The vines that never were

Jack-of-all-trades and forager that I am, I was roaming the hills looking for wild asparagus to gather, exquisite with pasta, with just a few anchovies and tomato, wandering the odd copse, ditch and cultivated field.

With my trained eye, from years of contadinitudine, I could pick out from hundreds of yards away in the March sun, all sorts of different crops: tic beans, wheat, barley, the vineyards and the olive groves, wild fields or those being prepared for corn or sunflowers.

Coming out from behind a mound, clutching my bunch of wild asparagus victoriously, I saw this particular score of acres, already ploughed and cleared of boulders, but eroded by the torrential rain and the slope. A vineyard, I realised, only a vineyard would be right on here. The ditches carved in the ground by the near monsoon-like rains where almost like the tears in a Burri canvas. Whilst all around nature was sprouting and budding.

I couldn’t help thinking about the pain that farmer must have felt: this year he wouldn’t be able to plant his vineyard. I bet he never lost hope right to the last minute. A whole year in the vineyards is one really long year. 

Making my way down to the valley, towards the sea,  I thought, maybe he’s stubborn. Maybe he’ll manage to prepare that perfumed bed in time. In that instant I could see beyond the clear sky, there was a certain restlessness brewing and, from the north  I could hear a clear rumble of thunder.

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