Showing posts with label Fall. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fall. Show all posts

04 November 2013

The View from My Balcony


Last night's sunset over the Majella Mountains:




This morning's sunrise over the Adriatic Sea:




With today sunny and in the 70's for my walk on the beach and warm memories from dinner last evening with good friends, I'm feeling grateful.

05 November 2012

Combing Olive Trees Branch by Branch


Fall brings  a favorite opportunity in our olive rich area - harvesting olives the old fashioned way by combing branch after branch of our friend's olive trees. She has few enough trees to do it this way rather than the more mechanized version used by larger places. What a wonderful way to spend a day with friends.




My friend Sheila's trees were laden this year, ready to be swept into the nets below. Yesterday was in the high 60's with intermittent sun, the three dogs were bounding around begging someone to throw a stick for them to fetch and six of us were eager to engage in the ancient, almost meditative practice of harvesting olives.




A view from the olive grove located about 40 minutes from my house and closer to the mountains.



Sheila prepared a delicious, home cooked feast for the workers. We ate, chatted and shared snippets of our lives in Italy, rich with new-for-us experiences that endear us to this land, this place.



After pressing, each couple's reward is five liters of olive oil. I'm sure it enhances the heart benefits of olive oil to have combed the trees branch by branch and harvested the olives with our own hands.



Sheila has a couple of trees with eating olives rather than those meant to be crushed for oil. The green olives from Abruzzo, our area of Italy, are scrumptious and rated highly nationally.



Olive oil is used in products as well. Soap, of course, but also shampoo, body wash and lotion. My skin and hair love them.



It's hard to overestimate the value of slow, simple, earth based activities further connecting me to all that is- the trees, the sun, the earth, fresh air, fresh food, friends, easy banter, play with a dog, being a part of the cycle of that which feeds me. I'm grateful.

29 October 2012

How a Woman Living in Italy Lands in the Storm of the Century in the States


It was just a two week vacation with my Honey to see family and friends in the states ending with my niece's wedding in Ohio. Our departure date, though, coincided with hurricane Sandy, which morphed into superstorm Sandy, smashing the east coast, including our port of exit, Boston. Which means that I'm writing this from an airport hotel in Columbus, Ohio after our flights were cancelled and rescheduled for two days from now providing Boston's Logan Airport is up and running by then. Our flights were among about 11,000 flights that were cancelled. Do you know how many other travelers were attempting to change to alternate routes to miss the 1,000 mile wide storm? Too many, as it turns out.

All other family members made it out (most driving) so I have a stretch of two days to catch up with all the things I've neglected while devoting myself whole- heartedly to visiting. I want to figure out a way to blog and travel/visit at the same time. I miss my blogosphere friends when I'm gone. The TV coverage of the storm is enough to scare the wits out of any watcher that has family or friends in harm's way. Columbus is on the outer edge of this massive storm and still we have rain, cold, winds and emergency contingencies at the ready, but it's the population dense east coast that is feeling the brunt of it. Heart- felt prayers to them.

My Honey started with a cold last night and felt it full- fledged today so he's in bed and I'm out doing email, facebook, blogging, reading, organizing my vacation photos and using the fitness center since I can't go outdoors. With no distractions, it's rather enjoyable. Another advantage of retirement- the ability to roll with what is. I've even played Words-With-Friends real time with my daughter and a friend, got myself caught up with DragonVale as well and made myself some new (young) friends along the way to share DV gems and strategies with. What a fun game with ever- evolving features to keep loyalists like me happy.

Fall in New England, celebrating my father's 96th birthday, seeing friends from where I used to live in Maine, touching base and catching up with old, dear friends, conducting our 9th annual gathering of the women in my family, alone time (four days!) for the first time in ten years to talk with my daughter, and attending my youngest brother's youngest daughter's wedding stand as high points of the trip up to this latest experience of nature's power shared by many millions of my Country people. It's been a rich vacation.




















16 September 2012

Returning Home


It's a particularly splendid day after the torrents of rain of the past few days. The flowers continue to flourish, the table invites a sit to take in the view and enjoy the warmth.



While I've been away the hot peppers matured from green to bright red and have already been shared with eager neighbors. The little ones from Thailand are extra zippy. The bigger Italian ones don't skimp on the heat, though, and are plumped out well. All are grown from seed this year and thrive in this southern exposure.



The air is fragrant with lavender as the flowers not picked die back and scatter grains of scent on the balcony near the table. A good book (I'm currently re-reading The Hobbit and The Lord of The Rings trilogy), a cup of tea, Bocelli and Brightman singing in the background and a slant of sun under the awning complete the scene. Ahhh, it's good to be home.

And dusk falls.


04 December 2011

Fall Colors in Our Neighborhood

I'm struck by the beautiful colors in our neighborhood these days of extended fall. They're different than the dramatic colors of my native New England, a bit more subtle and subdued, but lovely nonetheless. Much of the color come from the leaves still on the vines after the recent grape harvest that is the source of our wonderful regional wines.

Taken yesterday on a country road down our hill:







Taken from my balcony this afternoon as the sun momentarily broke through the clouds.
Those are vineyards in the distance peppered with olive groves.
The first photo looks west and the second, south:




14 October 2010

Fall Colors Small Scale

So many of the blogs I follow have been posting amazing photos of fall colors all over the USA. I love seeing them and remembering experiences from growing up in and living in New England. We're too warm in our little corner of the world for fall yet but I was yearning for more color. So I made a little change right in my own living room that pleases me. I found a beautiful peacock scarf in my closet that a dear friend gave me in Maine. I've worn it for some special occasions but mostly it sits in the closet. Not any more. I put it on my red couch in front of the coleus plants and che bello!




It makes me happy to see it each day.