Tuscany belongs to everyone who’s ever dreamt about it, yearned for it or lived side by side with it. Regardless of where you are, the soul and essence of Tuscany is so present, that you don’t have to live there to know it. Live it where you are.
It’s almost a myth, the life that is being lived between farmhouses, olive trees and family recipes. It’s a life many people dream about, but it is not always within physical reach. What is this elevated dream and where does it stem from?
I believe a lot of it comes from the yearning a lot of people have, to live a more meaningful life in tact with nature and with them self. A life where you can get up with the birds in the morning and go to bed in the evening, knowing that your day has been full – that you are full. In between the birds in the morning and the sunset in the evening is the frame where you can pursue what makes you; You. Perhaps it is a love for art, the Italian language or the Italian man. (Whatever floats your Gondola). Perhaps you feel a calling for a life that can help quiet your mind and allow yourself to focus upon what is truly important in your life.
It is a place where time seems vaster. The landscape illustrates and underlines this with its sloping, soft hills and long lines stretched far into the horizon, where the mountaintops make a patchwork in blue. Time seems plentiful and packed with quality and beauty. It is a place where passion is given weight, where creativity is nurtured and, let me use a very poignant word from Alice in Wonderland; a place where you can begin the search for your muchness.
Most of us know that Tuscany is far more than poppy fields, gelato and sunshine. When the visitors go home, the land remains and turns into winter. Crops have been harvested, wine grapes have been collected and the hills are painted brown. Now, here comes the challenge… With winter comes reality and the cold months between November and March are there for you to go soul searching in the nooks and crannies of the house you live in. Building a fire in the morning feels like building character in yourself. There’s only you and the farmers down the road, and it’s your own responsibility to make meaning of your time, and to create the life that you yearned for – the life that is so much easier in the long days of the summer.
But in the winter, something happens. There arises a quiet joy and a melancholic harmony that brings you what you need to get through the bone chilling winters in a very old, dark and drafty house. I believe this feeling is the very soul of the land; persistence.
The satisfying feeling of making it through by building the fires, cooking on the fire, fixing your socks in front of the fire, reading in front of the fire, swearing and praying in front of the fire; it’s all there in the winter. Just like the leafless branches on the trees outside the window – uncovered, bare and honest.
The essence of Tuscany is so rich and complex, but a big part of it I believe is the frame it provides for finding oneself, and filling oneself to the brim of all that is good in life.
Tuscany will always be Tuscany – colored by the people who live here, the people who visit, the food that is being made and the overall love for the land, that goes deep into the soil, far beneath the vines. The rich history, the breathtaking art and the views that can leave you gasping for air, are all in the package that forms Tuscany. And it is all yours.
If you can’t make it here anytime soon, I suggest you start preparing. Start creating the frame you need to find your muchness where you are right now and Tuscany will always be here to nurture you and test you when you arrive.
Update: Turid is now living in Norway. Be sure to visit Turid’s website, Toscana Hus offering a vast array of exquisite holiday homes in Italy. Based in Tuscany and offering a charming selection of holiday houses concentrated in the Siena and Florence areas of Tuscany.
