Greetings, Everyone…..

Lloyd and I recently returned from having spent 7 weeks in my beloved ancestral homeland of Tuscany, and not only in Tuscany this time.

We took a week with dear friends to explore an area I had not visited since 2004: the Amalfi Coast. We stayed in a lovely apartment on the sea in the quiet town of Praiano (in other words, there were no day trippers because no ferries stop there).

Of course, we took day trips to Capri and Positano, but the rest of the time, we enjoyed village life and took the ferry to smaller ports, such as Maiori and Minori, to hike the ancient Path of the Lemons, an arduous but stunningly beautiful hike up up up. A midway stop gave us lemon granita, a gift from the gods.

I cannot imagine making a trip to this area in the summertime. The locals remarked how quiet it was when we were there in October, but we found it still very busy and congested to get around. Besides taxis and ferries, we also took the bus, which is standing room only, amid young people with luggage and backpacks, ladies with their groceries, children squirming on laps, tourists wild-eyed from the jostling into one another around curves and hoping they get off at the right stop. It was a hilarious adventure – and a bargain!

(Take the open car taxi if you go to Capri. It’s the best part of the day.)

From Naples, we took a train to Florence, where my wonderful group of guests arrived the next day for a weeklong trip to Florence and other Tuscan destinations.

We enjoyed beautiful weather, witnessed and tasted the result of the olive harvest, time traveled during the Puccini private concert (the music was played on the piano he used to compose it). 

We sat in awe viewing the drawings by Michelangelo in the scholar’s room at the Casa Buonarroti. On this trip, we visited Lucca and Pienza, which afforded us more than a full hour of driving time where you could not keep your eyes off the landscape. Even in late Fall, the hills are green and lush.

We made pasta and ragu alla Bolognese. We drank exquisite red wine. We laughed a lot.

We did not watch or listen to the news. We did not spend much time on cell phones.

We had long conversations at the dinner table, telling stories and savoring such a rare experience. Everyone went home feeling happy, full, relaxed. Everyone went home except us. 

We decided to add on a few more weeks…..and here’s what happened.

I returned to the place where I began the journey of writing my book, The Stonecutter’s Aria, in Settignano. We rented a lovely house owned by friends up in these hills and for three weeks, we moved with the rhythm of Italy.

We rested. We read. We ate almost every single meal outside on the terrace that overlooks Florence. I made gnocchi (twice) on the large marble table that every Italian kitchen has. We walked to the village to take the bus into Florence, the same Number 10 bus, (only 25 years later, a much larger vehicle).  It made me happy to take the ride down the Florentine hills exactly as I remembered. We sat by a cozy fire in our favorite restaurant in the town of Settignano, Sosta del Rossellino, enjoying bowls of pasta layered with Castelmagno cheese or beef tagliata, fork tender. The owner, Damiano opened the restaurant about the same time that I had been there and the memory of my celebrating my birthday all those years ago, gave me that wonderful sense of belonging to a place and being remembered.

We visited the cemetery, so I could pay my respects to Luciana, the woman who opened the gate to me when I lived in her house and she showed me to the room I would live in for six weeks, with the writing desk, where my journey of writing began.

The very personal nature of this trip, and the daily immersion of my senses as I encountered life here has deepened my belief and need for less engagement with what the world has on display that distracts and over stimulates, that entertains and dulls the senses. As we close out this tumultuous year of 2025, and open the door soon to 2026, I invite you to intentionally withdraw from all the noise, read books that uplift the spirit, spend time in nature, spend time in the kitchen creating, or whatever it is that allows you to be present and aware – and grateful for the beauty and abundance available to us.

Please enjoy looking around at this new web site.  I decided to create one to serve as a beautiful container of all that I wish to share with beauty seekers like yourself! I will continually add to it, enhance it, share more content.  Please let me know what you think of it.

I wish you a Happy, Healthy, Prosperous, Beautiful 2026!