My Favorite Things (about the holidays in Italy)
I won’t be in Italy for the holidays this year which is a little unusual. Since Giada was little, I’ve preferred to stay in Florence. I’m not a big fan of traveling when everyone else does, and I love spending time in a cozy, decorated house cooking and baking to Christmas music. It’s also such […]
Unanchored
Is Florence still my home? Of late, I wake several times a night, gripped by something I’m still unable to name. Is it solitude? Worry? Fear? Regret? Restlessness? I look out my window and stare at the darkness, hopeful for answers that never come. If I’m lucky, I get a little call from a particularly […]
We Need Romcoms Now More than Ever
Market Research I began binging romcoms and romances set in Italy in the name of market research as soon as I finished writing my first novel, a nostalgic, sexy, coming-of-age romp through 1995 Florence (for anyone who’s reading this, I’m seeking representation and think it would make a great movie or limited series). I’ve always […]
You Get What You Pay For: Underconsumption, Minimalism, and Cultural Contaminations
Chi più spende meno spende For years, and I mean years, there were limited options in Italy when it came to shopping. You had to frequent small boutiques, of course there were national chains like Benetton and a few large department stores, but there were wasn’t even a mall near Florence. Many years ago a […]
Beyond the Sea
On Italian Beach Culture Italian beach culture can be a bit of a mystery for first time visitors. There are, of course, free beaches (usually you pay for parking only), but many beachgoers across the peninsula opt for the comfort of stabilimenti balneari, beach resorts, or at least they did so in the past. Typically, […]
Turning Points: On Raising a Bicultural Child
When I moved definitively to Italy at the age of 28 I wasn’t really thinking about having a baby. I was in love and trying to find gainful employment which was as hard then as it is now. I got married a year later, we bought our first apartment, and I began my career at […]
Summer (mostly) in the City
It’s been a while since I’ve spent the better part of the summer in Italy and for most of it I’ll be in Florence. This year is quite unusual and dictated primarily by my daughter’s eighteenth birthday which falls smack in the middle of the summer. Turning eighteen is a huge deal in Italy and […]
Oxygen
I just got back from a digital detox weekend in Tuscany where I spent 48 blissful, device-free hours. The ultimate goal of this particular retreat was to transform six stressed superwomen into zen superwomen. Sound like a mission impossible? Well, I thought so, too. Fortunately Sandrine Kom is persistent — yet always gentle — and […]
Under the Influence
Podcast – Making your dreams of moving to Italy a reality with Fosca D’Acierno
Self-care and the solo entrepreneur
Once upon a time, when I was for working the proverbial man, I was a self-professed workaholic. In the almost two years since I pivoted to solo entrepreneurship, I have reached new heights – or perhaps it would be more appropriate to say new depths – of workaholism and self-neglect. There. I feel better now […]