Hmm.... Etna erupted again...8th time this year

Memory trigger! Peter took me to Taormina once for a week to celebrate his birfday... He was more than extravagant when it came to things like that. It isn't far from Mt. Etna. As in... within spitting distance. And while there, it sort of smoked lazily like someone enjoying a really good cigar outside a restaurant out on the street.

Wherever we went, it was there.... smokin' hot.

It sort of worried me at various times of the day, mostly because of the hotel we were in. It was built into a cliff over a cove, so of course I would think, 'if that thing erupts, there's gonna be an earthquake, and we are gonna slide into the sea.... at BEST...'

Don't get me wrong, it was idyllic, gorgeous tiled rooms with balconies looking down onto the cove, and birds I'd never imagined or seen before. The only problem with the hotel was that it was full of US tourists who were true 'Murkins. Loud can't define it. Ear-splitting oldies.

But I learned sneakrets. Like sitting on the café balcony while the oldies inside were discussing their remedies for digestive problems and what worked for them. Oblivious to the great beauty of the place. And why they never dress up abroad if they go to a cultural event. They were going to a concert or something and one exchange gave me the key to a massive mystery for me...

'You going out tonight?'

'Yes.'

'Are you dressing up?'

'No.'

'Why?'

'Because we're on vacation. ....... And we're not dolls!' My cappuccino flew out of my nose. Thank you Bubble-headed old Barbie and Ken.

Peter had always bugged me about why some US tourists went places looking rag-tag, taking back-packs to the Vienna State Opera, for instance. Hell, I'd worn a suit to watch the famous Salzburg marionette theater , and everyone was dressed formally for that. I hadn't known... So it was a revelation... or something. It became a huge joke with us... 'We're not dolls...' Uh-huh...

But when they were out on their day trips, the place was so quiet, and so beautiful, and would see steam pouring out of the ground less than a mile away, and look up, and there Etna was, smoking thoughtfully, or so I thought.

We had an incredible week there. I took a trip to Syracuse alone, because Peter had gotten a 24 hour bug. Guided tour. It was awesome. Met incredibly interesting people.

My favourite thing was to go up to the ruins of the amphitheater early in the morning which still had a proscenium, and through the arch, Etna was smoking away.

It felt like being transported back in time and into history.

The locals referred to it as 'the benevolent mountain', but seemed very wary of it.

I'd been to Pompeii years before, which was so impressive, I can't find the words. And Vesuvius was looming above it. Scientists are convinced that it might erupt again, although it has been dormant since the end of WWII. And are trying to get the people of 'New Pompeii' next door to sell their lands and leave. Which they refuse to do, because the farming land is so rich. Among other things...

I sampled orange juice from those places which knocked me out, and I HATE orange juice... or red wines that were so full, I thought I'd died and gone to heaven. Who would want to give up producing that, I ask you?

Let's face it... if Etna had erupted while I was there, I'd have been thrilled. Frightened, but thrilled. As long as I could live to tell about it...

As Mark Twain said after seeing an uncovered woman's face in palestine and realising he finally knew why the men there kiss... 'you have to travel to learn'. You can unlock secrets which have been a mystery to you. You can experience incredible things which go way beyond what you ever imagined.

But I DO know... I really wouldn't want to live near the foot of a volcano. Or on the San Andreas Fault, for that matter... I never understand why some people are so foolish that they re-build, and think it won't happen again. Cocked-up optimism???

Here's why...

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