In 2019, if I’d set foot in the United States, there’s a good chance I would have been handcuffed at the airport.
That January, I learned more about international law than I had ever wanted to know.
Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it) that particular story can wait.
By May, Elena and I had finally settled back into life when I received a WhatsApp voice message from Emanuele, a guy I had met only a couple of times.
A few months earlier, I had ended a three-year relationship with Paolo, a digital advertising nerd from Genoa, twelve years older than me and known by his friends as “Pablito”—a nickname he had picked up during the years he lived in Ibiza, supporting himself as an electronica DJ.
The relationship had become, to put it nicely, unfun. Especially for Elena.
Paolo complained chronically, and one of his favorite topics was the fact that Elena lived with me 365 days a year. Oddly enough, he had known this before deciding to move from Genoa into our house the year before.
By the time Emanuele’s message arrived, I was exhausted. Somewhere along the way, I had started equating romance with drama, and I wasn’t looking for any more of it.
Emanuele and I had first met at a little bar near my house. We drank red wine, ordered fried sardines, and talked about our shared passion for food. I remember thinking, Nice guy. He could become a good friend, which is exactly why I didn’t listen to his message.
Having spent a year working in dentistry, I immediately noticed the gap between his front teeth. It struck me as goofy. He wasn’t short, but he wasn’t tall either, and “tall” happened to be on my list of demands back then. Then there was his voice. It was soft, much softer than what twenty-something years of bad dating had convinced me I found attractive.
The moment I pressed play, those two little blue checkmarks would betray me. He would know I had heard it, and I didn’t want to encourage the idea that I was interested in anything beyond a friendship. Emanuele had already made it fairly obvious that he hoped for something more.
So I left the message unopened, but by the evening, curiosity had gotten the better of me.
He explained that someone from a television production company had contacted him. They were looking for contestants for an Italian reality show about entertaining guests called Cortesie per gli Ospiti (Courtesies for Guests).
Imagine Come Dine with Me if it took itself much more seriously. Instead of contestants judging one another, three experts—a chef, an interior designer, and an etiquette specialist—come into your home, inspect everything from your table setting to your cooking, and score your evening.
Apparently, someone from the staff had stumbled across Emanuele’s Instagram profile, where nearly every photograph featured food, which made perfect sense.
Emanuele had just left the advertising agency where he’d spent nearly twenty years as a creative director. He was also finishing his sommelier certification, and if there was one thing that consistently pulled him away from the pressures of work, it was food and wine. His social media wasn’t really about him. It was a gallery of dishes, restaurants, bottles, and culinary masterpieces that had caught his attention.
Alone, Emanuele didn’t have all the right elements to be eligible to participate. He needed a nice home and someone who could cook and be his partner.
After finally listening to the recording, I thought, “crap.” Back then, it was exactly the kind of opportunity I couldn’t resist.
Whom am I kidding? I still couldn’t.
So I called him to get the whole story.
I had spent my career juggling a variety of job titles. During that May, I had about six, and my daughter was in high school. And of course, my natural conclusion was, “Sure, why not?” Never mind the fact that I had already decided that I wasn’t going to get involved with him.
The first thing we needed to do was film a small audition. Before he showed up at my house, I had prepared a whole speech in my head about how we “could do this thing,” but only as friends.
The opportunity to perform that speech never came. Contrary to my initial assumptions, Emanuele treated me like a respected colleague during the several interactions we had over three days as we prepared the audition recording.
Since he was no longer formally employed, that meant he no longer had a company car either. During that transitional phase in his life, his only means of transportation was a helmet and an electric scooter he had bought on sale a couple of months prior.
The very first time he visited me at my house, I picked him up at the bottom of the hill with my light-blue, banged-up 2003 Toyota Yaris. The car’s interior condition was slightly worse than the exterior after moving an entire house and countless trips to IKEA.
My home was in a villa just 3 minutes up the hill overlooking the countryside.
As we parked the car, his jaw dropped. Just minutes away from the city center, that view was misleading. It looked more like a vacation destination than a place where five different families resided full-time.
When we got into the house, we plopped down on my white leather couch in my living room and got straight to work. With his notebook and pen on his lap, he started talking about where we could film and what equipment he had available for the audition. And then, he asked me what I thought, seemed to listen enthusiastically, and scribbled down notes and doodled. Doodling has been his thing for as long as I’ve known him.
He paid attention to my ideas and treated them as valuable contributions. I wasn’t used to them being received that way.
Brainstorming has always been one of my favorite things in the world. Give me an idea and I’ll instinctively take it from point A to another planet; especially if someone is willing to come along for the ride.
Working with Emanuele was like crack cocaine for my ADHD. Throw a little emotional ambiguity into the mix and I was cooked.
During the three days we spent preparing our audition video, he stayed exactly where he was. Not once did he hint at wanting anything more. Before I knew it, the script had flipped. I was the one who’d become smitten, while he appeared completely oblivious (or at least that’s what he let me believe).
In early June, we got news that we’d officially been selected, and that one of the guests was a vegan. Three weeks later, filming began in my kitchen.
The week leading up to the first day of filming was nothing short of intense. For starters, I hadn’t even watched an episode yet, so I first had to figure out what the show was actually about.
A wall needed painting, furniture had to be rearranged, six chairs borrowed (and somehow crammed into my battered little two-door Yaris in a single trip) from a friend who lived forty minutes away, flowers collected, and somewhere in the middle of it all I decided that preparing two entirely different menus (so I could also feed the vegan) was perfectly reasonable.
Looking back, what surprises me isn’t how much there was to do. It’s that it never even occurred to me to ask for more help. I was a single mother. Making impossible things happen had quietly become my default setting.
I was a single mom, slumming in an Italian countryside villa with my daughter, for God’s sake!
Years later, what I remember most isn’t the menus or the flower arrangements. It’s flying through the hills in my hopeful, little Yaris as though it had somehow qualified for Formula One. Looking back, it’s no wonder that only a year later the engine finally gave up and I had to have it hauled off to the junkyard.
When the camera crew showed up at 10:06 am, I was feeling rather awkward and stiff. As the cameras began to roll, Emanuele said, “Don’t worry. You’re going to do great.”
He was the calm and secure presence that I needed in that moment. He was a natural performer, and he somehow brought me back to myself.
I had been living alone in Italy with Elena since she was nine. By then, reinvention had become part of my job description. Every month seemed to require a new skill, another side hustle, another way to make ends meet.
A normal Tuesday might begin with designing a website, continue with translating documents, and end with teaching English. The next day I might be creating dance costumes, catering an event, designing a logo, or helping a singer rewrite song lyrics. Whatever paid the bills became part of the week’s itinerary.
The work was unpredictable. The income even more so.
Let’s just say that by the time we were filming the show, I had trained my mind to see uncertainty as part of the cost of our freedom.
“Don’t worry. You’re going to do great.”
It was the five-minute break I didn’t know I’d been waiting for. For that brief moment in time, it felt like someone had my back when no one else did (or could).
In the weeks since that voice message Emanuele had sent me back in May, he showed me how sensitive, interesting, hilarious, and refreshingly normal he was around Elena.
After having been with several men who struggled to accept me as a package deal, normal was a novelty.
Emanuele didn’t ignore Elena. He didn’t try to become her buddy overnight, and he certainly didn’t try to win her over. He simply spoke to her with the same curiosity and respect he showed everyone else.
She was no longer a little girl. She was on the cusp of legal adulthood, full of opinions, and more than capable of contributing to our brainstorming. While she doesn’t appear in the episode, she was there through every step of it.
We had become three peas in a pod, so by the first day of filming, we were there as a team.
As the filming went on, I was no longer conscious about talking into a camera. Before long, I was immersed in making pulled-pork ravioli (and the rest of my Italian-American fusion menu that the casting directors had been so excited about).
By the time the crew shouted “Cut! It’s time for lunch!” I had completely fallen into reality TV.
We packed up and headed down the hill to Birilli. After showing up for the fourth consecutive day, Emanuele and I had already become regulars at the local restaurant.
As we headed towards our chairs, Emanuele spotted an old acquaintance sitting across the room. As soon as he was out of earshot, one of the camera guys sitting next
me leaned over and said, “You should always stay close to him. He’s great support, and you look like you belong together.”
That was the first time I realized that people were seeing us as an item, and while the temptation grew, my logical mind worked hard to override my emotions.
But since when does my logic ever win over my emotions? At best, it’s been remarkably good at writing persuasive explanations for decisions my emotions had already made.
So there I was, sitting at Birilli on a beautiful, sunny day at 1 pm, with a TV camera crew refusing to mind their own business and essentially giving me advice on how to handle my love life.
Except Emanuele had just announced very clearly on national TV that, “We are just friends.” Maybe the cameraman knew something I didn’t. He neglected to mention how the story ended.
The Egg-Eating Vegan
The second day of filming came during the last week of July. We drove over half an hour to our competition’s house.
A beautiful, fluffy long-haired Australian shepherd came to greet us and we were ushered onto the property by the production team.
It would be the first time we’d be meeting the three judges and the opposing team - two nurses in their mid-50s. Their theme was “Vintage Flowers.” They kept calling it “Wintage.” Like many Italians, they were convinced the English V is pronounced like a W (or vice versa). It’s the sort of thing I usually can’t resist correcting, but that day I had much bigger fish to fry.
As soon as our eyes met the “Wintage” ladyies’, we smiled, and we whispered “good luck” to each other. Until then, I was worried that someone would be provoked into making snarky comments, as it often occurs on reality TV. On the contrary. When the cameras weren’t rolling, we told each other about our lives and laughed and acknowledged the experience thus far. They were indeed two very nice women. I found myself really wanting them to succeed.
I wasn’t even entirely annoyed when the vegan pronounced that she had made egg tagliolini. When I looked at her wide-eyed and baffled, she said, “Well, we used happy eggs. They are eggs from my friend’s farm.”
I thought, “Great. I wish they had told me about happy eggs before going through the trouble of making sure everything I was going to make her was 100% animal-free.”
Filming that night went on for hours. The waiting in between takes seemed endless. Our final take for the day was around midnight. I was so tired, I could barely keep my eyes open. But we had to keep going and it was no time to slow down. The next day, it was our turn to entertain everyone at my house.
The “Wintage” ladies must have noticed me and Emanuele spending a lot of time joking a and gazing into each other’s eyes because months later, when the episode finally aired, I heard one of them say during her private interview, “Those two aren’t really saying how things really are.”
I remember laughing. It was funny how everyone had something to say about me and Emanuele. Looking back, I must have looked like I was living in La La Land, even though I was trying very hard to keep my feet on the ground.
Another thing that cracked me up was when the ladies were asked who they thought was going to cook at my house, they replied, “Emanuele” because, as they put it, “Oh, come on, what is the American going to cook? They aren’t exactly known for their culinary capabilities.”
I woke up in morning of our big day with my annoying alarm clock blaring at 7 am, and I swear that Yakety Sax (The Benny Hill Show Theme) was playing in the background the minute I opened my eyes.
We were juggling marinating and chopping, painting a wall, and cleaning up our very questionable mess.
Everything had to be ready by 4 pm because when the camera crew showed up, the first thing they were going to film was me setting the table and getting ready.
With all of the endless things to do, the one thing that brought me peace of mind was the ironed tablecloth. It was there waiting and ready to go. Assunta, our eighty-four-year-old family friend, was like a grandmother to me. She had been my custodian at the castle I lived in as a child. Thirty-one years later, still close to us, Assunta took it upon herself to iron the tablecloth days before filming.
As the cameras rolled, I set the table and finished it off with the beautiful bouquet of light bluish-purple Hydrangeas I had picked up from the florist at the bottom of our hill that very morning.
Shortly thereafter, the judges and our Vintage guests arrived. Everything seemed to be going ok. Except….
Seconds before Saba, the etiquette judge walked into the dining area, one of the camera crew caught my attention by whispering and pointing at the table, “PSTT! Emilia!
Oh my God! With all of the commotion I hadn’t noticed the faded, but evident oil stains going down part of the table. Obviously, Assunta’s eyesight wasn’t what it used to be!
I slightly panicked, but I’d already spent years making impossible things happen. After a while, disaster stops feeling like an emergency and starts feeling like a puzzle.
Instinctively, without hesitation, my hand reached for a few flowers from the vase. I laid them across the tablecloth, which managed to cover the stains seeming as though they were there by design.
The camera woman that brought it to my attention looked at me and said, “Genius.”
It was later during the airing that I heard Saba’s repeated critique during her private interview, “Yes, nice but those flowers should have all stayed in the vase.”
I couldn’t help but think, “Well, you think that’s bad. I wonder what she would have said if she had known what was under those ‘messy’ flowers.”
It’s funny how it all works behind the scenes of reality TV. You make one joke or say something that the producers like, and then you’re stuck repeating the same thing over and over again while the camera crew shoots the same scene from different angles.
“Now hold the glass like that, pick it up, and say what you just said. Do it again. Ok, again. Now, again.”
By the third day, I was looking forward to it all being over.
At one point, while we were all waiting around for the next set of instructions, I asked Diego, the architectural judge, what it was like to travel around the country doing what they did every day. He looked at me and simply said, “It’s like Groundhog Day.”
I still think about what he said from time to time. Such a stark contrast to how I go through life, never even eating the same breakfast two days in a row.
During Diego’s private interview, he said that my house didn’t really reflect my personality and that the architecture of the building was too modern for that type of countryside setting. There I thought, “Well, hello. Renting. Single mom.”
Anyway, cooking and entertaining under normal conditions is very different from doing it with a camera crew shouting, “Freeze! Do that again! Wait...” Then you wait for ten minutes, frozen with a mixed drink in your hand while the summer heat melts the ice.
“Ok, go ahead and start boiling your pasta.” (Five minutes goes by) “Ok, now take it out!”
Me: “Wait, it’s not ready!”
Camera crew: “We can’t wait any longer, you have to move with the plates.”
Me: “Oh crap… Ok, hopefully it’ll be ok.”
Fresh homemade pasta has no exact cooking time. It’s homemade, the thickness will never be identical from one time to the next. It’s just done when it’s done.
At the same time, I was trying to finish the vegan’s spaghetti and meatballs. Everything had to go out together, so all I could do was cross my fingers and hope the pasta was ready.
As I settled into my seat, with everyone finally served, I took one bite of my ravioli and...
U.N.D.E.R.C.O.O.K.E.D.
There are very few things in life I do with absolute consistency. Pasta is one of them. I don’t overcook it, and I certainly don’t undercook it. So why—out of the hundreds of times I’d made fresh pasta—did it have to happen with three judges and a television crew watching?
And guess what, chef Roberto noticed too.
Then came my The Good, the Bad and the Ugly sliders—three miniature burgers inspired by the film: smoked white meat, hazelnut steak tartare, and spicy grilled beef.
Just as I was placing them on their buns, Emanuele stopped me.
“Everyone’s going to get full,” he said.
“They’re sliders,” I protested. “They need buns.”
Emanuele: “We’ll call them bunless sliders.”
Before I could argue any further, the production team cut in. “Time. They have to go out now.”
So out I walked carrying three decidedly bunless sliders. By the time we’d made a second trip out with the wine and the vegan’s spaghetti and meatballs, Chef Roberto had already spotted the problem.
“I never thought I’d say this,” he said, “but I’m kind of jealous of the vegan burger. Where are our buns?”
I knew it.
Somewhere between the bunless sliders and our Turin Vermouth and chocolate cheesecake, the judges took it upon themselves to nudge our “love story” along with comments like, “Great love happens when your hands are covered in dough.”
By the time the meal was finally over, I still really didn’t know who had won. So when we opened the box revealing the winners, I was genuinely surprised on the first take. I really had to fake the excitement by the 12th.
Reality After Reality
The first few days after filming had ended, I was on a victory high. Although the winning part was cool, it was just more about having gotten through all of the challenges without falling apart. It was nothing short of a big bonding experience between me, Emanuele, and Elena.
Emanuele and I spent the next couple of days texting each other pictures, reminiscing about the best moments, and making jokes.
Days earlier, my British neighbor Clair announced that she was going to be moving in with her boyfriend. That meant that her tiny independent home next to the parking area would be free. Upon hearing the news, I noticed Emanuele’s ears perk up.
In fact, only 3 days after the show had ended, he came to me and said, “What would you say if I became your neighbor? I could take over Claire’s house.”
I immediately felt awkward. My head said, “Not a good idea.”
Instead, my mouth said, “Sure! That’d be fun.”
My stomach tied into a knot. Deep down, I knew it was too fast too soon. I was still trying to figure out what I was feeling and what I wanted. But that part of me just didn’t have the guts to put up the boundary my logic was screaming for me to put up.
When I managed to successfully shut up the talking cricket, I thought, “Yeah, like he’s really going to follow though. There’s nothing to worry about.”
That last sentence still lingers in my mind.
Nothing to worry about.
Two weeks later, Emanuele showed up with his new used 2002 cosmetically challenged Renault Kangoo that he bought for 3,500 euros from a hunter, a signed rental contract, boxes of personal belongings, and cleaning supplies.
This was really happening, and there was no going back.
The next day, his sister came by in the late afternoon with her husband to check out Emanuele’s new place and to take him out to dinner at, of course, Birilli.
When they arrived, Emanuele called me over to introduce me to them. After some chit-chatting, they invited me to join them for dinner.
It was one of those evenings that felt effortlessly easy. We talked about childhood, what Emanuele was like growing up, and what his sister was like. Almost a little too easy, in fact.
When our dinner came to an end, Emanuele and I drove back home together. We sat in comfortable silence on the way up the hill. It was that familiar feeling of already behaving like a couple before anyone had actually said we were one.
When we parked the car, we walked up the stairs to his balcony and sat at the little shabby table left behind by Claire. Our conversation was candlelit with full glasses of wine.
At about 1:30 a.m., about an hour into our intimate conversation, Emanuele looks at me and says, “I had a Peruvian girlfriend for 6 months. We met through a dating app called ‘Threesome’”.
For the next forty minutes, I may as well not have been there.
He described in great detail her beauty, her hair, their passionate hotel rendezvous.
He looked completely lost.
I sat there listening to a love story I hadn’t realized I was competing with.
“I had never experienced anything like it. She was the sexiest woman I had ever met…”
As he continued to talk, my heart sank further, and my adrenaline started to take off at neck-breaking speed.
When he finally realized that he was on planet earth and that I was sitting right in front of him, he finally concluded, “And that’s why I’m having a hard time committing to anyone.”
I looked at him, and said, “Commit to anyone? Who is anyone? Emanuele, have you been sleeping with people since we started to film the show?”
He replied in a matter of fact tone, “Yes. I just slept with Chiara last week.”
“Who is Chiara? And… what!?”
I felt so incredibly stupid and duped. I knew we didn’t have a verbal agreement about what we were doing. My head raged with the thought, “This is my bad.”
It was now August, and we’d known each other for a total of two months. This was the first time I had been given any of this information. Not a hint, not a reason to think he had anything else going on. He was so present the entire time. I was so confused.
I just sat there in shock, blaming myself.
“I have no right to feel terrible about him seeing other women. I have no right to expect him to want more.” Those thoughts just spiraled and attacked me over and over.
My heart still racing, I went to bed, but the attempt to relax was futile. I tossed and turned, and turned and tossed. I was hot, then cold, then feeling like a cheese grater was being used to rip up the inner lining of my stomach. I felt like I was going insane.
At 5:30 am, I gave up and got out of bed as the sun was rising. I put on my running shoes, and walked 40 minutes down to the bottom of the hill. Maggie, my neighbor’s dog followed me. I knew she could sense something wasn’t right.
I found a park bench and I laid on it, exhausted, wide awake, sad, angry, and completely raw. The street was dead silent. I wished there had been more going on around me; anything to distract me from the torture inside my own head.
The adrenaline, still pumping fiercely from hours before, fueled my walk home. At about 7:30 am, I took out a piece of paper and a pen and began to write,
Dear Emanuele,
In light of what you shared with me, I’d rather we stayed away from each other. I’ve blocked you on social media. This is not out of maliciousness, or because I’m mad. I’m just feeling really awful and I need the mental and physical space. I need to see and be exposed to you as least as possible. It may be a long time before we speak again. Please respect my wishes.
Emilia
I put some of the odds and ends he had left at my house over the last few weeks, including the notebook he’d doodled in, into a bag along with the note.
I simply placed the bag outside his front door, and walked away without looking back.
And that was the first time Emanuele shattered my heart.
