Seven Seasons in Siena (28 page)

Eventually the finish line comes into view, and I say to Tatiana, “Let's cross it at the same time, so neither of us has to be last.” Tatiana cheerfully agrees to this face-saving scheme, and we sail over the line with the élan of synchronized swimmers. But almost immediately an official descends on us with a clipboard, asking to know which of us crossed first.

“Neither,” I say. “We finished together.”

He shakes his head sadly. “Sorry, we must have a ranking.” In other words,
we must know who is the loser
. I'm so impressed by this bracing political incorrectness—in America, we go out of our way to make sure no loser is ever forced to confront his loserhood—that I happily volunteer to take the fall. For her part, Tatiana seems content to let me.

I ask the official who came in first; he names someone I
don't know, then points this paragon out to me—a gaunt, silver-haired, middle-aged guy who's celebrating his victory with a cup of wine and a cigarette. Our carmate Guido, it appears, came in second.

They and all the other runners—most of whom look at us as if they've been here since last Tuesday—are enjoying themselves as though at a party. And Dario did in fact reassure me that there'd be food and drink at the finish. I go now in search of it and find a table barren of everything but oily paper liners and, almost lost in a corner, one lonely remaining sandwich. I decide that since I willingly took last place, I should get the last food item, and I snatch it up quickly. I've got half of it down before I realize this may have been a mistake. My body is severely traumatized, and now I'm shoving a large mass into it with the benefit of only minimal chewing. For a moment, I think the sandwich just might come right back up again. Which, along with my last-place ranking, would be guaranteed to make the contradaioli remember me—though not exactly in the way I'd envisioned.

I managed to keep body, soul, and sandwich together but suddenly realize I have an even bigger problem. It was warm in the valley below, where we started; but Montalcino is at a significantly higher elevation. And I now notice that all the other runners have been met here by loved ones who've brought warm clothes for them to wear over their running gear. Even Dario, I now notice (how had it escaped me before?) ran the course with a shirt tied around his waist, which he then slipped on at the finish. I alone am bare of limb. And beginning to shiver.

But I can't leave yet; I have to wait for a ride back to
Dario's car. It's then that I spot a large wall along one side of the street that's directly facing the sun. I approach it, squeeze between two cars to reach it, and then press my back against the brick surface to absorb the warmth. This position also serves to keep me fairly well hidden from view. Though at one point a couple of well-dressed Montalcino women pass by (wearing toasty leather jackets), and one of them glances at me, does a double take—then turns to her companion, whispers in her ear; and she, too, looks over her shoulder at me. I can just imagine what was said: “Am I dreaming, or is there a yellow pedophile hanging on that wall like a lizard?”

That night, Dario rents the movie
Everest
as a kind of joke. We watch it over dinner, and I find myself thinking, yeah, sure, those guys had it tougher than I did. But they didn't have to
run
all the way up the mountain face, did they. And they didn't have to do it dressed like Tonya Harding.

Later, as I try to sleep, my mind keeps returning to the Sienese self-exiles who sacrificed so much to reach Montalcino. They had a motto:
Ubi cives, ibi patria
. Where one's people are, one's country is. What a stirring paean to citizenship—to community! I suppose that, in a nutshell, is what originally attracted me—still attracts me—to these people. But it's also what stands between us. This day has been a depressing metaphor for all the time I've spent here: running harder than ever and still falling behind, standing to one side while others celebrate and commingle.

I have one last chance to get it right. My life has changed; the world has changed. My freelance clients have fallen steadily away, and the banking collapse has evaporated most of my savings. Paying the mortgage has become something
akin to a blood sport. If I'm to survive this, I need to commit myself to rebuilding both my business and my finances. I can no longer afford the luxury of chasing after the ideal society.

I'll come back one final time, for the July Palio, and do my best to participate fully—to be a brucaiolo both in spirit and in flesh; to be
present
for the event as completely as possible for a poor, moonstruck
straniero
. If I can do that, perhaps I can satisfy this longing from my heart; if I can, for a day, lose myself in the tide of community that rolls up from the Piazza del Campo, through Via dei Rossi, and down Via del Comune in a continual ecstatic roar, I'll have something precious to hold fast to; I'll have had, at the last, one moment, one blessed moment of true grace.

…

 
WHEN I GET BACK TO SIENA, TWO TOPICS OF CONVERSATION
predominate. The first is the Shell contrada. In April it was already favored to win the July Palio, since it had the best jockey (my good friend Trecciolino), as well as an enormous amount of cash to spend on “strategy” (by now we all know what
that
means). Since then, the final three contrade for the July race have been selected by lottery, and the Ram wasn't one of them, which means the Shell won't have its rival on the track—another signal advantage. The only remaining factor in the equation is the horse. The extraction is tomorrow, and there are two great favorites from past races: Fedora Saura (who has won previously, for the Goose) and Istriceddu (who won last August, for the Owl). Should the Shell manage to land either one of those, the race will be its to lose.

The second hot topic is the prize banner itself—the drappellone. It was painted by an Italo-Lebanese artist, Ali Hassoun, who has chosen as his subject Saint George and the dragon, with the Virgin Mary smiling down on him, all rendered in the style of the great French master David. But Saint George is wearing a black-and-white kaffiyeh instead of a helmet, and above the Virgin's head Hassoun has included the title
of the nineteenth chapter of the Koran, which is dedicated to the Madonna. This has stirred up debate over the appropriateness of commissioning a Muslim artist to produce a work venerating the Virgin. In fact, the controversy has already attracted both local and national attention, with international not far behind. But here in Siena, the strongest objection to the banner comes from an entirely distinct quarter. As you can imagine, the Dragon contrada is less than pleased that its mascot is depicted on the banner as not only slain but lying in a heap at Saint George's feet. In fact, the
dragaioli
might well be said to be breathing fire over the matter. I rather like the thing, personally, but it's hard to find anyone else in Siena who doesn't have some objection to it, and I quickly learn it's best just not to bring it up.

This particular Palio is dedicated to the 750th anniversary of the Battle of Montaperti, in which the Sienese smashed, stomped, and pulverized the high holy crap out of the Florentines, to such an extent that Dante, a Florentine by birth and a poet by nature, exacted a writer's best revenge: recording for the ages his fury and disgust, penning that the Sienese brutality “dyed the river Arbia red with blood.” The Sienese, far from being chastened by anything so effete as a few lines of verse, remain spectacularly proud of the victory, and even today, when they face Florentine teams in sporting events, will unfurl in the bleachers large banners reading
REMEMBER MONTAPERTI
.

I have some American friends in town for this Palio. Sally and Biff, with their teenage daughter, Grace, have rented a spectacular villa called Barbocce just a short drive from Vagliagli. Since I'm once again availing myself of Dario's hospitality, I'm able to shuttle over to see them shortly after my
arrival and thus spend a lazy afternoon at their pool before plunging tomorrow into
i giorni del Palio
. Their son, Miles, is also on hand; he's been traveling across Europe with two friends, R.J. and Aldo, strapping boys who make me feel very old by treating me with entirely too much cordiality. There's also another family sharing the villa: the Hintons—mom, dad, two daughters. Factor in Dario's clients for the week, the Stouffers, and it begins to seem like a full-scale invasion. After my last few visits, I've grown accustomed to being the only Yank in town (aside from Rachel, who by now seems more Tuscan than American). I'm a little worried about how I'm going to immerse myself in one last, glorious bath of pure
brucaiolismo
when I've got my countrymen all around me grooving on the novelty of it all.

One small incident seems, on the face of it, a good omen: in one of the rooms at Barbocce, there are two antique engravings of Caterpillar alfieri. There aren't any other contrade represented anywhere on the villa's walls—no Palio memorabilia of any kind, in fact, just these two nineteenth-century boys attired in blue, yellow, and green. Later I'll report this to the contrada archivist, Francesco (aka “Il Tira”), who will be particularly intrigued—possibly I'll have helped facilitate a new acquisition for the Bruco museum. Which is a
much
better legacy than last place in the Siena-Montalcino or even second place in the karaokando.

The day of the extraction arrives, and there's a tripe and wine breakfast at Società L'Alba—which, believe me, is much more appetizing than it sounds and quite energizing too; or possibly that's just a matter of the almost palpable suspense. The brucaioli are humming with interest in what the outcome of the extraction will be, though in general they aren't
burning with desire for a victory themselves; their last win is still a fresh memory, and in any case they've promised to help their ally, the Shell. But if the Caterpillar should happen to land Fedora Saura or Istriceddu? Everyone is certain that Gianni has one or two contingency plans in place. If handed a golden opportunity for a fourth victory for his captaincy, he's not about to turn it down.

Piazza del Campo is packed with people for the extraction, and the sun overhead is merciless; I've yet to attend an extraction in which the heat wasn't borderline lethal. I hover in a pocket of shade watching the ten contrada representatives, all in medieval dress (caps and doublets and hose—how do they keep from fainting?) as they await the beginning of the ceremony. One note of interest: the Wave has broken with tradition by sending a woman to collect the horse. She looks fetchingly boyish in the contrada's sky blue and white.

Though the heavens are scorching the rest of us, they seem to be smiling on the Shell, because it walks away with Istriceddu. Actually, its members march, leap, cartwheel—practically
fly
away. This is all they've been waiting for. They've got the horse, they've got the jockey, they've got no rival, and they've got cash to spare. The actual race might at this point be little more than anticlimax.

Dario isn't so convinced, because the other highly sought horse, Fedora Saura, has been taken by the Forest. “No one ever pays much attention to them,” he says. “They have no enemy; they're the boring contrada. So they slip by under the radar. And that's how they've ended up winning thirty-six races. They could do it again, with this horse.” The Forest's fantino is the twenty-six-year-old Silvano Mulas, aka Voglia (Desire), who's racing his first Palio, for which reason no one
pays him much attention, either. “But he's won everything else, everywhere but here,” Dario says. “It's a mistake to underestimate him.”

The Caterpillar extracts a horse named Elimia, which at first I hear as “Elimina,” not a hopeful augur. Our jockey will be Gingillo's brother, Virginio—which, again, I mishear as Vergine (i.e., “Virgin”).