This blog began with the wonderment associated with walking through the Tuscan paradise, and today after two interesting days in Florence, we have returned to the glory of it all. Wandering through the medieval fortresses of Volterra and San Giminagnano was a great thrill, complete with scaling the highest towers in each town, but once again it was the panoramic beauty of the Tuscan hills and vales which took our breath away.
Some places are just more beautiful than others, and Tuscany is at the top of the list. We drove and drove in our stick shift, diesel powered Peugeot station wagon, which only had 450 miles on it when I rented it. We drove for hours up and down, around and through; up one mountain and down the other side, and all the while the sun and clouds playing hide and seek provided us with the most awe inspiring and absolutely heavenly vistas. The veils of sunshine illuminated vast areas of landscape, and the different perspectives exposed by the light and shade were other worldly. God forces you to pay attention here.
The cultivation here is different than Sicily's at this time of year. Yes, there are thousands and thousands of acres planted in grapes and olive trees, but the majority of the topography is covered in windswept, verdant Spring wheat; so, not only do your visual senses overload with the richness of color, but at times it is also all in motion when the gentle breezes blow. It is nothing short of breathtaking, which I know I have used many, many times in this blog to date. I am at heart, not a city boy, but function best in the vastness of open spaces; so for me there is never enough time to become connected with the natural elements of air and earth in the middle of nowhere, going nowhere, plodding toward freedom in some way, shape, or form-becoming one with seas of green. Whether he was rich or poor, in good health or bad, Hesse's Siddhartha would always come back to the same three principles to ground himself and become centered in his soul again, which were: "No matter what, I can sit, I can think, and I can fast." Walking aimlessly, on and on into the vastness of an unending ocean of hip high spring wheat with a steady breeze cooling you as you go on and on into the openness; the canopy above a ceiling of blueberry sky that is almost drinkable, is as simple and uncomplicated as it gets, and allowed me to feel connected and centered. This sensory ablution only made me think of...." I wandered lonely as a cloud that floats o'er hills and vales, when all at once i saw a crowd, a host of golden daffodils: fluttering and dancing in the breeze, tossing their heads with sprightly ease..." I'm a little rusty, but you get the point.
We tired, so we stopped on a country road going nowhere and found a nice spot in a huge olive grove to take a nap. This to me is vacationing; sleeping quietly in the middle of nowhere with ancient olive trees providing shade for a weary family. It also provided relief from some of the family stresses and triggers, which go hand in hand with the word, familiarity. Our family seems to constantly misspell the word, compatible, instead spelling combatible, which isn't even a word! Deen is sorely missed, but I am sore enough without him. I know I am a descendant of some form of Italian Catholic martyrdom, and therefore capable of tolerating hours and hours of self denial and abuse, but the mental and emotional stoning and flogging does get out of hand. At times I seem to be the Mount Everest of trouble and all things gone wrong. In our family dynamic all roads really do lead back to the Roman! I mean, Aliyah can get a mosquito bite sitting in the car, and somehow it is my fault, or she can misplace a Q Tip, and in some way I did something twenty years ago that is connected to this life changing calamity! Oh, the wonder of it all! One of my favorite Shiffrinisms from years ago which Rob would always blurt out in moments of impossible family craze was, "Don't get married, don't have kids!"
Speaking of Romans: As I rested, I did have thoughts once again of ancient Romans resting in the olive groves after pillaging some lesser opponent and beheading the whole place for fun on their way back to Rome. The sleep was just a bit restless! ( Something inside of me keeps stirring about entering Rome. It's the Maximus thing again-that damn movie! I don't even want to see anything other than the Collesseum when we get there, and that damn Wide World of Sports or Olympic Anthem keeps pounding in my head also!
This experience makes me think about how difficult it must have been for my Grandfather and his brothers to leave their farmland in Abruzzo in 1917 and get on a boat bound for the promise land called America. They only came to Philadelphia because they needed workers to build the Ben Franklin Bridge, (according to Novelli folklore), so that is how the family came to reside there. As a young boy I remember the two small cement planters in the eight by eight foot cement back yard of my Grandfather's South Philadelphia row house, where he had two wonderful fig trees planted. He would rap his two little babies with tar paper in the winter time so they would make it through the harsh Philadelphia winters. He also made his own wine in the basement, and it was a great joy to drink grape juice right out of the spigot when the fermenting process was just beginning. But, in reality, he was, as I am, merely a misplaced farmer, who would have contentedly sat in the shade contemplating about the simplicity and natural order of the Universe. Instead, he was caught in the machinery of the industrial devolution and now I am caught in a microprocessed devolution! Perhaps my son's son will one day return to the natural order of our ancestors.
My step Grandmother, ( I was too young when my natural Grandmother died and we were living in LA, dude- I was much cooler than all of you, even then!)( we thought my Grandfather was kidding when he went back to Italy to get another wife at age 78 or something), anyway, my Step Grandmother, Madia they called her, was a nice old lady from Abruzzo who had altars and shrines all over the house with hundreds of candles burning day and night. We never knew how she did not burn the house down, because she had linen doilies, or whatever they were called, underneath all the jam packed candles. These shrines to the Virgin Mary and Jesus where in every room, but the kitchen was where the real action was: It was there that she had many, many strings of garlic hanging with red and gold Italian horns strung together, which drove away the demons and evil spirits. (Unfortunately, she didn't do that great a job on me!) We always thought that she used enough garlic cooking to kill anything within a few hundred feet anyway. She was a really nice lady who respected our family and loyally took care of my Grandfather until his death. They were the real deal, the original items.
I should go back a day or two when blogspot was not functioning and talk a bit about the former center of the world's intellectual and artistic movements, Florence, Italy...... Yes, the home of the great Duomo, second only to the Vatican, I believe, Florence is a great place to visit for a few days. Yes, it is a city, but the frescos, museums, and buildings of course are everywhere. It is also a great destination city, so it is jumping with activity of all sorts, and filled with people on the move. The center of it all is the amazing Duomo (church), which is one of the many great wonders of Italian architecture. It is the center of the city and the central location from which all activity seems to generate. It must be seen, to believe, so google it up. The immensity itself is mind boggling, and on a beautiful Sunday like the one we spent there, it is mobbed.
Of course, art, music, intellect, architecture, and culture should be the primary focus when visiting one of the great cities of the world, however, for my loved ones, the shopping bazaars and countless shops took center stage. Ah, yes, back to the beloved euro we go. My love affair with this wonderful currency just won't stop! Yes, the euros were flying away faster than I could count, but the crazed, supposedly joyous looks on my beloveds' faces were priceless. It was better than a Mastercard commercial. Yes, there were leather items and bracelets and scarves and hand painted writing paper and hats and boots, and soccer banners, and hazeri and chachkees and many other broken Yiddish depictions! ( Where's Reba when you need her!)
Don't get me wrong, we did visit quite a few important places in Florence. One particular museum/courtyard, a former monastery and church, was a fresco paradise that dated back centuries, but the thing that caught our eye as we entered was a marble tomb cover with the names' Orloff and Wentzel inscribed on it. Orloff is my brother in laws' family name and it is Jewish as is Wentzel. We asked the museum director who they were and she told us that they were one of the powerful aristocratic families who governed Florence. This was a fascinating footnote for us, and one that I am sure will provoke much discussion at our family gatherings in the future.
So, the blogging goes to date. I will tell you more about the medieval towns when I return. Until then, signing off from Sienna, where the main piazza is also one of those one of a kind, centuries old wonders that must be googled to be understood. Ciao from Chow Man
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