Rocco's Riviera Rambling: Christmas Day

Its Christmas morning and I wake to the clanging of church bells from the Duomo and Santa Croce echoing in harmony throughout Florence. It's our first Christmas in Italy and for that matter our first Christmas outside of Toronto. We arrived in Florence on Wednesday with much anticipation to spend a few days with my sister Maria and her family and Simona and Madeleine were so excited to spend time with their cousin Giovanni. Florence was paralyzed by a blanket of snow the previous week and with any measure of luck we might enjoy a white Christmas. It was not to be as we were greeted by a blanket of cloud; warm, rainy weather that gave the city an eerie dark feel.

The words don't come as easily today and I struggle to capture my mood. Mixed feelings mostly. On the one hand, Christmas is always such a fun time of year and this year is no exception. So much to be grateful for given this wonderful adventure we are on. Grateful to be able to share Christmas with Maria and her family in Italy. She was her paranoid self and generously went out of her way to make sure we felt welcomed and at home.

Her stuffed squid and spaghetti last night was delicious. Watching Simona and Madeleine dote on little Giovanni with him squealing in delight was priceless given how little they see of one another. Midnight mass in Brunelleschi's Duomo, however anti-climatic it was with less than a few hundred worshippers was memorable nonetheless.

Certainly, Nancy and I don't miss the stresses and hustle and bustle that this time of year so often brings. The running around and buying last minute presents, the worry of having to host Christmas dinner are things we are happy to not have to deal with this year. Santa seemed to be particularly generous and even though Nancy and I agreed that we'd dispense with gifts for one another given the year we are having, gifts managed to find their way beneath the tree.

Yet in many ways, as Simona and Maddy so innocently and genuinely observed, "it doesn't feel like Christmas". No snow and no tree twinkling in our living room. No Rudolph or Frosty or Silent Night and no halls decked with holly. No watching the girls rushing madly downstairs on Christmas morning to discover what Santa left the night before. No stockings hung by the fireplace.

At this time of year our moms always make strufoli, deep fried dough balls covered in honey that the peasants of southern Italy made during Christmas with leftover dough. As much as I dislike those desserts (if you can call them desserts) and urge our moms to stop wasting their energy making them, right now a few strufoli might not be such a bad idea.

Perhaps I'm just waxing nostalgic but I'm thinkin Christmas back home in Canada ain't so bad after all.

Merry Christmas, Buon Natale, Joyeux Noel

Below are various pictures taken during our week in Florence over Christmas.

Sal