October 29, 2001
Its autumn -- pruning time. The mums are blooming, as are the confused lilac and spirea. This warm weather has the plants all giddy and discombobulated. It was another sunny, warm day and frankly, I'm getting suspicious. At some point it has to get cold for more than a night or two, wouldn't you think? It's Halloween.
I did light my first fire this weekend. Sat evening was fairly cold so I hauled in some wood and set it up. I must toot my own horn -- I did a good job. First a layer of twigs, then some small logs (wrist sized). A little paper underneath and the twigs went up like a brush fire. Everything caught... and built up an impressive bank of embers. After a couple larger logs, I could have smelted ore on this fire.
I'm struggling with my Italian. Sometimes I really think I'm getting it... I can form sentences and short conversations on my own and make myself understood. However, put an Italian in the room and expect me to respond... then it all changes. All my practicing and repeating is for naught when I am faced with a real live person who speaks with an Italian accent. Drat. Today I was defeated by the post office. I never found it... rode out to pick up a package... "Scuzi. Parlo solamente un po Italiano, ma, penso che c'e' un pacco qui per mi. Mi chiamo Katerina Simon. Grazie." See... I was ready. However, I could not find the post office. When I asked where it was... "Dove l'ufficio postale, per favore?" ...all I got from the response was "prima strada"... "sinistra". And I could not remember if sinistra was left or right. So. I had a little country drive.... to the right, and then to the left... and then I came home and made lunch. Whew! What a day! On the way home, after 12 when everything is closed, I noticed a little post office right at the base of the hill. Dang it. So... tomorrow perhaps?
October 26, 2001
Martha came in for the weekend from Rome today. We made a lovely dinner over here in my house... trout with scalloped potatoes and a big salad (from the garden). It was my first opportunity to entertain here, so I lit all the candles. Very nice ambiance... we sat by the fireplace and chatted. A most satisfying evening!
October 20, 2001
Last night, I made the most fabulous meal I've had in Italy. Don't get me wrong...it wasn't the finest or the best prepared, by any stretch of the imagination. It was simply a most soul satisfying dinner.
Last night, I made meatloaf... with roasted potatoes and fresh spinach. I even found ketchup at the co-op. I love the food I've eaten since I arrived... but for one night, basta with the pasta. The sizzle and pop of the meat cooking... the way the skin of the potatoes puff out as they brown and steam in the roaster. .. and the succulence of fresh spinach with a touch of butter and salt. By the time the meat was ready, I was pacing in front of the oven, opening the door, poking at the food. Trying to decide if it would be okay to eat the browned to perfection meat and potatoes and have spinach for dessert. I compromised. I waited about 3 minutes to serve up the entree and added the spinach when it finished. Even the ketchup was to die for... slightly more vinegar than at home, but the perfect piquant complement. And I was thinking of my mom and meatloaf sandwiches all during dinner. Perfection. I walked away from the table sated, in body and soul. Takes communion to a whole new level.
October 18, 2001
Today marks the end of my fourth week in Italy. Seems like it must be longer I've settled in so well, so quickly. When will the other shoe drop?
I'm beginning to find a rhythm but right now, it is too attuned to the workers coming to the property. The day is built around when they will arrive and what do I need to speak (and I use the term loosely) to them about. "Ah, Marco. Come sta? Io? Ah, bene. Tutte bene. Oggi taglia l'erbe? Bene dietro la casa, nella collina? Si, si.." It takes me hours to work out these simple conversations. With no guarantee folks will respond the way I imagined it. This often leaves me standing smiling saying "si" and "bene" repeatedly. Next month, lets hope I have progressed a little further.
Its getting chilly here in the evenings. Luckily, I was loaned a fabulous invention - la scalda. La scalda is an electric mattress cover that you turn on about 30 minutes before you go up to bed. Pull the covers back and you feel a lovely warmth rising to meet you. Think of the joy of putting your toes under the warm blanket and sliding your tush in to meet the sheets. Let me tell you, I don't know how I've lived without this. In the dead of winter, la scalda will be a better friend than most. And the cats like it too.
The vegetable garden will last another couple of weeks I think. Does anyone have any suggestions for an overflow of lettuce? Can't think of a thing to do with extra lettuce Lettuce cookies? Lettuce pickles? Lettuce jam? Last evening I made a salad from my fresh lettuce, arugula, cucumber and tomatoes right out of the garden. Now for those of you who have a garden, that is old hat. However, I have not had a garden since I was a teenager. So, the idea of food picked ½ hour before consumption, lordy.
I'm planning next year's vegetables... think companion planting and a mix of flowers with vegetables, nasturtiums, bush beans, eggplant, peppers, arugula, marigolds, peas, lettuce, melons, tomatoes (cherry & plum), spinach, potatoes, cukes, zinnias, zucchini, pole beans, beets, radishes, carrots. Any suggestions or tips? Any hints from the experienced? The paths around the garden are being set with stone this fall between the stones I think we'll plant creeping thyme and chamomile. Any other aromatic ground covers I should think about? There is an old fountain at the head of the garden. That is becoming an herb garden for perennial herbs. Annuals, like basil, can go into the garden.
October 15, 2001
Over the weekend, we hiked up to an Etruscan tomb on the hillside above the house. It wasn't a long or strenuous hike but we had fabulous views of the valley and surrounding hills. The farmhouse looked enormous from way up there. It surprised me. It doesn't feel that big at ground zero.
The tomb itself is small. At first glance you might even think, "Eh, so what?" But then you think about it. The tomb was built somewhere between the 2nd and 5th centuries... made of huge blocks of stone. The engineering is tight and still working. You can still pivot the door on its hinges. Amazing. (Also amazing is the fact that you can get right up to it, walk around and touch it. How many antiquities have you touched recently? The Etruscans were a fascinating tribe... well versed in metal craft, stone craft, ceramics... they have left us some beautiful treasures to ponder but very little info about them -- their origins, their beliefs. Every now and again a local farmer unearths an archeological find... some tablets with a few more pieces to the Etruscan puzzle. Maybe someday we'll know who they really were. Or, maybe it is truly lost in the mists of time. In either case, the Etruscans and the Umbri (another ancient pre-Roman tribe) settled in Umbria. Many of the old hilltowns have good museums with local artifacts and treasures. Worth a look see...
Melchiorre packed a picnic for our trek -- of course, what did you expect? Once we had looked the tomb over, we sat down in front of it and shared a little snack with the ancestors. Smoked fish, homemade cheese, carta di musica, pancetta and a fresh mango for dessert... dining al fresco. It was a lovely day.
Then I came home and Martha gave me a lesson on the ride-a-mower. I've never wanted to own a car, but I think I could grow fond of a John Deere.
October 11, 2001
Melchiore thinks these olives may be 500 years old. They are evocative trees... well, anything that old hints at lives past and old labors. You can imagine, 300 years ago out on these terraces, peasants moving from tree to tree, pruning or picking. Now, the trunks are split and hollowed... the curves halves remind you of the old trunk that once stood. Suckers come up from the roots and it all keeps going. (A little like the redwoods.) But these grey green gnomes don't tower above you or awe you like the redwoods. They're accessible, more comfortable... like old easy chairs.
Its sunset... a deep vee of geese just flew overhead. Romana is trilling and twining around my legs. The dogs are lying on the lawn -- large, furry statuary. Every now and then I hear a hound's yelp in the distance. Its silhouette time. The colors are subtle... the barest pink washed over yellow in the west, and a pink lavender in the north. Both cats are sitting quietly, watching the horizon with me, like I've called a meeting to watch the day end. The cats are encantada at this time of day. They leap at the fluttering moths and bugs and stalk one another's shadows. The birds are chattering away... but it's the insects, the symphony of bug sounds that is so amazing. Maybe some are frogs. The sky -- with the play of cloud and color -- reminds me of alabaster. A subtle translucence that hints at depth... these blue gray chiffon clouds pulled over a pink sky... like the veins in marble. And the bats, little birds of twilight, are out zipping through the olives.
October 8, 2001
Two weeks have passed since my auspicious first day. Eight days ago, I began to settle myself into a place in the hills, about halfway between Umbertide and Perugia. The property is extensive an olive grove apricot, pear, cherry, almond and several local varieties of fruit tree beds of lavender, rosemary, sage, sedum, chrysanthemums, yarrow, iris roses, Virginia creeper, clematis and wisteria climbing trellises and arching over pergolas and walls a vegetable garden. Although there are neighbors, the house sits on the hillside tucked in a bend, so no one else is visible. The little town at the foot of the hill, San Giovanni del Pantano, is well below the ridge and out of sight. It gives a feel of being much higher up and much more isolated than actuality.
There are two buildings on the grounds. The large main house has 4 or 5 bedrooms, a large kitchen and living room spread over 2 stories. A library and small 1 bedroom apartment, are also housed within the structure but not connected to the main living area. The second property is a restored and converted barn. This is where I live. The ground floor has two large living spaces, a kitchen/living room and an office/guest room. There is a small bath in the back and a little staircase winding up to a cozy little bedroom.
The buildings are the traditional local stone probably about 300-400 years old, with 2-foot thick walls that keep it cool in the summer and warmer in the winter. The floors are stone or tiled. The sinks are old marble, worn smooth. The ceilings are open beamed and 20-25 ft high. I have a large fireplace in the living room and (soon) a wood-burning stove in the office. When the barn was converted, large west-facing windows were put in to let the light stream in.
I'm watching the owner's two dogs and two cats as well. This, for me, makes the place very cozy and homey. The dogs (Bosco and Mentuccia) are mixed-breed Italian sheepdogs big, white and furry with deep resonant voices and brown soulful eyes. The cats (Romana and Tigretta) are both petite tiger cats one with a big raccoon tail, the other with a lot of russet in her undercoat. All are sweet animals very sociable.
It's hunting season, so this week the hills have reverberated with baying hounds, shouting men and the occasional rifle crack. Yesterday the hunt was all around me and late in the day a couple bedraggled, spent hound dogs wandered into the yard lost, confused and just plum-tuckered out. One, after a quick pat of reassurance, lifted his muddy muzzle to the sky and let out the most mournful howl as if to wail his sheer despair at ever getting home and seeing a warm bed. He wandered off as silently as he came, one minute there on the lawn, the next minute gone which made me think of the Hounds of the Baskervilles.
When the hunters go away or I figure out their schedule I'll start exploring the hills with the dogs. I understand there is an Etruscan tomb above on the hillside somewhere. I am very close to Monte Acuto, which was a rather important site for the ancients. It is a striking, triangular mountain, which seems to have had significance to the Etruscans. I'll learn more as the days unfold.
