Some People Get Physical Therapy - Some People Get Burned at the Stake

On Monday we caught a quick lunch of pizza (delicious with bresaola—cured beef—and rucola) at our little neighborhood place across the bridge on Corso Vittorio Emanuele II. 

Then headed by taxi to physical therapy. What is it about going to PT for one thing, and the exercises they give you create something else? With the goal of strengthening my knee for walking without crutches, my back was now killing me after lovely Claudia put me through the new exercises. But I’m excited about walking again even though they say I have to start with 5-10 minutes a time inside … going a little crazy, I’ll admit. (Here's a video of us navigating the streets in the wheelchair on Sunday; I know, I know, it should be landscape!)

On the way home, we got out of the taxi near a pharmacy (to get some more zanzare spray for me), and I convinced Brad we needed a glass of wine on a side street just down from the Castel Sant’Angelo bridge (which is just a few minutes walk from our house).

The plaque across the way from the restaurant commemorated a pre-Reformation sect (Waldensians), which broke with Rome in the 12th century. They came from France to the northern Italian mountains and suffered many centuries of persecutions by the Church. (They now have a presence in North Carolina, where you can tour their "Trail of Faith" exhibition!) The plaque commemorated the burning at the stake on the bridge of Giovan Luigi Pascale, a Waldensi pastor (1525-1560). 

Tried in this place by the Inquisition ... 

Chilling, as he was only one of thousands killed here. In many cases, their heads were impaled along the bridge for greater impact on the public. And here we sit now, Romans and tourists, drinking our wine and eating our potato chips and thinking how things are bad today …