Bella
Under the old stone bridge exhibiting balustrades shaped like a woman’s torso, oily green waters swirled and lapped their way to the Grand Canal. Moored at the sides of the canal were workboats in various shades of blue, their paint fading and peeling where they bumped against the concrete walls. No gondolas glided past.
Far from the oft-photographed visitors’ sites, only the occasional lost tourist couple, furtively consulting an unfolded map, walked through the small square and over the bridge. The bridge and square were part of the Venetians’ Venice, the Dorsaduro.
At the foot of the bridge sat a traditional wood-fronted trattoria. In front of the restaurant, a leathery-skinned old man drank wine from a small water glass on his table. Next to the glass rested a purple-stained ceramic pitcher from which he refilled his glass at infrequent intervals. He nursed the wine in the glass, endeavoring to make it last. Across the square, twenty feet away from the old man, I sipped my espresso.
November in Venice can be a mixed affair. One day can be damp and cold with a clinging fog that rolls across the islands of the Laguna. Occasionally, on a winter afternoon, the sky may clear, with brilliant sun breaking through to light the outsides of the buildings with reflections bounced from the canals.
On the dark days, people hurry and scurry to their destinations, not seeking to linger outside. But on those rare warm November afternoons, people take their time strolling home, soaking in the sun, knowing it may be a while before they see it again.
On those days, the women break out their designer skirts and leather boots, their coats swinging open to reveal stylish sweaters and blouses. Dark sunglasses rest in jet-black hair. An artistically wound scarf adorns every neck.
All this the old man took in with each glance, his pale blue and rheumy eyes following each swishing skirt and scarf as their owner transited the square and climbed the stone bridge. “Bella,” he would say as each woman went past him.
“Bella” he sighed to a young woman in a pale-blue sweater and skin-tight jeans; “Bella” he nodded to a pierced twenty-something in a leather jacket, purple hose, and thick, black Doc Martens.
The old man’s deeply etched face reflected a life of hard labor; he could have been anywhere from a bad fifty to one-hundred years of age. His short white hair sat up in spikes through which one could see his tanned scalp. He wore dark-blue flannel pants and a brown corduroy jacket over a dark green army sweater and open-collared shirt. A red scarf wrapped around his neck, the ends of which disappeared into the jacket.
He sat at the outdoor table, his back to the brown wood-and-stucco building being warmed by the afternoon sun. Bells rang from a nearby church. If one listened carefully, they could hear the vaporettos on the Grand Canal.
“Bella, Bella,” came forth the soft exclamation for an elegant forty-something woman with large sunglasses towing a small white short-haired dog.
Do the women hear him? I wondered, as I sat at my table across the foot of the bridge.
But if I could hear him, so surely must the women as they walked between us. None looked angry; not one twirled on her heels to confront this “dirty old man.” Instead, each woman’s smile broadened as they continued across the bridge. My dispenser of “Bellas” was improving their day, confirming they still had style and grace. They would surely lose “it” one day but, for now, they still shone. Thanks to the old man’s acknowledgement, they truly felt “Bella.”
The square’s old man was a civic virtue, a man who kept an entire city’s women, or at least those in the Dorsaduro, looking and feeling more beautiful.
My espresso completed, I called my waitress over, and pointed at the old man. I ordered him another jug of wine, left a twenty Euro note on my saucer, and started my way back to the hotel.
As I skirted his table, I bent slightly in his direction and nodded. “Bella,” I whispered, then was on my way.
