In small Italian towns, anything can happen! Sometimes it doesn’t even matter if it’s true, as long as it makes for good gossip! Take the time they had my husband all but dead and buried for example! Or at best seriously ill. We were away most of the summer, as we often are, staying at […]
Toc, toc, toc. I wiped my hands on my apron and headed for the door, wondering who would be visiting so close to lunchtime. “Buon giorno,” I hesitantly greeted the unexpected visitor. “Um, can I help you?” I really didn’t know what to say or do. We’d never had a priest visit us before! “I’m […]
Our neighbors are mostly older, simple folk with little education. Often confused by our rapidly changing world, they often have difficulty using technology. So they tend to stick to the way they’ve always done things. And that can lead to some pretty crazy conversations! Crazy dialogues! Just for fun, let me share some of these […]
We have a saying in Italian. Non c’è niente di nuovo sotto il sole. (There is nothing new under the sun.) And yes, I know it’s from the Bible. But I also know that King Solomon, who wrote it, didn’t live in a foreign country. Otherwise, I wonder if he would have changed it to: “There is something […]
I can still see her, old and frail, limping up the steep hill with her homemade canes. “What do you have there, Zia (Auntie)?” my Hubby asked, pointing at the mesh bag on her kerchief-covered head. I just gaped, wondering how many nasty things had been on that seldom-washed, filthy headscarf! “Oh rabbit droppings for my […]
Chestnuts, an open fire, and the importance of finding joy in simple things. The fire didn’t heat better out of the fireplace. All it really did was create more smoke! Although no one would ever convince the dear, stubborn, old man of that! Yet we fondly remember those simple evenings of reading by the fire […]