At last, the sun broke through, casting welcome warmth across the faces of buildings. The arteries of the sidewalks thickened with people. Despite my umbrella, I was soaked to the skin by now, but I didn't care.

I turned a corner, and marveled at the wall: huge, solid, high, with a crenellated top. Must be Vatican City, I guessed, and I followed it up the hill, feeling tiny next to its mass. I gazed out over the city at sunset, old square buildings with a forest of TV antennas jutting from their roofs.

I stood for a long minute on this quiet hillside, awed by the long past of this place, its dream-like quality, and my awake presence within it.

Returning from my hillside promontory, I decided at last it was time to sample the apex of Italian cuisine. My first taste of true gelato melted luxuriously across my tongue in buttery sweet bliss, sparking a sense of pleasure so profound that for a moment, standing on that busy sidewalk, I was struck blind and deaf, nothing existed except that sublime sensation.

“Scusi, Signorina,” the man said, breaking my trance. He was perhaps in his early thirties, short hair, his face sincere and earnest, neatly dressed in dark trousers and a white button down shirt. He continued in accented English, “I was just finished with work and on my way home when I noticed you. You look so happy. May I take you to dinner, perhaps show you some sights?”

“No, thank you, grazie.” I replied.

“You are in Roma by yourself?” He asked.

“Yes, my first day here.” I said, turning my attention back to my melting cone.

“Then come with me.” he persisted.

I thought about the person I had been, the person afraid to be on her own. “No, grazie,” I said, smiling. “I came to Rome to be alone.”

Next: Shopping for Breakfast