Yesterday, we went to Milan to return one rental car and pick up another. Because we are foreigners, the longest amount of time we can rent a car for is six months -- and that only at one place in Milan. So by now we have had many cars of varying sizes and personalities. Our third car was a four-door Renault station wagon -- far too large to really be driving around the roads up here, which were all laid out by wandering goats two thousand years ago -- with French license plates and a fortunately calm demeanor. Because it was French and as big as a cow, we named it Albert Carmus and called it Bertie Car-moo. When we were cleaning it out before we dropped it off after six months, we found a 50 euro note in the little compartment between the seats. We assume it was a tip or a parting gift from Bertie in fond remembrance of our times together. When we later rented a second one of the same make, we called it Bertie Car-two.

There was also a German car called Horst that we had only a short time last spring. It became quite hysterical whenever the driver got (what it considered to be) too close to any outside objects, such as low stone walls, for instance, or other cars. In Capriglia, we are always too close to outside objects -- the roads having been laid out by goats, etc. -- so we drove around with Horst in a pretty much constant state of frenzied alarm bells beeping and screeching at us. This is not particularly soothing for a driver trying to negotiate the hairpin turns of the Via Cappezano Monte, which make the charming Via Capriglia looks like the Champs Elysée. Horst also actually fought us whenever we tried to change lanes without using the turn signal, yanking the steering wheel back into line. So despite his obvious overwhelming care for our well-being, we were relieved -- for Horst's sake -- to return him. We can only hope that he went on to live somewhere with fewer narrow lanes edged by low stone walls, someplace we he could get some peace of mind.

Our new car is tiny and black, like a bat. Naturally, we call it the Batmobile. But "bat" in Italian is "pipistrello" -- one of my favorite Italian words. So the car is actually the PipiMobile. As Jonathan and I continue to age -- and to laugh uproariously -- this name becomes increasingly accurate for all of our cars.

In Milan, taking a taxi from the place we dropped off the old car to the place we picked up the new one (the same rule that limits us to six-month leases also prohibits us from just renewing the current lease of even just getting another car from the same place), the cab driver was surprised (as people often are) that we speak Italian. Most foreigners visiting in Italy apparently just don't bother to learn even the basics. 

"Yes," Jonathan said. "During the Covid lockdown, I made myself a project of trying to memorize as much of Dante's Divine Comedy as I could."

"Ah," the cab driver said, picking up the book that he had next to him on the front seat. "That is what I am reading now." And he showed us his copy of The Divine Comedy. We all laughed. He told us that he had not been able to complete his secondary education until he was in his 30s. He is now in his 50s and says that he is not a "cultured" man, but that he tries to improve his mind. On the back of the seat in front of Jonathan was a quote (in Italian) from Hamlet. The cab driver is not big on religion, he said, but The Divine Comedy, for him, is all about the interior journey. He told us that he was very pleased to meet us. I left his cab feeling that I had been lucky.