"Under the Tuscan Sun"

This book by Frances Mayes was recommended to me by my sister, who haunts the discount aisles of her neighborhood Barnes & Noble on a weekly basis. She told me about Under the Tuscan Sun last year, and I found a hardcover copy at our Half-Price bookstore for just one dollar. How can you not buy a brand-new hardcover book for one dollar?

I keep my books-to-be-read stash in an antique sheet-music cabinet in a corner of our bedroom. All of the thin music-sheet shelves are long-gone, but the cabinet itself is lovely, and I rescued it from my mother-in-law's house when we were shipping some of her furniture here from up north. With all the confusion of the shipping, and the rearranging of furniture that was already here, my books-to-be-read pile got hopelessly out of order. As a result, books that I had recently bought were being read weeks and months before books that I had bought last year. Which is why Under the Tuscan Sun hasn't seen the light of day till this week.

And my, my..... what a beautiful book. Rich in history, Italian landscapes and vineyards, hundred-year-old stone houses, and recipes so mouth-wateringly described that you'll be hungry at the end of every chapter. I've already made pencil-notes in the front of the book so I will know which pages I want to refer to when I feel the urge to cook or bake something with a Tuscan flavor.

As the author writes about the renovation and decoration of her Tuscan farmhouse, I can't help but think about our little lake cottage. By no means are we renovating (thank goodness) but I can certainly understand Frances Mayes' desire to create a home away from home. Each time we go to Mayberry, it feels more comfortable, more furnished, more "us."

Although, with some things, my husband would say the cottage is more me...... as with the pot rack in the kitchen. A big black wrought-iron pot rack that hung from the ceiling on two silver hooks. Not an easy-on-the-eyes pot rack, mind you, but a plain farm-looking rack that could've easily held pitchforks and shovels if you hung it up in a barn.

I wanted the pot rack down and out and gone. My husband wanted it to stay there. For what? I wasn't ever going to hang pots on that thing. If you hang up pots, they get dusty, which means you have to clean them off before you use them. Not something I wanted to be doing up there. And even if we wanted a pot rack in that kitchen, the one that was there wouldn't have been the one we would've chosen. Simple logic--- get rid of the pot rack.

Which we did, finally... this last time to the cottage. And what a difference.... that black pot rack against the white ceiling, next to a white ceiling fan..... I swear, it looked like a giant spider was hanging down from the kitchen ceiling and threatening to gobble up everything in sight. Now, however, with that monstrosity gone, the entire kitchen looks open and airy, and the only division between the cooking area and the eating area is the pretty island that separates those two sections of the large country-kitchen.

And the pot rack? It's in the garage up at Mayberry. I told my husband that he can use it for hanging fishing poles, or yard tools.... anything but pots in our kitchen. He gave me that look.... the one that men give their wives when they think they've lost the battle. What battle? I just wanted that ugly pot rack out of that pretty kitchen.

The kitchen in Frances Mayes' house in Tuscany--- no pot rack. What a great book.