I hadn’t set the alarm because I had been waking up before it, but this morning when a new fly kept landing on me, I asked Maurice to look at the clock.  It was almost eight.  Allora!  In between gathering our supplies and getting dressed we each had about a quarter cup of cereal and a fried egg.  Dewey and Jenelle graciously waited for us and we headed to our town of the day San Quirico d’Orcia.  It was quiet and we sat on the porch of the only place open, the Bar Centrale in the piazza just inside one of the town’s big brick gateways, to supplement our brekky and wait for the others. 

The Bar Centrale on the left

Flags were flying, the sun was shining and the town livened up quickly.  The painters spread out amid the gathering throngs.  Maurice quickly found his spot near a well in the small thirteenth-century courtyard of the Ospedale della Scala.  I spent the day exploring, enjoying the town and returning to check on Maurice and bring him snacks. 

The well Maurice painted; Dewey under an arbor; Vee spotted via long lens from the third floor palace window

At the lovely Romanesque church at the end of the flag-bedecked street, the Collegiata dei Santi Quirico e Giulitta, a service was in progress; I knew this by the gathering of men, small children and several smartly-dressed young women outside the west door.  (I don’t know why they stand outside instead of going in but they do.) 

When the service ended, white-robed boys and girls walked out holding candles.  First communion?  They walked around the corner, followed by the priest holding the ciborium aloft under a canopy borne by four men.

A band that had assembled in the street began to play, leading the procession of children and priest, followed by a long line of congregants and families.  They marched and wound their way through all the streets of town.  Ken, another painter’s spouse, and I kept guessing where they would appear next and zipping ahead to meet them for more photos.  When they started toward Maurice’s end of town I dashed to his courtyard and alerted him to the impending procession so he could enjoy it too.  The whole thing ended in the piazza where we had started the morning, with the band assembling practically on top of Dewey and his painting supplies as he sat under a jasmine-lined archway, painting the medieval brick gateway.

Dewey and the band

The day was warm but the churches and the palace with the exhibit of Alberto Flammia’s dramatically dreamy Tuscany photos were cool and inviting.  Two long hallways in the palace were painted with landscape murals; the birds flying across the high ceiling reminded me of last year’s Carrieres de Lumiere.  At the end of the hall the town council meets under a ceiling mural of a racing chariot.

Below:  painters’ spouses and men-about-town Dick (in doorway) and Ken (on bench with some locals)

At day’s end we gathered with some of the group at the Bar Centrale to chill and chat and try the bar’s homemade lemonade.  We did not take a shortcut home.  After salad and ravioli, the last of our supplies (and breakfast will be even sparser tomorrow), we spent another pleasant evening sitting outside, Maurice in the “internet cafe” by the olive tree where the signal is strong, with a view of the Tuscan landscape in one direction and Montalcino’s mountain in the other.  I sat outside our door on Maurice’s folding chair that we take with us during the day and move in and out of our apartment in the evening.  Though it’s squeaky, I love the chair and wish we could take it home.  Wilma came to visit, meowing and generally making a pest of herself.  At one point Maurice found Wilma on our kitchen stove.  That cat’s going to end up with toasted feet.  When we shooed her out for good and closed the door, she had tomato sauce on her nose.