Today was not a day to visit local sights. The clouds have rolled in and the temperature has dropped to half that we had yesterday! So today we plan to stay in town and, weather permitting, maybe take a trip into Monza and have a look around. We leave our hotel room and head off to Zia & Zio's house. On arrival it starts to rain. This ends our plans to do anything at all so Zio puts on a DVD of Lino's & Silvia's wedding and we watch that with some interest. Unfortunately for Silvia, her father was in hospital on the day of her marriage and so they made the unusual decision to allow the groom to walk her down the isle. Despite it appearing strange, it all seemed to work OK. We then spent some time sightseeing via Google maps. I showed them the street that we lived in and they were surprised at how open and large our houses were! You've probably guessed already that with all this confinement, Lucy was as restless as a Jack Russell scratching at the door. Zio, desperate to calm her down, decided that it was time for a DVD.
As the rain pelted down outside, we sat watching the Italian version of Mamma Mia. Both my Zia and Zio said that they loved to watch it and did so once a week. Most importantly Lucy loved it too! For a moment, my mind was taken away, and I recall that my mum, if she was alive, would have loved to watch it as well. Half way through the movie, by some devine intervention, photos started to get passed around. I soon realised, perhaps reservedly, that another period of reflection had been reached. We saw photos of events passed that we had missed, children that had grown to become men and women, and those dearly loved that had met the end of their human life both, old and young. As we trawled through years of photos, perhaps also with a sense of guilt for all that had passed unnoticed, we were serenaded, in the background, to the sound of ABBA's song "When all is said and done"; and as the sun goes down on our sojourn to Monza, on a day earmarked with weather heralding the first real day of Autumn we are left with the lyrics to that song in our head:
"Here's to us one more toast and then we'll pay the bill
Deep inside both of us can feel the autumn chill
Birds of passage, you and me
We fly instinctively
When the summer's over and the dark clouds hide the sun
Neither you nor I'm to blame when all is said and done"