The Whirlwind

Tom, Noah, and Laura

We had some wonderful visitors this week. Laura, Tom, and Noah arrived last Tuesday and stayed through Sunday morning. Laura and Tom have been here before but this is Noah’s first trip to Florence. He is three years old and we’re pleased that his parents thought that the three of them could make the trip to visit us in Florence.

What kind of experience would a three-year old have in Florence? What kind of impact does the great Renaissance city have on such a young child? Those were questions that we wondered about in advance. We should have thought about the impact of a three-year old on us.

We forgot that he is a whirlwind.

The morning of first full day we took Noah to Piazza Republicca, a large piazza in the center of the city with fashionable stores, fancy cafés, and a carousel smack in the middle of the automobile-free space. His carousel ride was fun and he smiled as he went round and round, up and down on his fine stallion. Then the ride was over.

And the real fun began.

Noah hopped off the carousel, took a few steps across the piazza, and began to stalk a pigeon. Of course, the pigeon interrupted his hunt for shards of bread and pastry and flew a few feet away. Noah squealed with delight. This continued for the next half hour as Noah ran around the piazza, disturbing the scavenging of the pigeons.

Some of the adults in the piazza noticed Noah and his contest with the pigeons. A man whose job was to bring people into his restaurant smiled. A man who sold tourist trinkets from a cart stopped and had quite a conversation with Noah about what presents his parents and grandparents might want to buy for him. Fortunately, Noah was more interested in the pigeons.

We could keep up with him only because there were four of us and just one of him.

On the carousel

Noah and his parents had a stimulating time visiting the Bargello Museum, Florence’s great sculpture museum. The museum is an old fortress with imposing, crenelated walls. Inside there is a large central courtyard with a large, deep well (safely screened a few feet from the top.) The ground floor and the floor above contain a number of sculptures by Michelangelo, Donatello, and the other Florentine masters but Noah was more interested in the collection of old cannons and sculpted lions in the courtyard. (The lion is one of the symbols of the city.) Egged on by his Nonno (grandfather), Noah would put his finger in a lion’s mouth and pull it out suddenly, complaining of bite by the animal. There were many such encounters with stone lions.

Pigeon pursuit 1

Noah ignored the Michelangelo scultpures and circled the well in the courtyard again and again.

Pigeon pursuit 2

There are not many green spaces in Florence. The famous book about Florence, The Stones of Florence by Mary McCarthy, describes a city where the streets, narrow sidewalks, piazzas, and and buildings are constructed of gray or brown stone. There are two exceptions, Piazza Santo Spirito and Piazza d’Azeglio. The first is across the Arno in front of the church of the same name. The second is a large park in a residential area in the western part of the city. The park is surrounded by fine homes and an expensive hotel but the playground swarms with young children in the afternoons when the weather is pleasant. The park also has a carousel and pigeons. This may be Noah’s fondest memory of Florence, the carousel and the pigeons he pursued in this park.

Besides carousels and pigeons, Noah also enjoyed the street musicians who are often very good musicians. The guitarist chose a spot between buildings where his music bounced off the stones beautifully. Noah took a coin to put into his guitar case. Noah also was interested by a man wearing white makeup and a costume that made him appear to be a statue. Noah approached him, the man gently put his hand on Noah’s hand, and slowly turned his head toward us so we could take pictures. Artfully done.

Talking with a salesperson

A thought about our three-year old’s experience

It seemed like a whirlwind but that is how we adults see it. The three-year old child was engaging everything that was around him and bouncing from stimulus to stimulus. Interestingly he quickly developed a sense for where things were. The first day he got a cookie our favorite bakery, he was very happy. The second day we passed near the same bakery but from a different direction, he recognized the store front and wanted to visit again. (Of course, we did.) He also knew how to travel the blocks from our apartment to the park with the other kids and the carousel. He seemed to be mapping the city in his mind quickly and accurately.

The statue

We remember reading a book review some years ago titled What Babies Know and What We Don’t. The reviewer noted that adults have a style of learning that might be called spotlight consciousness where we focus on one thing (for instance, writing a blog entry) and ignore or try to ignore other things. Young children, on the other hand, have a style of learning that might be called lantern consciousness where they

“are vividly aware of everything without being focused on any one thing in particular. There is a kind of exaltation and a peculiar kind of happiness that goes with these experiences too.”

The guitarist

It seemed like a whirlwind but it was a child taking in a varied collection of new experiences with “exaltation” and “happiness” and bringing his parents and grandparents along for the ride. 

We made a mistake. We should have napped when he napped.

Coming down from an exciting day