Window Wednesday - Shower, Positano, Italy

Pensione Marialuisa. Positano, Italy 2011.

Let’s start with the window in my shower. Pensione Marialuisa, Positano, Italy.

If you stand under the shower head, there’s a rounded window carved into the white concrete wall on the left. No glass or screen, just a wooden shade that pivots open and closed to reveal the side of the cliff. A cliff with views of the ocean and a village reaching all the way to the sea. 

It’s the end of September so the summer crowds have thinned and the heat eased enough to wear sleeves in the evening. 

The sun has set just moments ago, leaving an opaque veil. Behind the dark green shutters and the ageing whitewashed walls there are people who’ve spent the day on pebbled beaches or boats or day trips to Capri. They’re tangled in their bedsheets — waking from a nap, or making love. They’re showering, and dressing, putting on lipstick and cologne. 

Then they walk the winding streets and climb the wide stone steps. Down they go along the road of bars and restaurants where they’ll drink their spritz, and wine and dine.

There’s music playing somewhere and the sound of slamming doors — swirling round and echoing off walls and tiles and rock.

The scooters make their way in soon — youngsters riding double, parking anywhere they can. Engines off, helmets off, fixing flattened hair and crumpled linen shirts. 

Then there are the dog walkers — slower, leathered skin. And groups of three and four, beach towels slung over shoulders, the last of the day’s tourists traipsing up the hill.

Eventually, I will stop gazing through my little porthole and let the water soothe my salty sun-drenched skin. In the last of the light, I’ll follow the cobbled path to a restaurant lit with lanterns.

“Un tavolo per uno,” I say. A table for one. 

And there I sit in the warm perfumed air, amongst the couples and the groups, with my thoughts, a basket of bread, and a piece of Italian coastline that feels as though it’s just for me.