Walking around Italy is exhausting. So, like many other tourists, namely Americans, I liked to take a seat and admire the nearest fountain, statue, or cathedral from ground level. Basically, I am too lazy for this city. Specifically, I took a seat to ponder the vastness and ostentatiousness of the shrine to Julius Caesar. Caesar, I learned, was the first mortal being to be given a shrine. And let me tell you, his was fit for a god. After a few minutes of thinking about all the good he must have done to revive such a monument, I stood up, only to notice the ancient Latin inscribed on what I was using as a chair. No, I was not a disrespectful tourist; I was completely in place to be sitting where I was sitting. The thing about Rome is that EVERYTHING is outrageously spectacular so ancient artifacts get used as misshaped chairs. Countless were the times that my family and I walked right passed a building that, if in any city but Rome, would have been the center of our guided tour. I don't know if this is saddening for cities that do not stand up to Rome's elitism or marvelous for Rome itself, but it is a fact that has been following my every step. The buildings I am using for shade, the paths I am slugging across, the fences my brother stuck him garbage behind, these are things that have amazing yet overlooked stories.
In this way, Roman artifacts are a lot like people. When we read history, we read of Julius Caeser and other men who have been deemed shrine-worthy. But, how many great human stories go overlooked, just like the Latin inscriptions I used as a bench? How many silent heroes have gone unnoticed because of a simultaneous overshadowing figure? Just like these marvels in Rome, a persons greatness is relative to that of those he is surrounded with.
But, I guess, there is only so much we can take in, and some just get the short end of the stick.
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