We were not going to a town to paint so I planned to sleep late.  Ha.  At 6:25 music started playing somewhere.  I recognized St. Andrews Strings.  It must be my music, but why was it playing?  I wanted to go back to sleep.  I listened to every note, exhaling thankfully at the end, then the piece started again.  Stop!  “Why is that music on?” I mumbled to Maurice.  He got up to check it out.  The music was in the main room, still playing.  And playing.  “I can’t figure it out,” called Maurice.  How hard could this be?  Just turn it off.  Soon he brought in the ipad, scrolling through the playlist, to see if I could figure it out.  Uh huh.  “It’s not the ipad playing,” I told him.  It was my phone, still drawing the bows over the strings in the other room.  I hadn’t actually turned off the alarm the morning before.

Janice had said she would be out in her lovely yard to help the painters from 9:00 today but we decided to go over after lunch since we were staying for the evening pitch-in, as Janice says.  (She means a potluck.  “What does she call it?” asks Penny.  “A throw-down?”)  I was tired and we moved slowly.  It was a day to work on painting, or write and think and pray.  We just got news from Chris that he can expect “hotfill” orders (whatever they are, but probably bad) to El Salvador.  El Salvador!  Isn’t that the country where those awful gangs are? I asked Maurice.  He looked it up.  The gangs are mostly fighting each other but it’s the country with the highest murder rate in the world, though the embassy compound looks secure.  We were all expecting Madrid or Stuttgart.  Well, I emailed Chris, at least it’s close to Florida, plus the baby can grow up bilingual.

The expected rain didn’t come.  Wilma appeared and invited herself in but Maurice banged on some pots and gently tossed pebbles at her and she stayed outside.  Without the usual ingredients or measuring cup and only a hint of a recipe, I whipped up some sort-of pie crusts for my sort-of pies (strawberry-apricot and peach) for the evening pitch-in.  After much improvising, they turned out to be tantalizing rectangular tarts.

We drove to Janice and Jerry’s and found everyone set up with their paints in shady spots in the Canonica gardens.  Jerry pointed out the local hike and I set off, enjoying the gorgeous scenery.

At a T-intersection I followed a sign toward the village of Vergelle, and soon found another sign hidden in the ginestra that said “15%.”  It meant down.

The road curved into a line of Italian trees then descended steeply.  I was glad I had my poles, even as I wondered how far I should go.  But I went all the way down to Vergelle, with a dead-end symbol under the town’s name sign, so I knew the only way out was back up the hill.  The village contained two or three attractive agriturismos, a closed restaurant, a clump of abandoned buildings and the local equally-abandoned-looking pieve on a hill.  A few dogs were lying in the road but there was not a soul in sight.  I didn’t stay long.  The climb back up was the Camino revisited.  Every patch of shade was welcome.  Then it was through the lovely scenery again to La Canonica.

I putzed around and chatted, which Maurice did too, even though he was supposed to be painting.  His painting of the steps from Pienza yesterday was looking nice. 

Connie and her daughter-in-law Paige, though their apartment was small, definitely had the place with the best outdoor spot, a level patio under a canopy with table and chairs, some shady lawn beyond and an exceptionally beautiful view over the Tuscan countryside.

Ken’s laundry enjoyed the same view.

Kay brings her flute on these art trips and hoped we might play something together.  I remembered I had Schubert’s Heilig Ist der Herr on the ipad which might be something she was familiar with.  She wasn’t, and since she couldn’t see the music over my shoulder at the adequate piano in the nice common room, I ended up calling out the notes which Kay wrote on a piece of paper as letters, with some sort of mark to remind her which ones were held longer.  We practiced and it worked out OK.  We put on our one-selection concert after dinner.

About 6:30 people set up their paintings for an exhibition in the common room—such creativity and beauty!

Several of the many watercolors

At seven everyone brought out their potuck and the table under the canopy in the front yard overflowed with the bounty of a Thanksgiving meal.  There were salads, deviled eggs, pasta by Paige, Hungarian risotto by Kay, caprese, spaghetti with homemade sauce and grilled vegetables by Penny, and grilled rabbit and “weenies” by Jerry. 

The fruit pies with their solid crusts, the best I could do with Italian flour and olive oil, were the only dessert, and finally I brought them out (no pictures!).  Penny hacked them into pieces, I spooned on the vanilla yogurt and we passed them out.  Everyone raved and nothing was left.  They even liked the crust.