Urns...
Archive post March 14, 2019…
Buon Giorno a tutti…
Before I proceed with this week’s blog-post, I would like to ask the 3 followers of this blog…
if there are more of you out in there in the Blog-o’-sphere, please make yourselves known. It’s a Question of Moral Support…
to take a Great Big Sniff of the left-hand photo below. Il Poggiolo was a farm for 800 years, of humble roots, and the house & gardens nearly disappeared into a sad destruction, thanks to the indifference of its previous owner, a woman, who benignly allowed the roofs to collapse and the garden to become a garbage dump for the locals. I was told she NEVER set foot in what she had inherited. I am the Hero here.
There is, however, a person near & dear to me, who believes himself to be il Vero Salvatore del Poggiolo. Much contrary to this Other Person, I feel it’s silly to maintain any pretense that il Poggiolo a Codiponte could ever become a physical kindred & equal to, say, a noble Tuscan villa, such as the Villa Mansi in Lucca, just by planting an urn in the garden. My Barbaric American Voice does not come heard.
Our blog-story harks back several years when You… Dottore You-know-who, to be exact, he who labors diligently to save people’s eyesight, occasionally pointing a laser at them to do the job… discovered with the help of his Hospital Nursing Staff… an unsavory congress of persons, a thoroughly Bad Influence upon Our Dear Dottore… found the urn in the photo on the extreme left on an Italian garden ornament website specializing in historical stuff.
You has not been the same since.
Led him to a career dallying continually on the Internet with that Staff of his. When DO THEY work? Managed to collide head-on with catawiki.com. An Internet auction house. You says it is too much fun and saves him bunches of Euros. (Says there’s a trick to win what you want spending few Euros. I am contractually PROHIBITED from divulging it. Sorry. Those are my Orders.) Anyway, a dialogue… Catawiki? How nice, Dear. Have you found something delectable to bid on? Oh, yes! They arrive on Saturday. And so they did. At the local mechanic’s officina. Two tall, heavy-weight cement statues of Dr. Bacchus and Mr Hercules. Middle 19th Century. Had to pay for their transport all the way from il Veneto. Cost a pretty penny. The Other Person was not carrying his wallet. They now grace certain panoramic sectors nel Poggiolo’s garden. There’s one in the middle left photo. The rather swish stance of Mr. Hercules. Greek. Probably Gay. Lots of trials for it too. Myths are tough.
I declared You insane.
More disasters. Helping a client to dabble with the Italianate for her centuries old tower, now a enormous house, You & I developed a close & affectionate collaboration with a stuff emporium, a paradise of the old, copies of the old and a few things truly antique. Heaven. Ambling around & through the depository during one visit, You happened upon an urn. A terracotta urn. Shortly, money passed hands, the AUDI was loaded with not one BUT two of the things. And, a few hours afterwards, they too graced certain panoramic sectors nel Poggiolo’s garden. Che gioia. One of them is nestling in its spot in the middle right photo.
Thought I might sign myself into an asylum.
Many months passed, the Seasons came & went, the calendar changed years too, without n’er a Grecian urn acquired. Then, I had a moment. Just last weekend. Innocently touring the famous antiques-to-vintage market at the oddly Chinese looking pavilions of the Parma fairgrounds, I came upon love in terracotta. Though mildly unfocused, I panned an impromptu exhibition space outside of Pavilion 5… an overflow of stuff from a stand inside… and there, at my Adidas-clad feet were two lovely, oval, elegant, terracotta vases. Urns. The pair’s faces were quite nicely done too. Love. Big Love. VERY BIG LOVE. Can happen to anyone. Even the innocent. Terracotta Love. At first sight. Alas unrequited. A minor problem erupted. Someone was in rapt negotiations with the Neapolitan owner to purchase & carry away My Terracotta Loves. Seemed a done deed. I walked away and with one last look, I snapped a pic and whatsapp-ed it to My Resident Urn Expert with a sort of an apology… Got bitten but they got away. The End