Don't be Scared

Why are Italians so afraid of the weather?  I ask myself this question every time it rains and I find myself outside surrounded by umbrella-covered Triestini running for shelter like its World War III. Literally every single person in Trieste carries an umbrella around all day, and they think I am crazy when I say, "It's just water."  

At first I was convinced they were all witches and would melt.  I imagined them saying, "Oh no, the water from the sky again!  What a world what a world," but that's just ridiculous. Maybe it's because they wear more expensive clothes that I do and the rain is damaging to their fashion.  Or maybe the rain in Italy is acidic, and my health is in great danger, but I won't find out until I have a squid baby years from now.  Whatever the explanation, their fear seems to be present when the sun is out as well.

Today I strolled downtown for a haircut.  Being sixty degrees and sunny, I said to myself, no need for a jacket, and took off wearing nothing more than jeans and a long-sleeve shirt.  You would have thought I had left the house naked.   Everyone stared at me, which I am used to being an obvious American, but today they weren't disapproving, it was more like the Triestini feared for my life.  The ladies in fur coats seemed especially alarmed, and one even asked if she could help me in any way.  When I arrived at the salon (barbershops don't exist here, sorry fellas), I thought the woman behind the front desk was going to have a heart attack when I didn't hand her a jacket to hang up.  

I wish I could load them all onto a giant plane and take them to Vermont during a hailstorm, the type in April when the sun is out, and people are all outside in T-shirts saying things like, you call that hail?  But then again, it's all relative.  When my stylist went reaching for the hair gel, I ran out of there screaming like an Italian in a rainstorm.  I's just a good thing I didn't have to stop at the front desk for a jacket.