I was a kid who liked mummies, Roman myths, and a book my father had about bog bodies. I was–and still am–fascinated by the plaster death casts of Pompeii. By some miracle, I did not become an archaeologist or a goth.
I went to Pompeii in 2002, after September 11, when the airfares were low. My friend Jennie and I had gone to graduate school together, and we decided to meet up for a week in Rome, with some side trips to Florence and of course Pompeii. We went to the catacombs, saw a chapel decorated with bones, and now we were off to a city whose residents met a horrible, sudden end. We weren’t goths, but medievalists. Close enough, really.
Despite an early arrival at the Termini Stazione, we didn’t get to Naples until after lunch–due to my poor Italian at the ticket window–and I was practically shoving Jennie along in my fear that the city would shut early on some official whim. But we had plenty of time. The weather was good, the traffic of Naples terrifying, and the city of Pompeii seemed strangely present.
I’ve seen lots of ruins: deserted medieval villages, castles by lochs, deserted mills, and abandoned farms. I’m always happy to wander through the remaining walls and foundations, thinking about the former mysterious residents. But as Jennie and I passed into the town, peering pass locked gates into houses and squinting at the shaded frescoes, there was a unsettling feeling to Pompeii.
It felt like somewhere I might live.
Now, it’s fun to imagine you are a monk in a Florentine cell, or a princess in Urquhart Castle, but you know perfectly well that you are not, and that in a former life, you most likely weren’t. But as I strolled on the raised sidewalk–hopping across the series of fat stones that let the Pompeians cross to the other side with unsullied sandals–we walked by bakeries, restaurants, shops, and little houses, all tightly packed together. They only needed a roof to be as they were. It felt like Davis Sq, where I lived. And I could imagine myself here in Pompeii, in the bright sun, walking with my friend, shopping and talking, getting a snack, maybe going down to the harbor to see the ships, all under the purple shadow of Vesuvius.
Pompeii is in DC at the moment at the National Gallery. It’s a beautiful exhibit with all of the artifacts that we didn’t see in our short trip to Naples, with frescoes and statues and jewelry. And I enjoyed it, wandering from piece to piece, looking into the sad enamel eyes of busts or the wicked smile of Silenos riding a fat wineskin fountain. But while beautiful, I wasn’t really moved by them.
When I think of Pompeii, with its sunny streets, it’s really the feeling of familiar that I remember. The sense we could be living in a good place, but be moments from disaster.
