What’s the one ingredient I can’t do without and why?
Olive oil. Because it’s the essence—soul, spirit, nature, heart—of life.
Posted in Daily prompts, Umbria
Tagged essence, Italian photos, living in Italy, moments, olive oil, photos, postaday, terrazza
Which object? Only the shadow knows.
Posted in Umbria
Tagged Italian photos, Montone, piazza, postaday, postaweek, shadows, Umbria, weekly photo challenge
A little late on this post. A window on a cat’s desire…
Posted in Weekly photo challenges
Tagged cats, Italian countryside, Italian photos, photography, postaday, postaweek, weekly photo challenge, windows
‘Beginning’ can evoke emotional and powerful feelings…but sometimes a beginning is…well, not quite what we thought it would be?
Posted in Weekly photo challenges
Tagged awakening, beginning, marriage, moments, photography, postaday, Prague, wedding, weekly photo challenge
The greatest gift this birthday was the full moon, which brought my mother to me in its silvery light. I’m breathing again three years after her death; this is the first birthday I’ve wanted to celebrate since then. It’s just like her to know this and send the full moon to me.
Two years ago, I posted a piece about the gifts she had given to me on various birthdays (My birthday gift to you). This one tops the charts, for it’s the gift of getting my life back without the black hole that became my heart for too long. Life does go on with its pains and losses, joys and discoveries, and above all, with all the richness of color and living things that surround us if we take the time to look.
To breathe again is to take in the world and realize that this most precious thing we call life has been given to us…not to waste or rage against or try to obliterate. My birthday wish this year is the hope that the millions of people who don’t even come close to having what I have will be able to breathe one day and start to live.
Posted in Reflections
Tagged awakening, birthdays, color, gifts of life, moments, moms, moon, photography, postaday, Writing
Dawn. 6:00 AM flight.
From my kitchen window, sipping a cappuccino. Glad I didn’t have to be on that early bird! For the daily prompt.
Tagged Italian stories, living in Italy, moments, photography, postaday, travel, Writing
Statuesque views, more or less, of the Montone countryside.
Posted in Umbria, Weekly photo challenges
Tagged Italian stories, moments, Montone, photography, postaday, postaweek, sculpture, Umbria, weekly photo challenge, Writing
In Prague through a glass lightly for the daily prompt.
Posted in Daily prompts, Travel
Tagged Czech Republic, daily prompt, photography, postaday, Prague, reflections, travel
The moment I peer into the box, I’m in another time and place. I’m looking at old notions—old friends—that give me immediate comfort. They represent rituals that introduced girls to the world of sewing. Believe me, this seems like ancient history now, repleat with stereotypical roles, and I’m glad the world has changed in so many ways. But, for the moment I’m taken back to the way it was, and I indulge in the memories.
In sewing class, you had to have a whole array of notions: red pin cushion, a tin box of Sucrets for bobbins, a seam ripper, a thimble, pinking shears and scissors, a button box, snaps, a can of very fine oil for your sewing machine, and of course the obligatory set of needles.
Good lord, I still have them all…from 1967. The Sucrets box has my signature on a piece of adhesive tape! They don’t make tape like that anymore. I take all of these notions for granted because I still use them.
I smile and shake my head at the three “Happy Home Rust Proof Needle Book” ladies!
And you know what? They ARE rust proof! The needles, not the ladies.
The buttons are my most precious notions. Who would have thought that so many memories could spill out of a button box? I rummage around the box, pull out a few, and this is what I see:
M grandmother’s fur cape with the large blue, braided button.
The anchor button: my dad’s heavy knit sweater he always wore sailing.
The tortoise-shell bob button next to the anchor button: my brother’s P-coat.
The yellow button: my mom’s bathrobe that she wore into tatters. The light blue button of my sister’s formal dance dress. And so many others.
I think it’s good to hold onto some old notions, whether a belief, an understanding, an impulse or desire, or even…old sewing stuff.
Posted in Reflections
Tagged buttons, gifts of life, memoirs, moments, notions, photography, postaday, sewing, Umbria, Writing
So much for crocheting that afghan. Recently, I discovered what Piero had been up to for the last few weeks. It’s not a pretty sight.
When I carried him upstairs and asked him what he thought he was doing, he looked at me and ‘told me’ that he did it for love.
Huh?
And then I melted when I saw what he meant.
Posted in Cat Tales
Tagged cat tales, cats, Italian stories, living in Italy, moments, photography, postaday, Writing
Writing in Umbria 