In a grove beyond the Arno

surrounded by every colour and scent of rose, a huge cotton tree blows pollen over the lodge and down the meadow where the olive trees grow. The gardner rakes it all up each day, same as he mows the wildflowers, but somehow there's never any less of it; must be a trick of the light. There's a lot of light. Storms on the mountains, blossoms at the start of May, but mainly light, bleaching out the old stone of walls and farmhouses, stimulating funky spotted lizards into frenzied activity, feeding the vines, the roses, the barley, the fig trees, the cherry tree, the flame flowered quince, the olives, the olives and their cousins, the other olives.

I was going to be cultured this holiday, but then larians brought me to one of the most enchanting spots on earth, so beguiling that you just want to sit and stare and do nothing. At one point, sitting on the porch swing, I found myself imagining some future with us as a pair of old peeps, me a much rounder version of my grandma, him tending our sumptuous garden of roses, vines and olives. And a dovecote.

This is an unheard of pattern for my thoughts to take. Tuscany is ridiculously beautiful, a 'witching place!
( My holiday shame and stop-off in hell )

We knew we were in an enchanted land the first night, when we went out into the local village of Marciano Della Chiana and saw a huge blue star in the sky; far too big to be anything other than a planet, and too late, I thought, to be Venus. Below we caught sight of a toad clambering a mud bank. Poor old bufo was massive enough for larians to call him a monster, but in truth, his eyes were speckled and lovely as he scraped his way through the wildflowers, climbing up to Jupiter.

On the last night, larians, took me down into the olive grove and showed me fireflies. I haven't seen a firefly since the 90s, in North Wales. larians showed me a small star far below the ones over the mountains. It flew straight towards, between and over us, flickering on and off, near enough to touch. We didn't. We hugged each other instead.

And as to what happened between toad night and firefly night? I am going to write a great deal down, for my own memory's sake, and it will take more than one entry, but I promise to not spam up everyone else's friends page with my ramblings; The cut will be generously used.

About Siena

( From witches to liches )