I didn’t know a soul. Except two women from New Jersey, with the same name. You guessed it, Jess. We exchanged messages and booked the same flights into Firenze. It was comforting to know others crazy enough to pack all of their belongings into two suitcases and move to Italy, where everything was foreign: the language, the culture, the way you had to starve until an 8pm dinner. There’s nothing more exhilarating and fear-inducing than getting off that plane and into a taxi that weaves in and out of the Florentine traffic and stops just in time before rear-ending the car in front.
The most notable thing about living abroad is the way you find yourself. It’s impossible to fall into old routines, when there is no routine. The experience forces acceptance of change and reliance on yourself, and when taking on these challenges alongside others, it bonds you in a way that is permanent. Those special ones slip into a crevice of your heart forever. For me, those special ones are those two women from New Jersey. There’s a word for that in Italian: due. And I was lucky enough to make their due a trio.
Over time we established our own routine. Day-after-day we woke up, walked to school, ate a panino the size of our face, butchered the Italian language, learned about another madonna painted by Donatello, Michelangelo, Giotto, Brunelleschi, and pressed our bodies up against the radiators before bed to escape the winter chill that sets into the stone houses. I found comfort in many of our routines, but my favorite was our greeting. We threw the proper buongiorno, buonasera to the wind and settled on ciao bella.
It was our mantra of sorts. At first it was foreign and quirky, but when repeated over time; routine. It’s amazing how a phrase can put you in the right frame of mind. Now whenever I hear ciao bella, I’m taken right back to the time I made the uncomfortable, comfortable and of course the due that made it possible.
The Jess 14k Gold Customizable Phrase Ring
The Jess is our 14k gold customizable phrase ring. Her namesake is a dynamic ‘due’ (Italian for two) that makes you feel comfortable and welcome in the most unfamiliar of environments. Part of the comfort derives from a manta, or power phrase, that you can repeat to refocus yourself. This due used the greeting ‘ciao bella’ (Italian for hello beautiful) as a reminder that there is immense beauty found in the unknown. The Jess ring is fully customizable to a phrase that moves you.