Creativity and superstition
I spent my remaining days in Petrópolis walking and writing. I felt that the visit to this city had freed my creativity, which flowed from my fingertips filling pages and pages of ideas. Lota, Elizabeth, Portinari, Dorothy Draper... textures and colors clustered in my head and slowly transmuted to paper, guided by my grandmother, with whom I felt closer than ever.
It was among these dreams of linen and velvet that I walked, as I wrote these words, through the historic center of Petrópolis. Here everything is impressive; here the colonial, the historical and the imperial embrace nature in a unique way, proving that not all opposites repel each other. I had been enchanted by the Crystal Palace, a structure that had nothing to envy to similar ones in London or Madrid. It was a gift from Count d'Eu to his wife, Princess Isabel, which today had become a symbol of freedom and equality, since it was there that the last slaves of Petrópolis (and the world) were freed and a new era for the Western world began.
I also visited the summer home of Santos Dumont, one of the fathers of aviation. History, as in this entire city, flowed from the walls of this small building. Located on a small elevation, just by visiting it you can see the gift of creativity that characterized this adventurer of the skies. A born superstitious, Santos Dumont believed that one should enter every room with the right foot, to avoid bad beginnings. That is why he modified the steps leading to his house so that each person would walk up the same way, and thus end up crossing the doorway with the right foot.
How I enjoyed those little superstitions! Even today I usually write in my travel notebooks all the ones I collect around the world. I treat them as treasures, which I enjoy collecting. This had been a great inheritance from my grandmother, who also treasured them and followed them to the letter, especially those related to meals. I remember how she would force me to take the salt that spilled on the tablecloth and throw it behind my right shoulder; or how as a child she would exclude me from toasts, since you could not toast with a glass of water.
As I walked through Santos Dumont's house-museum, I felt his presence again. If they had met, they would have gotten along very well. As I wandered through the rooms, I was noting down all the strange habits of this pilot that I saw inscribed on the information panels. When I reached the dining room, I stopped as I had unearthed a memory.
My grandmother loved to decorate dinner parties with candles. The dancing light they emitted when lit was for her the perfect complement to any tableware. I was always a willing and happy candidate to help her set up those settings. During one such set-up, I discovered how every time she wanted to light a candle, she would approach the dining room door and hide behind it.
- Grandma, why are you hiding behind the door to light the candle?
She winked at me.
- Can you keep a secret, Manuela?
- Of course it is!
With a wave of his hand he asked me to come over there and came close to my ear.
- When I was in Brazil, a great friend of mine had a very important dinner party. While I was helping her prepare everything, as you have helped me here, when I went to light the candles, she stopped me and took me behind the door. "This is the only way you can ward off the evil eye," she told me. Since then, I have always done the same thing.
I had also imitated her from that moment on, happy to join in the fun. It was nice to think that days before I had been in the dining room where that story had probably happened.
Santos Dumont's house was my last stop in Petrópolis. I loaded my suitcase into the car with a certain melancholy, promising to return, as I did with each of my destinations. I knew that here I was leaving an important part of me, and that in exchange I was taking another part with me, a magic full of ideas, colors and stories. But the end was not yet on the horizon. A search was pending on my way: to look for the traces of Lota and Elizabeth in Rio de Janeiro.
