Oh, but there are so many reasons why this would be a terrible idea. To begin with, Giovanni is ten years younger than I am, and--like most Italian guys in their twenties--he still lives with his mother. These facts alone make him an unlikely romantic partner for me, given that I am a professional American woman in my mid-thirties, who has just come through a failed marriage and a devastating¹, interminable divorce, followed immediately by a passionate² love affair that ended in sickening heartbreak. This loss upon loss has left me feeling sad and brittle³ and about seven thousand years old. Purely⁴ as a matter of principle I wouldn't inflict⁵ my sorry, busted-up old self on the lovely, unsullied Giovanni. Not to mention that I have finally arrived at that age where a woman starts to question whether the wisest way to get over the loss of one beautiful brown-eyed young man is indeed to promptly⁶ invite another one into her bed. This is why I have been alone for many months now. This is why, in fact, I have decided⁷ to spend this entire year in celibacy⁸.

To which the savvy⁹ observer might inquire: "Then why did you come to Italy?"

To which I can only reply--especially when looking across the table at handsome Giovanni--"Excellent question."

Giovanni is my Tandem¹⁰ Exchange Partner. That sounds like an innuendo¹¹, but unfortunately it's not. All it really means is that we meet a few evenings a week here in Rome to practice each other's languages. We speak first in Italian, and he is patient with me; then we speak in English, and I am patient with him. I discovered Giovanni a few weeks after I'd arrived in Rome, thanks to that big Internet cafe at the

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