By Giove

There is a place, deep in the Umbrian countryside, at the top of a mountain. 

There is a bee farm and olive groves.

There is an artist, Marco, who is a classical guitarist and is also the bee farmer. 

There is a kind, gentle woman, Ornella, who writes poems about her friends. There is a sprightly woman, who cares for animals, known as Tinkerbell.  There are cats called Matisse and Dali. There is a ballet dancing man. This man is developing a philosophical system to use the waves of the financial markets to distribute money more freely and creatively in the world. 

There is a gallery, run by the most amazing people, where I performed amid an exhibition of dramatic photographic seascapes. The sound of the piano drifting through the gallery and out to the tiny street outside, made me very, very happy. 

After the performance, I was taken for my supper, to a pizzeria with this wonderful group of people. At this pizzeria, no ordering of food occurs. Instead, round after round of anti-pasta and pizzas were delivered to the table, only stopping eventually after a unanimous declaration of ‘Basta Così” (nothing more!).

Until very recently, there was a festival every year in the woods near Giove. People searching to confront their mortality and find some peace, came to be hung by hooks in their flesh and to swing from the trees. This process of mortification of the flesh, stems from religious zealots of the twelfth century. Ornella and Marco hosted some of the flagelants, tending their wounds with propolis from the bees and wishing them well on their way back to the cities. 

I have found this piece of writing quite tricky, and I don't really want to post it - I think what I really want to say, is that for someone who has lived in a world influenced by stories and fairytales, I have never been somewhere that so much feels as if I fell into a very magical, storybook world. The name of the village is Giove. In English this means Jupiter. I think that kind of sums it up for me.