Tuscany Burning

I'm just off to Italy for some much-needed convalescence, so this will be my last post before I arrive. Like Greece, the Tuscan Alps also have a problem with wild-fires and recently the mountainside above Peralta - where Neil is working - has been blazing. He walked up the hill early the other morning and sent me these pictures of the fire as he casually strolled through.




It looks hot - but after weeks and weeks of miserable northern weather and a maximum of 17 degrees (this is summer?) I think I can take a little heat!

I'm looking forward to the relaxation, the Prosecco, and cafe life. I have a favourite cafe, run by two sixty-something men with grey pony tails and ragged jeans. The main attraction is going to the loo, where they play a tape of someone's sonorous voice reading Dante. It's quite hypnotic and people do seem to spend a lot of time in 'i servizi'! The tables are heaped with newspapers and poetry books, and it was here that I first came across Alda Merini 'one of the most powerful contemporary female poets writing in Italian' according to one review. I think some of her poetry is quite religious - content difficult for an aetheist - but the sound of it is utterly beautiful. I've never let my religious differences put me off Donne or Hopkins, so not Merini either. I'm learning Italian and hope to be able to understand it better in the original language soon.

Here's to practising! And I will remember to raise a glass of Prosecco to absent friends.

Up to my knees in sewage

Just spent the day in wellington boots trying to unblock the drains. We have a septic tank and the pipe leading to the soakaway, which runs across the drive, has somehow become blocked. After attempts to run a hosepipe through it from the manhole (why don't I have man to do this?) failed, I was forced to start digging up the lawn to locate the pipe. Several men stopped to ask me what I was doing - at a safe, odour free, distance - but I didn't get any offers of help. Anyway, I've cured the puddle in the drive, but now have a garden pond (organic of course!) full of brown water. Tomorrow I will have to have another go at it. I bet Antonia Fraser never has to do this! Consoled myself with the thought that I'm off to Italy for the weekend at Peralta (peraltatuscany.com) for an exhibition in memory of Fiore de Henriquez. Neil is putting all his sculpture out in the olive groves on plinths and I'm really looking forward to seeing it in this wild setting. Also looking forward to sunshine, unlimited prosecco and fresh air with a rather more attractive aroma!