Spring is in full advance here but it is more of a dance than a straight line. It’s two full steps forward (sunny & warm), then a full step back (cold & rainy with light snow up in the village), then a half step sideways (sunny & cool). However, sunny & warm is gradually taking more control over the last few weeks. We still tuck into our bed at night with our heated mattress pads but it is not the urgent dive under the warm covers that it was last month. However, the downside of our mild winter is the quick rebound of the insect kingdom. The ants are in full march and we are ever alert for the next incursion into the house. The stink bugs (helicopter) bugs never completely went away and we know they will soon be everywhere.
Margaret’s flower garden is looking very nice. I noticed in her last blog that she had mentioned her new found (small) interest in creating the garden. This is no longer a small interest. With help and some donated plants from our neighbor, Robert, the garden is doing well. Margaret does pop out of the house several times a day to check on how the “girls” are doing. Her flowers make her smile and her eyes twinkle.
We did have a small earthquake here 2 days ago, 4.8, with a couple of aftershocks. It occurred at about midnight and Margaret noticed the bed shifting. I slept through it.
With spring comes an increase in fun things to do. This past weekend there were a number of events and tours across our region of Abruzzo. A local organization (FAI) works with villages to open up museums, private homes and conduct tours and historical lectures. We toured the activities in three villages and it made for a busy and interesting weekend. Two of the towns incorporated the local children in presentations and the kids were full of excited energy.
We made a point of going to Corfinio as one our stops because it served as the capital of the “Italic” tribes in the area and their museum has a silver coin stamped with the first recorded use of “Italy”. This confederation of tribes declared war on Rome to force Rome to grant Roman citizenship to the tribes, https://www.britannica.com/event/Social-War-Roman-history.
Our village celebrated the festival of San Giovanni two weekends ago with a band and a parade. Everybody came up to the village. There was a big market with a bunch of vendors and we bought some miscellaneous items. These vendors make weekly rounds of the local villages but our village only sees them on special occasions.
Here's a link to some recent photos: Click here.
As summer approaches, we are thinking about committing to a full seasons rental of 2 chairs and an umbrella from a beach concession vendor. Each vendor has the rights to a slice of the beach and they provide private access, restrooms and food to their customers. We would not use our chairs everyday but they would be there for our exclusive use all summer.
This blog marks our first full year in Italy. We enjoyed the switch from an impersonal urban life to a tranquil, friendlier, pastoral life. We expected to be less busy in Italy but that has not happened.
I spend most mornings working my way through the EDX.org Italian course. I had started this course back in Chicago but my study habits tailed off as the move to Italy got closer and more involved and my health took an unexpected turn. As I prepared to restart the EDX course, I saw a free two-week course also on EDX on how to learn. That was worthwhile as it talked about the science of short vs long term memory, memory synapses and how they interact. What is helping my morale and attitude is their conclusion that science cannot explain the leap from deliberate memorization and awkward parsing to being able to talk without thinking about talking. It is a “black box” jump that will just happen if I have faith and keep working.
Margaret has the harder job of working towards her Italian Driver’s License. While I pat myself on the back if I get in 2 good hours of study, she is working through the mass of material she needs to pass the written part of her exam. It’s hard to explain how much detail she needs to know because any one of the 30 questions (from a pool of 7,000) could be on how brakes work or the licensing requirements to drive a heavy duty truck, etc., etc. The good news is that there are a number of websites and apps that are devoted to this and Margaret is sifting through them all.
Today our schedules went awry as a Pescheria (fish) van was up in the village and we ended up gutting and frying a lunch of anchovies and dinner tonight will be mussels and pasta with even more shrimp and two whole fish in the freezer. This could be a regular Thursday morning shopping experience along with the fruit and vegetable van.
We had dinner with a new neighbor from the USA who just moved here this month. She is a retired teacher from Arizona and was not expecting how cold a stone house in Italy can be in March. Like our story, she has been welcomed with open arms by her neighbors. When we moved here we were in a fully furnished house but she needs everything, including designing and ordering a full kitchen from IKEA.
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