FuoriBorgo

even when it blizzards

When it snows, it blizzards ... is there such a saying?  If not, there should be!  It blizzarded heavily in our little corner of the world (more ice and snow storms are expected to hit the country, but I choose to ignore that for just now), and as I sit down tonight with a cup of tea, and look back at the last couple of weeks, I wonder at how much has happened in such a short time.  Let's see:

-    When we got snowed in, the provincial highway department trucks cleared and salted the provincial road leading up the hill, so that the municipal trucks could clear and salt the municipal lanes in the village, a procession that took several hours, and sometimes the whole day.

-     The provincial trucks pushed the snow onto the municipal roads, and the municipal trucks pushed the snow onto our dirt lane, where it still lies.  By now it's a huge mound of ice, which blocks the way to our wood barn and the house. 

-    We're out of wood already (!), the lane is blocked, there will be a lot of hauling firewood this weekend (this is also something I choose to ignore just now).

-    Our girl has been sick, and there have been trips to the doctor and to the hospital.

-    There's been a clogged toilet.  Now - you may ask - how's a clogged toiled related to the snow?  Well, once upon a time there was an evil steamed cauliflower core, well past its "best by" date, and a tired, stressed-out mamma alone in the middle of wintry woods with her three children.  One snowy day, she was walking around the house talking on the cellphone to a friend, pouring out all of her worries, while absently carrying the bowl with the evil, smelly cauliflower core, half-wondering what to do with it, given that the compost pile was under a meter of snow.  That mamma thought the best solution was simply to be rid of it, and to flush it down.  Guess what?  The very evil stinky cauliflower core had its revenge.  

-    There were temperatures as low as -12C, fallen trees, power failures, burst water pipes and telephone and internet lines cut.

But as I sit here with my hot cuppa tonight, I know that all of the above and more happened, yet it doesn't seem real.  Because what really counts is that Tom's back.  All is well now, even when it blizzards.

and then the snow came

I went to sleep worrying about the snow that had started to fall, and whether I'd made the right decision when I allowed the boys to sleep over at friends down on the coast, instead of picking them up while the roads were still clear.  I woke up in unusually white light for a winter morning, and knew it had snowed a lot.  Oddly, though, I felt relieved. 

We're snowed in, an event that I dread each and every winter.  However:

-    Rebecca is not sick
-    for once, I've just stocked up on groceries
-    we have a barn filled with firewood
-    we still have electricity and phone lines
-    the boys are certainly having a lot of fun on their prolonged sleep-over (thank goodness for nice and flexible friends!), and I'm sure I'll be able to pick them up long before springtime 

True, we're snowed in.  But there is not one thing I can do about it, so I'm going to stop worrying.  Instead, I'll try and relax, and have some fun with my girl!

quiet

Under the gray sky, in the wintry light, it was very quiet at the market, and it matched my mood.  I strolled around aimlessly, then got back to the car, and drove away - the music from the radio a little too loud (no small people with me wondering why loud volume might irreversibly damage their hearing, like I always warn them, and not mine).  For the first time since I've started this blog almost three years ago, I've felt a little quiet recently.  The other night, as I was writing my daily note in the postcard calendar journal, I saw that Tom was away traveling last January too.  He's been traveling a lot this year, and almost incessantly since June.  And although I'm grateful that the interest in true olive oil is very high, some days I feel quiet because I miss him so.

Tom

I never mentioned why we are here in the US.  We came over to be a little closer to Tom, who's spending an extended period of time in this country - and to share with him some of the excitement when his book came out at the beginning of December.

Yes, his book, Tom's book, the book to which, on top of his work as a freelance journalist and writer, he dedicated a great deal of time, energy and passion during the last few years - research, travels, interviews, writing, editing, tweaking.  The book that has also involved our whole family in learning about olive oil in all its beauty, but also in its ugliness.

Tom's journey into the world of olive oil began twelve years ago, when we moved from the city to our isolated village on a hill in Liguria, and an elderly farmer offered to help us haul on his tractor some of our belongings up the steep path to our new house.  To thank him and his wife for all the generous help they'd given us in those first hectic and complex months, one brisk day in December, Tom went with them to harvest olives.  They left early in the morning, bundled up in layers, carrying empty baskets and a pot full of rabbit stew alla ligure.  They returned late that evening, baskets filled with purple olives ready to mill, the rabbit pot empty, and a new world discovered: the ancient world of small rural communities in the Mediterranean, rooted in grapevines and olive groves.  

Tom's book is dedicated to them, our dear neighbors, Gino and Rosetta, who have taught us so much (I wrote about them many times, including here and here).  From that harvest day on, Tom began learning about the fresh nectar from the olives, more commonly known as extra virgin olive oil, in all of its aspects: from the groves in the Mediterranean (and also clear across in California, and all the way down under in Australia) to the mills, from the oil casks to the table or to the gymnasium as the ancient Greeks and Roman did.  A journey in time and space, discovering the rich and deep world of extra virgin olive oil, from the wonderful nectar to the fraudulent adulterated liquid that so often is bottled and sold as extra virgin olive oil.

Tom's book, Extra Virginity: the Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil, is available in many idie bookstores and oil shops across the US, as well as at WW Norton, Amazon, Powell's, Barnes & Nobles.  Copies signed by the author (aka my husband!) will soon be available through his web site, EV Truth in Olive Oil, a web site dedicated to promoting, discovering and teaching about good and authentic extra virgin olive oil - because if there is so much adulterated stuff around, there's also a wealth of great, authentic extra virgin olive oils out there, and countless honest growers and oil-makers that are in danger of bankruptcy in a market clouded by fraud.

a rich Christmas

Today, I find myself thinking of our simple Christmas last year, the five of us in a little apartment high in the Alps, an enchanted forest outside, and inside a few ornaments we improvised (here).  And of Christmas the year before, with our artificial tree lit by candles and sparklers, pine boughs on the mantlepiece, and our shared fondu dinner (here).  This Christmas on the other side of the pond could not have been more different.  It was so rich in family, normally so far away, and in traditions so different and yet familiar, part of the story of our bi-cultural family, enriching our days now and the days to come. 

I didn't bake the cake

I didn't bake Rebecca's birthday cake this year.  Granny did.  

It was a "layer cake", which in my book means baking two cakes.  Granny baked them both.

I didn't make my simple lemon juice & powder sugar icing for the birthday cake either.  Granny made a proper fluffy cream cheese frosting.

The birthday cake that Granny made for Rebecca was beautiful.

And all I had to do on this birthday, was sit down, sing along and enjoy the cake.  It was delicious.

heirloom doll houses for my birthday girl

Here's quite a coincidence:  my girl is yet again treated to playing with a hairloom doll house on her birthday.  Two years ago, she received her brothers' seven-year-old doll house as present (here).  Today, she's playing with a special family heirloom - her great-aunt's doll house, made by her own parents 65 years ago.  The other day we brought it down to Granny's home from the family cabin in the woods (where it shall return after our visit - thank you Aunt Helen!). 

What a marvelous privilege for Rebecca to be able play with this very special handmade family toy on her 5th birthday today!

at the cabin great-grandpa built

 

About fifty years ago, Tom's grandfather built a cabin by a lake in the woods in north Idaho.  This is where his children and grandchildren spent every summer, and where his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren gather together most summers even today.  Nicholas toddled his first steps here, in the summer 13 years ago, and Jeremy learned to paddle the canoe with his cousins across this lake (here).  Last weekend Rebecca visited it for the first time.  She never met her great-grandfather, but she's heard the stories.

a mere bag of rubber bands

I'm sure that for months to come after our visit, Granny will find in odd places of her house stray rubber bands, calling up memories of her three grandchildren armed with rubber bands and turning her house into grounds for boisterous battles.  Imagine two boys, bigger than they realize, chasing each other, their little sister following suit and filling the rooms with shrieks of excitement.  I hope that she will smile.

I hope that she will smile, as I am just now looking at the photos and being reminded how the best of toys can be a mere bag of rubber bands - because kids don't need all that much to have fun.  
(We must remember to do a thorough rubber band search before we leave!)

father-land

My boys getting reacquainted again with their paternal roots, my girl learning about them for the first time - so important, so special, so good.

Happy December!