A Financially Successful American Family  yet in Emotional Disarray, living in Los Angeles Sells their Goods, Quit their Jobs and go to live in Genoa,  Italy, to rebuild the  family dynamics gone wrong.  
 
Susan Pohhlman wrote "We were transformed in so many ways, We became a closer family, and our marriage is still strong. We're really careful now. I think we see life differently and can navigate the excesses of American culture a little differently now, maybe leave a little bit at the door."

They were almost to the point of divorce.

Susan and Tim Pohlman found that their life in Los Angeles - he was a radio-station executive; she was a stay-at-home mom caring for two children - was driving a wedge between them: excessively hectic schedules, too much emphasis on material things, unspoken resentments and no time or inclination to communicate.

So they chucked it all and went to Italy for a year.      Huh?

"Our marital therapist called it 'an elaborate scheme of avoidance at best,'" Susan Pohlman writes at the beginning of Halfway to Each Other.

Her 2010 book - written in short, often-humorous chapters - is part travelogue and part confessional, describing the rebuilding of family dynamics gone wrong.

Pohlman - who, like her husband, was born in Ohio and attended the University of Dayton - will appear Tuesday at Beehive Books in Delaware.

Starting in July 2003, the couple (she was 44; he was 45) and their children - Katie, then 14, and Matthew, 11 - spent a year as expatriates living in an apartment in Genoa, overlooking the Italian Riviera. They had sold their house and possessions in the United States, and Tim had quit his job.

"I think we were just in this desperate mode," Mrs. Pohlman said. "How can we salvage our marriage and our family? We didn't want to break up, but we were so unhappy. When this opportunity presented itself, it was like door No. 3. We grabbed it, not knowing how it would end."

She describes their struggles with both the language and the erratic Italian bus system, a pizzeria where young Matthew is invited to help bake the pies, the threat of Gypsies robbing them in their sleep, and generous neighbors who cook them an Italian feast and are perplexed at the American barbecued chicken and baked beans offered in return.

"I didn't really set out to write a book," Pohlman said.

Friends asked her to e-mail them about her year in Italy. One, a newspaper writer, suggested that Polhman turn the accounts into a book.

The year the family spent in Italy, though, happened to be the same year documented by Elizabeth Gilbert in the best-seller Eat Pray Love.

"My book was turned down by everyone," Pohlman recalled.

Editors who read it told her they thought something was missing.

"That was the spirituality aspect of it that I had chosen not to put in," Pohlman said.

She decided that if Anne Lamott, a popular essayist and novelist who incorporates Christian themes in her writing, could write about her relationship with God, so could she.

Peppered with Scripture passages and prayers, her narrative found a publisher: the Christian-based Guideposts.

Publishers Weekly  described the memoir as "full of charm, Kodak moments, and tumult typical of Americans abroad."

Mel Corroto, co-owner of Beehive Books, doesn't book many Christian-themed authors for appearances at her store but thought Polhman and her story would have popular appeal.

"And we plan to offer a bit of complimentary red wine with her appearance," Corroto said.

As a postscript, the Pohlmans returned to the United States and eventually settled in Arizona. Tim manages three CBS radio stations in Phoenix. Katie is in graduate school in San Francisco, and Matthew will play volleyball in the fall as a freshman at Ohio State University.

Susan and Tim, now in their 50s, have returned several times to Italy for visits. They recall their year there with great fondness.

"We were transformed in so many ways," Mrs. Pohlman said. "We became a closer family, and our marriage is still strong. We're really careful now.

"I think we see life differently and can navigate the excesses of American culture a little differently now, maybe leave a little bit at the door."

ngilson@dispatch.com 

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/arts/stories/
2011/02/06/year-in-italy-rescued-u-s--family-in-distress.html?sid=101
 

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