She kept the necklace!

A former law school professor, originally from Poland, is springbreaking with a granddaughter in Italy this Spring (lower rates: pandemic and war), and teaches her latest little one how to collect a glass-blown necklace crafted by an Armenian artisan who was taken to task for a bit of misplaced teasing with the mistress and child...

And then a boat (arranged by Martina) takes us home.

It was a very, very full day. I am intensely happy that I chose a dinner place that is extremely close to us -- Al Gobbo di Rialto. (Martina had an interesting observation on Rialto. Perhaps because of the market here, she sees it as touristy, yes, but also very Venetian with much of daily life playing out there as well. San Marco, on the other hand, is all handed over to tourism.)

The Restaurant is the best kind of ending you could have here. It's all  about being in Italy with kids. The expectations are that kids are a different species and you should treat them accordingly. Plain spaghetti with parmiggiano? Of course. You want to play with your toy? Well, can I play too? No dessert tonight? Then how about a cookie or two, on the house? And on and on and on. And I know it's not thought of as cool (back home) to keep calling your grandchild principessa, but still, it happens often here and it is so filled with affection for the demographic rather than anything else, that here at least, it is forgivable in the extreme.

[As a funny side story, when we were in the glass factory, I asked the guy who was explaining the master craftsmen's work to us if there were any women who did the Murano glass works. He made some joke about women being 100% kept out of that skill set beecause glass blowing requires blowing and you can't both talk as women do, and blow glass. I was instantly in the Academy Awards moment: do I laugh? Do I slap his face? Okay, I did not punch him out. I frowned. Martina took note. She threw him a glance. He recoiled and said something that was even worse -- we know that life is all about women and god. They rule... there's nothing else. At this point, an eye roll was the best strategy. He came up later, gifted me a necklace piece and apologized. He said he caught himself right away and thought -- oh shit, I said the wrong thing. I said -- listen, I have two women as kids and three grand girls. I care about how they view their future. He apologized again. Later, Martina said -- well, you got a slice of Italian life. The thing is, he is a really good guy. I know him well. Those were just your typical Italian jokes. And I know she is right. The line drawing here is different than it is back home. I don't live here so I can't really tell how women fare in the world of men in daily life. It's too easy to draw conclusions from quick visits, but I wont do it. All I can say is that he did apologize and admitted to not even being Italian from birth, but rather -- Armenian and well, you know about the genocide there! See what I mean? You rarely know the full story in a brief exchange.]

(dinner, with principessa herself)

Clearly, you learn different lessons vacationing with a wily grandmother than your own family, with a father along also.  Men and mixed company add something;  we have to learn to tolerate the goodwill of other cultures, including well-meaning adult teasing, here at home, and teach children no harm was meant. She could learn to blow glass too!  He was just not practiced teaching down and encouraging girls, which is more a parental role, not for a grandmother to insist the world be sanitized down to a child's level... or you earn a necklace for your troubles and feigned offense.

What message was taught there, what do you think the child absorbed?  One of privilege and a special place for complaining girls who offend easily as girls? You don't win many friends or change the world that way, much.  You won't integrate your way in to places like that. Or chart an independent career path by taking offense at the well meaning words of men who work as well.

And who would want to work, or live, in a company, a world, a subdivision or a building, where there's no working men because the women and feminized men have teamed up and driven them out of the workplace where civilized masculinity, which includes the rules they have been taught to play by -- leave your fists at  home, gentlemen -- is no longer welcome, and the women only need a token male or two for "protection" amongst them?

Not me.  I like the company of most men.  I like mixed company even more, and places small enough to respect individuals, not have to divvy us up by sex, race, religion or region, the best.  That's still America, right?  In the localities...