Andrà Tutto Bene

That brief moment at the end of February seems like an idyll now. In Rome, we were hearing about the novel coronavirus showing up in various countries, and people all over the world were starting to think twice about their holiday plans. Then on Sunday, February 23, I woke up to the news that there were 152 cases in Italy, most of them in the north, and the authorities were worried enough to close the Duomo in Milan and cancel Carnevale celebrations in Venice. Okay, I thought, this must be serious. But I didn’t think it had much to do with me.

By Monday, the trickle of tourists cancelling visits to Italy was turning into a wave, and universities were calling off study-abroad programs. There was also a notable emptiness to the ordinarily crowded streets in this city where I’ve lived for eighteen years.

I had a train ticket to Florence booked for that Thursday. It didn’t occur to me not to go, with only three cases of the virus in Rome and only one in the...