on saturday morning, the kids rode their bikes and we headed for a park that's pretty close, with a wide dirt path around the whole thing, and cassie said the kids liked to just ride in circles, so off we went. well, as it turned out, the park was closed for some reason, but they were so excited to be on their bikes so i asked them for ideas of where we could ride... none of us quite felt like going back to the apartment. so, although they're good about speaking in english with me, i could hear sophie telling nico she should they should go to the market, because i was a visitor and i'd probably like to see the market. so we rode/walked to the market, (which i'd already seen with cassie the previous day), and right across from the market there's this huge square that has absolutely nothing on it... i don't know what it's normally used for, but it seemed like the perfect place for them to ride around for a bit, which they did.
at one point sophie rode over to where i was sitting and told me she was hot and tired (and, at that time, it was maybe 11:15am) and i said, (thinking i was being the cool cousin), 'how about we stop for gelato on the way home?' ... well, this got quite the reaction on her little 8-year old face... 'gelato? in the MORNING?' to which i said.... oh... do italians not have gelato at (checking my watch) ... 11:15 in the morning? and she said, well, do americans have ice cream in the morning? and i just thought, well, i guess not typically, but there aren't really any rules on the matter... so then i said, well, do you think we could just be wierd and get some anyway? or is that too american of us? and she said, well, there's probably no place that's open... unless we go to the center of the city, where they open for tourists (giving me a long glance as she said this).... but that's a ways away, so maybe not. i found this all very funny and said, well ok, maybe we could stop at a bar (which is italian for, like, a little deli/convenient store type place) and get something cold to drink? to which she said, ok.
we didn't find gelato on the way home but we did get some iced tea. but had we found the gelato, i had decided that we were breaking from the mold and getting some.
later in the afternoon, cassie and i drove the kids to their nonna's house out in the tuscan countryside, where we all had a wonderful little lunch on their back patio with this gorgeous view of the countryside... i wish you could have seen the view i got when we arrived, but since you can't, i'll describe it (and i'm not describing the scenery)... what i saw was maria luisa (their grandma) coming towards us, lots of wrinkles, big smile, apron on, and a fist full of basil, hugging and kissing us all. that, with what colored the space behind her, made for quite the welcome.
the kids stayed with their nonna most of the weekend, and cassie and i had a really relaxing day and a half in the little tuscan apartment... i slept a lot, which may sound like blasphemy given where i was, but it was so peaceful and quiet and frankly i'm still carrying a bit of jet lag, so i felt it was best. the highlight was maybe Sunday morning, cassie and I walked up a very long hill to a little church at the top of the hill for mass, and thanks be to God, some lady asked us if we wanted a ride about halfway up, and we just would have never would have made it in any kind of decent time had she not taken us into the car.
i was really delighted that it was Pentecost... i feel like that's a fitting Sunday to begin my time here, because so much of my time here (and my time since coming back from MH) has really been an invitation to get to know the Holy Spirit, to listen attentively, and to live in that Presence, knowing I have an Advocate... especially with the language barriers here... He just infuses everything, and asks for my belief in that... it's a wonderful consolation, really.
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