Sitting on a shady bench at the end of the Piazza Navona, I am facing a caffeteria and ristorante called Dolce Vita. The one patron in particular who stands out to me is an elderly man. He is deeply engrossed in his newspaper and must have been sitting here for a while because his coffee cup has long been cleared by the waiter. For a man of his age he must be retired, yet he is more than presentable in his freshly dry-cleaned blue button down shirt and crisply pressed dress pants. His white moustache and large reading glasses round out the ensemble perfectly. It seems that he is performing the first ritual of his day, because he is so at ease at the caffeteria and rarely looks up from what he is reading; he never once makes I contact with me, though I am facing his direction and keep glancing at him. Yet, like many Italians, he is also a natural voyeur. I can tell this because he has deliberately rotated his chair completely away from the table and is facing the sidewalk and Fountain of Neptune. When turning pages of his paper he finally looks up and surveys his surroundings, which have probably shifted slightly since he first sat down. I doubt he can tell he is being watched, because for him this is a daily routine and moment of complete solitude. Sitting in the shade, admiring his long-time city of residence, he can gather his thoughts and start his day on the right foot.
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