Week 43 - a tumultuous time for Ellie

Edited BY

G P Kennedy

Ellie - Milan, Italy

What a week this past one was! Life is always a roller coaster ride, as the end of 2020 brought me to recognize.

But being in the downward section of a scary round is not fun at that very moment. So, the thrill of this week is the upcoming Carnival. Of course, the real, in-person celebration is canceled in most places this year, but not the accompanying traditions, like the special treats that come with the season.

Like these chiacchere, simple fried dough sweets covered with powdered sugar. And at that, Milan is special because two Catholic calendars are valid here that give us the chance of two carnival celebrations.

According to the Roman rite - the calendar valid most everywhere else - this year it's on February 16. But in Milan, where St. Ambrose was so politically powerful that the city was allowed to keep its Ambrosian calendar, it is on February 20.

In other times, this double chance to a celebration is seen as a special privilege for the Milanes to enjoy - and gloat about. But this year it's just a double occasion of feeling robbed of it.

And as the original meaning of the Carnival suggests, it's also the first faint announcement of the upcoming spring.

We are really grateful for it. The past month has been unusually cold and snowy for the area.

I am sure that many of my plants are not going to survive the multiple below-freezing nights.

But I am grateful for the sunny days that we have lately and keeping my fingers crossed for the succulents that look rather dreary right now.

This is the mural (or should I say fresco) on the exterior wall of our town's nursery.

It belies its agricultural past and is still called a consortium.

That is a cooperative where peasants pool resources together to order supplies in bulk as well as sell plants and produce they have grown.

But now the consortium is just a store that sells decorative greenery, pet food, and yes, seeds for yard veggies like cucumbers and tomatoes.

It is slated to reopen soon for the spring season and the owners are looking forward to making up for the losses last year when they had to close in their most productive (commercially) months. 

Speaking of which, the last stop for the day is our local coffee roasters.

It is mostly a front store that sells the coffee roasted in a workshop and sports this antique lamp.

The owner told me that it was part of the space when she took over some thirty years ago, but the designer wanted to do away with it after the remodeling.

She kept it. And she has no idea what space actually was before. It had been vacant for a few years when she came from another region of Italy.

She plans to insist on her daughter to keep it when she takes over the business, even though she wants to convert it into a modern minimalist place.

And I thought that things change so quickly, so inexorably, and perhaps so radically that what we think is a long tradition with no likelihood of change is prone to a drastic overhaul at a short notice.

I thought I'd take this as the crumb of wisdom for the week.