Gee Wiz Folks!: 2012

A TRUTH TALE

VALROSSARA

S.M.Burnside,Esq.
26 Giugno 2012

Thyme, rosemary and fennel had been put in the drying hut--an ancient stone-walled, terracotta-roofed room out back. Juniper and lavender and heather had to be gathered for cleaning and drying as well. Sage, garlic and onion also had to be gathered and taken inside the house for cleaning. But the day was too splendid with sunshine lazily lapping over fields, animals, houses and people, most pleasantly, that such work could wait another day. Or two.

Cool pine scented the last breezes of summer, and a trace fragrance of honeysuckle could be detected blending in. A neighbor had adopted one perfumed vine while in California in the U.S. America, and it had spread throughout her backyard and well into other neighbor's lands--pouring over and crawling through old stone walls and weathered wooden fences. In some places it wove its way up old clothes line poles, entwining a bit onto the lines themselves.

The neighbors didn't much mind. On warm evenings when the vine was in full bloom and perspiring its scent, most everyone in the Borgo took leisurely neighborhood walks with leisurely neighborly visitations along the way.

Most of the people of Valrossara had been born and raised here and started their own families, as had been done since the 14th century when a few French merchants and a German merchant stopped to rest a few nights and had briefly explored the surrounding lands. And the lands which they had explored were found to be good. VERY good.

Wild pink roses and bright sunflowers grew among wild herbs: lavenders, rosemary's, oregano's, wild fennel, and grape vines grew so heavy with red fruit they stretched out and bowed to earth growing on along like a ground cover. Honey bees, a lake with plenty water fowl and fish, deer, wild boar, truffles, hedgehog, wild pheasant and rich dark loamy soil you could squeeze in your hand and it would stay bound together. This was soil that would grow anything. And it did. This was soil upon which these sojourning merchants eventually brought their respective families to live and thrive. And they did.

The first families, as was common, helped one another out with hunting for wild game and large stones, and cutting trees into housing material. They built one another's homes and cleared fields for each other, helping to plant herb and vegetable gardens. Fruit trees were brought from far and wide: orange, lime, lemon, apple, cherry, avocado. Eventually, walnut and chestnut trees were added.

As merchants the men were familiar with where to go for basic supplies such as looms for weaving, threshers for threshing wheat for breads.

Blue Cypress were planted as windbreakers surrounding gardens and along fields. Tools that could not be had by trade were created in the Borgo. Reeds from the lake made fine baskets and mats. Straw made good hats for warm weather work. Goats, sheep, chickens, pigs, cows, a bull, horses, mules, dogs and cats were brought to Valrossara and homes were made for each. Of course, the dogs and cats slept outside at night. Well, mostly the dogs.

And so, years followed years, and the Borgo grew and grew until there were about three-hundred French-German-Italian-mixed residents dwelling serenely in Valrossara. All in all, life was mostly good. And, of course, life was sometimes bad, what with how people, some people, enjoyed stories of gossip and intrigue.

One such story had it that a Tuscan merchant named Armandi, came from Africa with two African Grey parrots whom he taught to wink, and speak fluent Italian and converse together. The parrots, named "Kukalu" which is Lingala for "parrot", and "Nan" which is Hindi for "bread", became so well-versed in their new language that they could create snippets of story about various subjects including any citizen who resided in Valrossara, always ending their stories with a wink.

Now this created extreme discomfort for the Tuscan Armandi, when some neighbor would innocently wander by below the parrot's open window (the parrots could not be seen, only heard which was enough!) and overhear some juicy and scandalous piece of information which the wandering person would take as Truth. Forgetting, of course, that they were hearing the juicy and scandalous information straight from the beaks of two winking, conniving and stealthy parrots! Tales such as:

"Signor Albenti fathered three children with that young harlot of a widow, Signora Guaraldo, AND Signore Albenti fathered two more with the governor's wife, Simonetta! It's TRUE, you know. I heard it first hand, but I cannot reveal my sources who would then be exposed to civil action and possibly violence!"

And then, there was the TRUTH of how:

"Father Vespucciola steals food from parishioner's gardens, AND chips away gold from the Basilica's alter trim and from some of the art works! Can you believe your ears? But, it's TRUTH and I heard it--may the saints and Mother Mary forgive these ears for hearing such scandal!!"

These such tales and many other similar TRUTHS were broadcast like Lima beans into furrowed soil. Well you may sigh and nod your head with disgust. Well you may! Especially since, eventually Signore Armandi was personally blamed for slanderous tales spreading far and wide.

And when the judge discovered that it was Signore Armandi's PARROTS who were spreading such slander, he demanded that Armandi hand Kukalu and Nan over, then sentenced the poor birds to death--and secretly roasted them for dinner the next evening, with herbs and garlic and drizzled them with a fine raspberry sauce, along with having a lake oyster soup and field-harvested asparagus which he, along with Father Vespucciola who brought a nice Chianti, thoroughly enjoyed.

Another such story occurred during one seemingly long summer a few hundred years past Valrossara's beginnings.

A German merchant, Herr Frolich, who had moved his family to this fair and growing Borgo, packed his family up and moved off to Spain for a four-month rest which the merchant most assuredly needed, as did his family. Before they all packed their carriage and left, Herr Frolich hired a neighbor's thirteen year old son, Antonio, to care for their home and keep it safe. Herr Frolich paid Antonio in advance plenty enough to keep the growing boy supplied with all what the lad needed for a four-month stay.

But, as boys of thirteen years back then often did, this boy Antonio did much mischief while caring for Herr Frolich's home. And what sort of mischief, pray tell, one may ask? Incline thine ear hither, and LISTEN:

"My teeth they hurt me,
   Don'tchu touch me,

I said my teeth sure hurt me,
Don't you touch me,

Oh ma'ma, mia!
I hurt so bad--
I'm gonna lose
My bitty teethes--
And then I'll cry, 'They're all I ever had!'

Si, ma'ma--
My teeth sure hurt me--
So what can this oldest son do? clkk-clkk   clkk-clkk
        clkk-clkk      clkk-clkk!"

Yes, Antonio would stand by an open window that faced the street and sing his heart out with song he had written and needed an audience for. However, this being the year 1786, such behavior was looked down upon, as the 'norm' was that Antonio ought to have been standing on the street beneath a young, pure, virginal, lovely's own window, serenading her instead of serenading himself and the neighbors, and the dirt streets below.

And whenever a person came close below Antonio's window to complain, hoping he would listen to reason and shut up, the young and off-key balladeer would lift up a hidden bucket of water and splash it down upon the poor sensitive-eared victim, followed by a string of curses and threats, followed by yet another song which would be sung even more boisterous than the last song.

Little did Herr Frolich know that young Antonio would be the main subject of another fine Borgo story being spread far, wide, and far again, adding to the Borgo's vast and on-growing folio of gossip and intrigue.

Now of course, should you ever travel to Valrossara for retreat, you will hear these stories and others, no doubt, from this so-and-so friendly neighbor or that so-and-so friendly neighbor.

However, the most famous story you will perhaps hear happened back in 1478 beginning in Eze, France and ending in 1503 in Borgo di Valrossara itself. And, of course, it IS a true story as truth is--well--Truth!

Thus, it goes:

It was just half-past 1478 in the little Mediterranean coastal hill town of Eze, France.

There had been a freak tornado in the area of Eze back then, setting down its tentacle just outside of the village, but then whip-tailing wildly through Eze and taking rooftops, barns, and shops with it. Towers actually exploded when the tornado whhoooshhd through close enough, and carriages were carried away up into the cone.

Village gardens had been thrashed and stripped of their harvest as though the cyclone had been hungry and needed something to gather strength from. The worst was that many of the village's people had been killed along with many animals. It was devastation not to be forgotten, yet was pushed back into the furthest caves of people's minds as they "got on with living".

Amazingly, only a few vegetable gardens had been inhaled by the passing funnel. One such garden belonged to a middle-aged couple who were expecting their first child. They lived next door to Monsieur and Madame Enchantres who just happened to be Wizards, and like other neighbors with surviving gardens were not happy with their expecting neighbors.

On one very full-mooned midnight night, Madame Enchantres heard a commotion down in their garden where herbs, vegetables, fruits and nuts grew in plenty and firewood lay re-stacked against a side wall of the house--all of which were surrounded by a ten-foot stone wall which kept the occasionally strong Mediterranean winds out and the abundant harvest in.

"Husband! Someone is in our garden again," Madame Enchantres whispered to her husband who was just ten dozing into a pleasant sleep.,

"This is the second night, my husband! And tomorrow morn, mark my words, our prize radishes and lettuces and no doubt carrots, chestnuts, tomatoes, and lavender will be missing! Probably half of our firewood, too! Just as last night! Husband, we must do something to catch this thief!"

"Pshhaw!" Monsieur whispered back. "Alright, alright. 'Tis true, wife. We are being robbed. So. Let us on the morrow's midnight sit in stealth and await our intruder and, well, curse him, but only while late at night when the villagers are all at slumber, oui?" Monsieur Enchantres rolled over and buried himself further beneath his covers, setting his mind back to the occupation of sleep.

"Oui, dearest. Merci, Amie husband! A good plan, a very reasonable and good plan!", Madame Enchantres agreed, and returned to the warmth and comfort of their bed.

Sure enough, on the morn when MM. and Mme. Enchantres went downstairs and out into their garden, carrots and radishes and lettuces and asparagus had been pulled up. And olives and chestnuts by the bag were missing. A chicken was missing as well.

"You see?", said Mme. Enchantres.

"Oh yes, wife--I see, I see too well!", replied MM. Enchantres.

"Tonight, husband, we catch our thief and place a curse upon his head. Why, his brain must be in his boots if thinks we can be robbed and won't reply!:, Mme. said.

So off the couple went on their day's errands of visitation, banking, buying material for clothes to be made and such--all that comfortable people buy to be made comfortable.

At dusk, like all villagers, MM. and Mme. Enchantres returned to their home and put all the animals to bed with dinner. They then closed up the downstairs shutters and barred the front door for safety, and stirred the coals in the fireplace, covering them with ash to keep a faint glow until morning when breakfast would be started and a stirring up of coals with added bits of kindling would be required.

Once again, around midnight under a not-so-full-moon, noises were heard down in the partial moon-lit garden. This time, however, the Enchantres were prepared for their invader. A candle-lantern was lit and shown out into the garden where a man could be seen loaded down with the Enchantres' harvest, and attempting to climb a ladder for escape over the garden wall.

"HA!", shouted MM. Enchantres. "Thief! Come down, thief!", and with a wave of his arm MM. Enchantres froze the thieving man in his tracks. Then with another wave of his arm, MM. Enchantres guided the thief down backwards and away from the ladder, all the way across the garden and up to where MM. and Mme. Enchantres were standing.

"Fool!", spat Mme Enchantres, and grabbed the sacks of olives and chestnuts. MM. Enchantres retrieved all of the vegetables, and a sack with two squawking, angry chickens within.

The thieving neighbor, having been unfrozen, attempted to explain about how his expecting wife was having many, many cravings and what with their garden being torn to shreds by that monstrous tornado, they had neither crops nor chickens nor wood.

"And you couldn't buy at Market?", observed Mme. Enchantres. "Surely you can supply yourself at Market!"

"Well,", replied the terrified neighbor, "Well, oui, I could. But sometimes wife's cravings happen late at night when Market is closed!"

"And you couldn't supply your wife ahead of time for her cravings?", said Mme. Enchantres. "Husband, I don't think our thief has even tried to get to Market, do you?"

MM. Enchantres folded his arms and huffed in agreement. "No, wife, I don't believe he has bothered, either. And it appears that he will continue avoiding Market and seek out other gardens to steal from if we do nothing to stop him!" MM. Enchantres stroked his short beard thoughtfully, as Mme. crossed her arms and rocked back and forth upon her slippered heals.

"But what can I do? What do you want of me? You have your crops and chickens back, and my promise to leave your garden alone!", said the forlorn thief. He clearly understood the gravity of his irate neighbor's ability to curse a person and wished to avoid such a fate at any cost.

"What do we wish of you?", replied the Enchantres in unison. MM. Enchantres stepped forward and looked his neighbor deep into his candlelit eyes.

"We wish of you to forever stop your thievery of our and anyone elses property!", he continued. "And we wish to have...your first born child as our own. THIS is what we wish, demand of you, sir! Otherwise, a curse of lifelong misery will be yours and your wife's. I make no idle threat, sir! Your child upon birth, or lifelong agony."

The neighbor-thief, who sobbed and wrung his hands fretfully, was allowed to return home safely. His wife had heard only a faint amount of conversation between her husband and the odd neighbors. When her husband told her of the choices the Enchantres had given them, she fell to the bed and cried and ranted and raved and demanded more chestnuts (cravings can make a person lose sound judgement).

But her beloved husband would not to out to any garden for fear of further curses placed upon their heads.

"No, cheri," he told her, "No. We must give up our child when it is born, otherwise our lives will be in much worse agony forever than the agony we shall have losing our beloved child. This is our only wise decision."

"No, no, NO!?!", the thief's wife screamed and sobbed into her pillow until she fell into a most fitful slumber. Her husband fared no better that night and many more nights and days afterwards.

At last the day came when the neighbor's wife gave birth. The midwife had come and assisted with easing the girl-child out and into life. She washed the babe and swaddled her in a warm blanket and then gave her to the new parents who paid the midwife and then dismissed her.

Once alone, the couple fell in love with their baby and just couldn't see how on this earth they could possibly let her go. One night, the husband went to speak with the Enchantres, hoping to change their minds.

"Please, PLEASE I beg of you to allow us our first born! It's only a girl anyways. Would you not prefer a boy child? When we have our first boy child, I promise he will be yours!", he pleaded.

The Enchantres shook their heads "NO".

"You see," MM. Enchantres explained, "the problem is this: you have a boy child and then you wish to keep HIM and will run away with him. We, of course, will find you and the worse life will be for you when we do! And, of course, either way, we keep the child. But do you see?"

Mme. Enchantres then raised her left hand and clenched her fist at a nearby olive tree. Suddenly the olive tree burst into flame and burnt down to the soil, leaving only ash that later afternoon winds would whisk away.

The woeful thieving neighbor at once saw the Enchantres' points, and returned home to prepare his wife and little babe for the biggest change of their lives.

All preparations were made. All wailing and gnashing of teeth and cursing (without any power behind the curses, mind you) went on until all energy was spent and the little family collapsed into a deep and fitful sleep.

The following evening, after most doors had been shut and barred for the night, the forlorn thieving neighbor and new father walked next door with a blanketed basket and a sack which he placed gently upon the Enchantres' front step. He knocked upon the door firmly, and slunked away back to his home where he and his distraught wife continued packing their belongings.

Within moments MM. Enchantres un-barred and opened his front door just a bit, enough to look down upon the steps and see the basket and sack. He then opened wide the door and swiftly retrieved basket and sack, bringing them into the house and then re-barred the door.

The next morning just as sun first peered over Eze's hill and tower-tops the thieving and mortified couple packed their worldly belongings into a cart which had a horse tethered in front to pull the cart along. And off they went, as far as they could get from Eze and the Enchantres, and the mournful memory of the loss of their only child, the infant Pirasolle.

Many, many years moved everyone on. The thief and his wife sojourned on further and further, eventually reaching Italy's Mediterranean coast, then travelled inland until they reached the Borgo di Valrossara where they took up residence in a stone home that was for rent.

The thief, who had quit his thieving, eventually became a stone cutter and mason, and his wife the most superb baker of French, Italian, and German delicacies ever to be found within Northern Italy. Here they resided and healed to the best of their abilities considering such loss as they had suffered.

As for the Enchantres, they were smitten by and fell in love with "their" Pirasolle, who was raised with joy and love and devotion.

Until she turned twelve, an age that many a girl began secret affairs of the heart either real or imagined, and expected to partake in marriage in a year or two.

However, the Enchantres had other plans which had simultaneously popped into both their heads when the simultaneous realization of their daughter's approaching womanhood arose in their brains as well.

They swiftly had built a tall, wide stone tower (they didn't use their Wizardry for fear of public outcry and backlash) complete with windows and green shutters, a comfortable bed, dressers with clothes, a huge closet, toiletries, bath, medicinals, food, dishware, books, stove, a desk with quills and ink and "paper". Oh, and a lute for musical enjoyment and a telescope for night sky observation.

One night just after Pirasolle's twelfth birthday the Enchantres lit a candle-lantern and took Pirasolle up to see the tower's interior, and told her she could use it as a Retreat, which Pirasolle was quite pleased about!

Poor thing. The second Pirasolle turned her back, the Enchantres snapped their fingers in unison and disappeared. The entire staircase disappeared as well, as did the downstairs tower door.

No amount of screaming and crying could be heard by any neighbor or traveller passing by below.

The Enchantres had decided that they needed Pirasolle to remain unmarried so that she could take care of them in their elderly age whenever it came. Of course, since the Enchantres were in fact Wizards they would live an amazingly long time, much longer than Pirasolle's shorter mortal one. Alas!

Ah yes, a most familiar tale, surely. Yet this tale is the Truth whereas all other such tales are obviously mere envious gossip created for bragging rights.

Many more years passed, thirteen to be specific, and Pirasolle gradually grew up into a most radiant, beautiful and amazingly compassionate young woman.

Her hair, beautifully dark and braided, reached sixty and five feet, and shown reddish at times when sun touched it, and bluish at times when moon touched it. The braid was so long she had to curl it up onto the floor and let hang from the window her remaining weighty tresses.

Meanwhile, quite far and nearly forever away in Borgo di Valrossara, Italy, an elderly couple shut up their home's shutters and doors, and finished delivering goats and sheep and feed to neighbors who would look after the couple's home while they were away in search of their long-lost daughter whom had to be left with neighbors when the child was just an infant.

Yes! The thief and wife, themselves! Twenty and five years later of course, and old now. For some unknown mysterious reason the couple suddenly decided to seek out their beloved daughter and beg forgiveness before their lives eventually ended.

Not knowing just where Pirasolle was now living nor whom she had or if she had married, the couple set out to return from whence they originally came: Eze, France.

They loaded up their wagon's bed with a few belongings in a chest, food in bags up front, hay pitched into and filling the bed, and snugly placed a baby goat tethered to one of the wagon-bed's posts, and off they rolled!

Stopping in every town along the way, they inquired as to whether anyone had heard of the story of Pirasolle and her Wizard "parents". And in fact many people had heard such a story over the passing years.

"Oh yes, sir!", they'd say, "they lived in Eze, then at some point moved somewhere North of there. Then again somewhere South as well!", they all would nod. The same story over and over.

"Well,", the couple thought, "at least the story is well-known. We must be on her path!" they decided, and would continue rolling on day into night on and on.

All the while Pirasolle's birth parents were travelling in search for her, Pirasolle had come to her wit's end with being trapped like a Christmas Goose, up in the Enchantres' tower. Especially as the Enchantres had decided to travel near and far for pleasure. They knew Pirasolle would be safe and not able to escape while they enjoyed themselves far away.

And so one full-moon summered midnight, after far too many potential husbands, and obnoxious children, and an occasional goat and donkey, had pulled and tugged and nibbled on her lovely hair to let them climb up or just nibble, Pirasolle pulled her entire sixty-and-five foot long braid up into the tower, took scissors and cut and cut and cut until the blades finally hacked through her lovely thick hair.

She then timed both ends of the braid into knots most tight, attached one end to a huge shutter hook and then quietly lowered her locks down along the stone wall of the tower. Then she bundled up her belongings into a brown shawl and tossed the bundle out the window, at which point Pirasolle went out the window, holding onto her braid and repelled herself down the tower wall to the ground where she retrieved her bundled worldly belongings.

As fortune did have it, along came an elderly couple driving a wagon of hay. A baby goat, tethered to the wagon post, lay in contended slumber upon the hay as they travelled. When they saw the young woman so late at night and alone and carrying her belongings, they offered her a ride to wherever she would need to go. They both somehow knew that she was running away from a bad situation. Call it "intuitive" or a "vision", but they knew.

This couple, of course, was Pirasolle's long-lost birth parents who, when they discovered Pirasolle's name and who had adopted her, they revealed to her that they, Monseiur and Madame Poulet, were in fact her birth parents and how the Enchantres had stolen her from them because they had stolen the Enchantres' vegetables, chickens and firewood after a freak tornado, and threatened to curse them if they tried to claim their baby.

The Poulet's had been wandering ever since, from Eze, France to Milan, Italy, to Valrossara, Italy, and back to Eze, whenever they heard something about where the Enchantres had taken Pirasolle (or seemed to have taken her -- after all, the Enchantres were filled with magic good and bad), the Poulet's travelled off in search of their Pirasolle.

Well! MM. and Mme. Poulet offered Pirasolle an eternal Welcome which she gratefully and joyously accepted, and she completely forgave them their thievery which led to her removal. And so, this is exactly how Pirasolle ended up dwelling most happily ever and ever after in lovely Valrossara!

And what, you may ask, happened to the Enchantres? Ah! A most scaly, clever and Pacifist dragon in Milan caught them off guard one day, and sprinkled a bit of fine Dragon gold dust in misty water over them which fizzled away all powers of Wizardry.

And this is how the Enchantres became amazing Wandering Story Tellers who travelled most happily ever and ever after!

Gee Wiz Folks!

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