, Italy with a heart shattered into a million shards of glass. The boy with the icy blue eyes that I had loved for the past three years had absolutely annihilated me hours before I was to embark on my European Adventure. When I arrived in Florence, I assured myself I would find a sweet, soft-spoken Italian to sweep me off my feet and into his world where his most pressing problem was burning the croissants he baked fresh every morning. I’d “find myself” by embracing an Italian mentality that encourages a life of leisure. I’d walk hand and hand down the crooked cobblestone streets with my comforting companion. We’d admire the soft sun as it would rise sleepily over the Arno and warm our chilled hands, the ones that weren’t clasped, with piping hot cappuccinos.

Denial Stage 1 – How can I actually be living in a place this incredible?: Florence, a city that drapes delicately around my shoulders, pulls me into a warm, freshly baked embrace any time I let myself wander freely around its winding streets. The street side smell of cigarette smoke and sweet, sugary pastries floods my nostrils. It envelops me in a haze as disorienting as the cloud of smoke being puffed in front of my face. When I wander aimlessly about the crooked cobblestone streets, I feel as if I finally understand the meaning of Édith Piaf’s “La Vie en Rose.” The enchanting city that lays before my eyes glistens and gleams, it emanates the same rosy hue as the rose-lychee gelato I consumed an hour ago. It’s almost as if I can’t escape the swirl of pride that surrounds this city. Even their public trash bins are proudly plastered with the fleur-de-lil. I understand their devotion though, because when I see the sleepy sun rise slowly over the Arno each morning, there’s that small slice of me that wants to stay in this serene space forever. Zooming vespas, soulful street performers, and beeping taxi monitors outside my open window wake me from my reverie.

Denial Stage 2 – Were those glasses I was wearing really that deceptive? I didn’t want to believe it: After weeks of frivolously frolicking about Florence in search of my fairytale, I forced myself to snap out of it. I had been gallivanting around the city of Florence with this notion that my experience abroad would be a movie reel montage of idyllic landscapes and romantic encounters. While yes, Florence practically oozes beauty and charm out of the cracks in its uneven streets, the expectations I had attached to it were largely misguided by my idealizing mind. I had fabricated this fairytale in my head of what my time in Florence would be like, but the reality of the situation was that I was a heartbroken girl looking to the romanticized version of Italy to save me from my sadness. I came to the realization that while life in Florence behind those millennial glasses of mine was as charming as could be, it kept me from viewing what was truly important: embracing the city and the experience, however messy, for what it was.

A revelation...En route to acceptance: Maybe in the beginning it really did feel like Florence wrapped me in a warm embrace, but the recent rain has flooded my optimism. No longer warm and fuzzy, it feels as if the city is a cold, damp denim jacket that’s beginning to drench my white tee-shirt see through. I have now come to terms with the fact that the cigarette smoke surrounding the city doesn’t just temporarily blur my view, it chokes me. The rosy tint on the glasses I had been wearing religiously throughout the first half of my trip was giving out, fading away to reveal a clear, unobstructed view of Florence. No matter how tight I closed my eyes and tried to hold onto the city as seen behind my big, bright, beautiful glasses, I couldn’t seem to retrieve the mesmerizing memory of it. My mind had repressed the ideal in favor of the real and I had to do the same. No more daydreaming.

The last stage...Acceptance: If anything really woke me up from my fairytale fantasy

surrounding the city of Florence, it was falling flat on my face in the street. This

was an incredibly cruel twist of fate considering I was arguably the one with the most positive

perception of the city upon arriving. Looking back on it now, I think that moment was essentially Florence’s way of slapping me in the face as punishment for being so swept up in my initial expectations of it. Florence, I do forgive you for breaking my nose and giving me two black eyes; I say this because I now know exactly why you did it. You were telling me to wake up and smell the cigarette smoke, overflowing trash-bins, and horse pee, and EMBRACE IT! You were telling me to quit searching for Prince Charming and find someone to start my super-successful singing career because let’s face it, that video the waiter has of me belting out ABBA’s “Mamma Mia” is some of my best work. I had embarked on this journey as a naïve, heart-broken girl searching for her future fairytale in supposedly one of the most romantic countries in the world. I was looking to Florence to pick up my broken pieces and craft them into one of its crystal clear, colorful works of glass. Instead, what Florence did was chew up the Starbucks chocolate croissant version of me, and spit out a flaky, freshly baked apple and cheese danish. Talk about a transformation.