La oca is getting grassa

There has been a frost of early morning the last few days. Some of the cold lingered yesterday on north-facing roofs, in the shadows on the soccer pitch, along irrigation ditches out in the fields. The street cleaners whirring by sweep up the most recent brown leaves, remnants from an extended fall. Each week the signs of Christmas’s approach grow in number and illumination. As in the United States, whispers of Natale were heard in these parts as early as late October – in the supermarkets, I frequently saw panettone, the traditional Milanese sweetbread, alongside Halloween decorations.










Now, every street has at least one house or apartment strung with lights (unfortunately I haven’t seen yet any of the palms trees so decorated). In the absence of yards, many hang the most popular decoration of the season from their windows or balconies: Babbo Natale climbing a rope ladder. Cute and everywhere. Though, with his feet dangling off the rungs, St. Nick looks less magical than out of shape, a kid struggling in gym class.


The towns and cities I have seen recently are tastefully, festively, even whimsically bedecked for Yule. In Milan, il Castello Sforzesco is draped with electric blue icicles. The comune of Parma have put up a large, well-appointed tree in Piazza Garibaldi; simple strands of white lights add elegance to a small side street.

Here in Codogno, as in many Italian communities, most of the streets in the center are spanned by a variety of bright stars and geometric constellations. One street even has wrapped presents sprouting from the walls above it.


I have seen no menorahs, dreidels, or potato latkes, much the pity. Hanukkah is not much celebrated in these parts.

We turn this week in our elliptical orbit - in the Northern Hemisphere a turn from darkness back towards light: the Winter Solstice. I hope that you and joy find each other, wherever you are and whomever you’re with. I hope that you can celebrate a festival of lights, with ample reasons for thanksgiving and continued hope for peace. And remember the words of Zuzu Bailey, “Every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings.”

The Shortest Day
by Susan Cooper

And so the Shortest Day came and the year died
And everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white world
Came people singing, dancing,
To drive the dark away.
They lighted candles in the winter trees;
They hung their homes with evergreen;
They burned beseeching fires all night long
To keep the year alive.
And when the new year's sunshine blazed awake
They shouted, revelling.
Through all the frosty ages you can hear them
Echoing behind us - listen!
All the long echoes, sing the same delight,
This Shortest Day,
As promise wakens in the sleeping land:
They carol, feast, give thanks,
And dearly love their friends,
And hope for peace.
And now so do we, here, now,
This year and every year.

Spooky in Italian would be...

For Halloween this year, I’m masquerading as a small-town Italian. I have many of the characteristics down pat (no pun intended): the slow bicycle rides; the affinity for gelato, cafe, and Park Club; the friend who drives a school bus; the other friend who runs a sports store with his wife; the friend who goes bird hunting just after the sun has risen; scarf wearing; a local watering hole where... well, everybody knows my name.

The Penguin Cafe has become our Cheers only it has more style and panache, decked out as it is in simple, Modern furniture and art; it serves much more wine than beer, and tasty aperitvo instead of peanuts and pretzels; you cannot watch the Red Sox or Patriots on the TV; and... right, it’s in Italy. And I don’t think anybody works for Poste Italiane, which is fine because the last thing those people need is anything else slowing down their infamously leisurely post service.

Mark met the owners, Mario and Paula, through an American who stayed here briefly over the past two summers. Now, Mark and I are greeted warmly when we arrive. We often end up staying past closing time, chatting away with a revolving series of characters. Personaggi. Just like in Cheers, the Penguin attracts many types: the longer haired charming suitcoat; the barkeep who laughs a lot and keeps everybody guessing; the wild-eyed sage on the corner stool. At a recent festa del vino, we even had the opportunity to rub elbows with the director of a vineyard. (Maybe that would be like sharing a pint with Jim Koch?)

All of us are drawn by the place and especially the penguini, as the staff are known. And the wine is excellent. Of course. [In truth, as inquiring minds might want to know, I have consumed nothing bad here in Italy. Even the strips of pig back, while far from kosher, were tasty.] As with the baseball team, it's nice to be included. To feel part of something larger than myself. Even if it is a bar... especially if it's a bar.

Happy Halloween to you and yours, wherever you may be. I’m sure that among the lot of you there are some mighty costumes. Maybe even a Sam Malone? A Papajima? Daniel LaRussa remains tough to beat, on and off the mat, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't give it a go.


Oh, and if you’re in Boston seeing the tourist sights, you can skip the Cheers bar. ‘Tis a silly place.

First ascents

Like pioneers on the big walls of Yosemite putting up first ascents in furious rapidity, only without the chalk dust, bloody knuckles, and rapidity, I have been doing many things for the first time recently. First time to the post office. First time getting chased by a dog in Italy. First time out to take photographs of the town cemetery. First time getting kicked out of a library in Italy. First time buying a pink newspaper. First time encountering the bureaucratic “Yes, tomorrow you can come back and we’ll fix this.”

For example, my first festa della birra, a beer festival. As you're not a pogo stick and I'm not a kangaroo, let’s not jump ahead. [On a side note: the accessories which in the US are called fanny packs are more or less ubiquitous here. It is my current theory that these must be given to Italians as they come of age as elsewhere are given spirit names, cars, or bank accounts in Zurich. In Italy, they are logically referred to by many as "marsupials."] These are not beer festivals like you might expect to find in Portland or Denver or even Lowell, the Mill City. At tonight's party, you could only get one kind of beer, Heineken, but then beer was not the primary attraction.

As basically everyone is on vacation for the month of August (please hold any and all comparative labor law disputes for a later time), towns up and down the country hold festas. While similar for in their exuberance and communality to festas common to Little Italies I have seen in Boston and New York, many of the August festas here are not religiously based. Some are held for a particular crop or local historical event - the strawberry festival (where's Pete Seeger when we need him?), the festival of the sea, the festival of the escape of the ox, and, if all else fails and you're just a small town looking to have a party, la festa della birra. If you are a small town without such a festa, or merely a resident of one, here is a recipe that has proven successful:

- (one) big loud band
- (at least 3 gross) people dancing, most likely a mix of retirees, newlyweds, 7 year old girls in pigtails, parents out to embarrass their teenage children, and, if you’re lucky and/or skilled at marketing, two or three odd Americans [emphasis here is on “odd”]
- (200 bushels) good and cheap food
- (a lot) beer
- (another lot) wine, mix of white and red
- (one or more) large tent(s), preferably white
- Optional: dueling trumpets, insufficient benches, hilarious cook who also drives a school bus and plays baseball, hedge maze.

Allow to simmer under the summer night sky for 5 to 7 hours. Serves many. Here are photos of last night's finished product.

Tomorrow I’m headed south to Siena for the Palio, a centuries-old horse race resplendent with medieval pageantry. I am sure there will be stories to tell...