San Martino, you may know, was the saint who cut his cloak in half to share it with a beggar. As the legend goes here in Italy, God sends warm weather to Italy in honor of San Martino around his name day, November 11- this is called estate di San Martino (Italy's answer to Indian summer?). In any case, it has been a lovely one! Maddy and Gus and I went for a walk in the warm and sun on Sunday on top of the hill adjacent to ours while Gibbs put in some happy hours working on line.
It's almost like a mini spring with the return of the sun- shoots of grass and tiny plants are popping out bright green all over (in the freshly tilled fields waiting winter vegetable planting as well as our bristly straw welcome mat). In the last picture here, you can see the back side of the hill where we live- in the grey spots (called calanche, similar to fjords?) are tons of rocks covered in shell fossils. I'm very curious to learn more about the local geologic history which appears to include sea beds and glaciers.
For San Martino proper, it is traditional here to eat freshly roasted chestnuts and drink new wine. So yesterday, we picked these things up at the local green grocer (an Italian ex-american football player!?!) and invited the neighbors over to enjoy them with us. Cheers!
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