There is a word Romans use that has no real translation: Ottobrata. Literally, it means “the October days”, but in truth it describes something far more elusive: the lingering warmth after summer has gone, the golden afternoons when the sun hangs low, the way people stretch themselves out into the light as if storing it up before November closes in. It is not just climate. It is a shared state of mind that belongs entirely to this city and to this season.

There is a moment in Sorrentino’s film when Jep Gambardella says:

“The most significant discovery I made after turning sixty-five is that I can’t waste any more time doing things I don’t want to do.”

Not every journey begins in the same way. Some are measured in miles, others in museum tickets or snapshots collected along the way. But there are journeys that begin between the pages of a book.

Much of this blog will follow, though not always, the path of a small guide I wrote and continue to update for my guests. A guide to the everyday Rome, the city I actually live in. Not the postcard Rome, but the one that reveals itself to those who stay a while.

My name is Stephanie Fazio. For years I worked in contemporary art, founding and directing a foundation in Rome. Exhibitions, residencies, institutional projects: work I loved deeply, but which at some point was no longer enough.