Summer break...

It’s not what you think.

I went to dinner at my English Friend’s house the other night. Codiponte, in its own way, is a very international retreat. Many of the World’s nations are represented, besides the Brexiteers or, non-… me, as the lone American then, a clutch of Dutch, a Brazilian family though they now live in Argentina… did not quite understand the explanation as to why, so I filled in the subsequent blank with Tax Dodgers. Buenos Aires seems the last place on the face of Dear Mother Earth to avoid the financial worry of excessive taxation… and some Australians. These later persons haven’t shown their faces in a couple of years. Must be the abominable airplane trip through Dubai since, QANTAS eliminated Rome from their docket of destinations or, now, the COVID-19 scare. Oh, well… back to my English Friends….

The wife is a determined Good Cook. She served a shrimp cocktail with homemade mayonnaise… a Southern Down Home Favourite, especially the mayo. Well, the shrimp too ‘cause I have relations who hail from Savannah, Georgia, Shrimp HQ… broiled to a crip outer shell river trout and an unofficial version of ratatouille. Odd though there were NO POTATOES!!! Like Italians, who do not count a meal a meal without bread, I thought the same with the English and spuds. What found a brief home on the plate before me was delicious and a bit Fall-ish. Summer fair cold meats, steamed vegetable and/or too many salads. Blessedly, there was lots of white wine and conversation to cover the absence of no roasted tatters.

One whirl of conversation that evening was on our Summer weather. Ghastly hot. Terrifically muggy. LITTLE RAIN!!! The English Wife is a True Believer in the Phases of the Moon. N’er a move without consulting the Lunar Calendar. I was remotely aware of this info conveyance but, typically, gave it scant thought. Filed it away and next to the amount of pressure for my beat-up SUV’s tires. Ah, she said, new Moon tonight, dears. The weather is due to change its tune. Yes, rain will be our music for next week. Get ready. It’s going to rain like it hasn’t since October of 2013. Gosh! Well, we are in next week and all I have seen was some spray just at the moment I needed to carry off the debris after two days of gardening, while You grumbled & groaned setting to rights our salotto and sala da pranzo post-camino construction. Three months of dawn arrivals of the workmen… the Dog and I are communally comatose until at least 9:00AM, he contemplating an imminent evacuation, me on nursing my third tasse di caffe’… no shows of others, vacation interruptions, for cryin’ out loud, dust, disorder, depression. The English Wife said Summer would break. Come on…

My first experience with a Summer Break… can’t recall experiencing such a phenomenon in America but, boy do they need it in California, Oregon, Colorado… was the first Summer I came to Italy. Florence. To learn Italian. August. Not the month to be anywhere but Greenland or, in the upper reaches of Norway. The city of the Medici is in a bowl. The prevailing winds pass right on over the place, leaving a desperate sort of heat & humidity. A smoggy dark brown haze soddens the antique stones and roof tiles. Must be why I found the Florentines so grumpy and unpleasant. I have since altered my perspective on the city. I fell in love twice in Firenze. One stuck!!! I have to confess… I stopped going to the Leonardo da Vinci School of Italian after the first week. I had paid for a month. Annoying teachers, treacherous students from Eurolandia and, my own personal freak-out in attempting to master Italian beyond Ciao! and Arrivederci. I will not speak of two difficult Italian verb tenses, except to say, I still, after thirty-six years, steer clear of any linguistic necessity to resort to them. One, however, is only used in places like Sicilia and the darker regions of Calabria. Ahime’. Travelled instead. Talked to old people waiting for the corriere at, Thanks to the Almighty Lord, a shady bus stop… normally these spots are situated on a large expanse of asphalt charmingly referred to as la piazza… and saw stuff. Best trip was to Assisi. But never mind. Oh, but no! It was upon my gainful return to Florence from the city of Francesco d’ that an enormous thunderstorm struck Florence and environs. Black skies, multiple & simultaneous bolts of lightening ripped across the sky, pounding torrential rains, a good deal of pandemonium with traffic, fear, terror and, a number of trees knocked down too. OK… so no electricity for a few hours afterwards. Candle light is so atmospheric. Yet, the next morning sprung a gloriously beautiful August day of blue skies, breezy, cool temps, DRY!!! Fall like weather. WONDERFUL: Summer was broke. The drenching heat & humidity snapped until the following June. That is what the English Wife was implying. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must practice my Italian Rain Dance. Still no sight of rain, darn it.

Doesn’t look like rain to me…

…but, my laundry is drying nicely. No, that’s not my stuff hanging on the line. Mine is on folding stands in the courtyard, where it belongs, out of view. I’m not from Naples, thank you very much!