Having a Nice Trip

 

Three years ago, I came to Rome with three friends to help with the Rome Temple open house. That experience convinced me that Robyn and I had to return to live here—while we were still heathy enough to do so without worry--(yet to be fully determined).

 

For a few days before the official open house got underway, we were assigned at each of the two guard houses of the plaza entrances to the temple--to help arrange deliveries and to explain to people who wanted to enter the grounds that it wasn’t yet open, and to greet other volunteers as they arrived.  They needed us because there was an even mix of Italian and English speaking arrivals and we were multi-lingual with abilities in Italian, English, German and Spanish—all of which came in handy. We would open the large gate for vehicle deliveries and encourage pedestrians to walk on the edge of the driveway. That’s because there was a 2” piece of angle iron sticking up in the middle of the driveway for the gate to stop on.  Unfortunately, it was very much the same color as the cobblestone pavement and lots of people tripped on it—including us.

 

Once, while Eric Anderson and I were engaged in our duties, I noticed out of the corner of my eye someone in a suit come running up to the guard house.  His toe caught the piece of iron and he went flying—completing 75% of a forward flip—landing on his back. I was sure we were going to need an ambulance and ran over to see James J. Lund, Esq., our fearless leader, lying on his back trying get his breath. When it was clear that nothing was broken or bleeding, we started to laugh uncontrollably. Two of the gardeners had heard the crash and came over to investigate. They went over to the flower bed, picked a red flower and put it on Jamie’s chest. He reenacted the event the next day while I took photos.

On Wednesday, I noticed they have added a bright yellow caution decal warning people they could trip on it.