I Think My Ass Is Bleeding

It takes true talent, I believe, to end up in the back of a police car by day three in Italy.

So I drank a bottle of wine at dinner, something I do often and can easily handle. Or so I thought. I caught my bus to Termini station, and then the connecting bus to my monastery. In my superior confidence in my navigational abilities, I put on my headphones, zoned out, and started the trek home. I'm not exactly sure at what point I noticed that I had missed my stop. The thing about missing your stop on the bus routes of Italy, is that it usually means that you can get off and walk your way back. Unless the road you were on is a freeway. Where the only way you can avoid being absolutely mowed down by passing vehicles is to get off the main thoroughfare by climbing over the railing, scraping the hell out of your ass, and ripping your pants in two. If you know me well, you know that I may have a tendency to exaggerate, but I need to make it clear that in this case I was complete and utter bare-assed to the world with pieces of pant tatters flapping in the breeze. The terrain into which I had climbed was the wilderness (unbeknownst to me, there IS a wilderness in the outskirts of Rome), and became more and more treacherous as I attempted to claw my way back towards anything that resembled civilization. I fell into one hole after another, often up to my waist, and had to fight my way out through thorn-covered vines and gnarled brambles. In chaos and confusion, I found myself screaming, "really? REALLY?!" to no one in particular.

When I finally spotted something resembling human colonization (ie. neon lights at a gas station), a huge, barbed-wire fence (are we sensing a pattern here?) stood between it and me. With no thought to the fact that climbing over things not meant to be climbed had not served me so far, you'd better believe that my dirty and exhausted, half-drunk, bare-assed self managed to heave myself up, and sort of "fall" over it. To say "climb" would be giving myself far too much credit. I then emerged like the swamp monster, covered in foxtails and weeds, and begged the station attendant in broken Italian, while sobbing, to call me a taxi. Followed by a wait of exactly one hour, while I shivered (I lose all my heat through my ass, of course), and learned how to thank the nice man (via translation book) for looking after me. This is all because I thought he was calling me a taxi. So when, an hour later, the cops arrived, I tried very hard to find "You suck," in the translation book. It wasn't there.

The cops spoke no English. Of course. They asked me for documentation, which I promptly discovered I had lost, along with both of my credit cards and about $70. Of course. The fact that I was covered in dirt, and that my pants were ripped meant that it was next to impossible to convince them that I had not been beaten or mugged, but was merely a drunken idiot who had gotten lost in the wilderness, coincidentally had lost all of my important documents, and was now tearfully, desperately, in need of my bed. The story wasn't even convincing to me, and I had lived it. Not to mention that the only relevant word I could say in Italian was "lost" and the only word they could say in English was "attacked." That and "boyfriend," which they kept asking me if I had. I'm still not clear as to whether this is because they thought it was he who had beaten and left me for dead, or if they were sussing out the potential for a date. One thing for sure is that they could not believe I was traveling alone. I explained that I had only been here for three days, and that I planned to stay for three months, and perhaps it was that I had exhibited such stupidity in such a very short period of time that prevented them from comprehending that such a thing was possible. Who let this unlucky, navigationally-challenged, half-naked American girl with a drinking problem wander around a foreign country for three months?!

I finally came up with the idea to give them the number from the guidebook for the restaurant in which I had dined, thinking that perhaps they could solve the mystery of where my credit cards had disappeared to. Instead, we got a VERY pissed off, English-speaking waitress on the phone, whom the officers then used as a translator. She merely wanted to know why I had the cops calling her establishment, and whether or not I had been robbed, which she then communicated to the officer in Italian, and hung up. Of course. So I was still no closer to resolving whether they had found my missing documents.

When they put me in the back of the car, I had to take it on faith that I was going home and not to Roman jail to spend the night with Roman prostitutes and Roman crack whores. Fortunately, we shortly arrived at my monastery. Unfortunately, both officers demanded to be let in to see my passport. So picture this. I'm not allowed to bring boys home, and I stroll in at 1 am with two polizia in tow. Of course. So I let them in through the huge gates and up the pitch-black stairwell to my room, praying that they would be quiet. They weren't remotely, of course. But by now, perhaps out of relief that I was near my warm bed, and not on my way to a foreign holding cell, I started to see the humor in this situation. Now we were snickering, pushing each other into walls, while I scolded them to be quiet, and we continued to use charades to communicate with one another. I kept asking if I was in trouble, because I couldn't figure out why they needed to see my passport, and because one of the guys had been on the phone with god knows whom for the entire ride home, repeating my name and "California" over and over again. When I repeated the question to his partner, the only way I could communicate it was to hold my wrists out in "arrest me" pose. At which point, the officer pulled his handcuffs from his pocket. I nodded. He then pointed to the headboard of my bed. Giggled. Literally giggled. Endearing and wildly disconcerting at the same time. Then the first officer, while still on the phone, noted that I had a pair of jeans drying on the window sill, pointed to my bare ass, and suggested with a grin, that I change.

They say truth is stranger than fiction. And the truth is that if ANYONE after three days could have a run-in with non-English speaking police who don't believe a word you're saying and end the night making fun of you and being suggestive, that person would be me. But it occurs to me that I got a good story, a free ride, and an excuse to buy some Italian fashion out of all of this. If there is a silver lining, I will find it. Of course.