Celebrating the Simple

I was taken by a remark in this weekend’s New York Times ( “The War Against too Much of Everything”) : “ ‘As our planet gets warmer, as animals go extinct, as the humans get sicker, as our economies bail and our politicians grow ever more twisted, Americans just go shopping,’ Adbusters says on its Web site. Overconsumption is destroying us, yet shopping is ‘our solace, our sedative: consumerism is the opiate of the masses.’ ”

I thought of recent correspondence with dear repeat clients, now close friends, who wrote me some years ago that “we need to get away this holiday from the relentless spend spend spend mentality which annually grips Dallas and area.

And the Christmas carols that have been playing in the supermarkets since before Thanksgiving.”

“We want to get aways from the commercialism, the excessive lights, the gross-ness of the push to acquire.

We want a quiet holiday, a family one, very few presents, family richness only. Marjorie, please help !”

We did. They went to Amalfi for ten days, where the only excessive lights were on the eve of the festa of Saint Andrew, where traditional fireworks light up the hillside below Amalfi.  Christmas Day lunch was a seaside feast of tagliolini with lemon, local grilled fish and artichokes, and traditional Christmas desserts. The Dallas family spent the afternoon on the beach, listening to the gentle waves, talking, and enjoying the quiet simplicity of this most gentle (if we celebrate it lightly) of holidays.

An alternative to the over consumption is to partake in, if not abstention, a thought to buy only hand-produced presents, easy if you plan a trip to Florence during one of the twice-monthly Fierucola markets.

The early December one – where we bought most  of our holiday presents this year – celebrates exclusively local artisans – of pottery and olive wood, of honey and vegetables, of cheeses and textiles (linens, flax, cotton) of homemade toys, wools (cashmere, angora, sheeps wool) and kitchen tools, of herbs …

Florentine aristocrats and bohemians both — and no one we could see whom was not Italian —

carried home beautiful, inexpensive gifts for loved ones and perhaps even themselves.

Close t0 fifty stalls filled harmonious Piazza Santissima Annunziata.

No recorded holiday music.

No pressure to buy. Just a celebration, now as for centuries, of simple, lovely and hand made goods.

All through the year there are Fierucole in Florence, and with each season, their offerings change. We have our own listings of artisan-only markets in every corner of Italy and are happy to share these with you.

Buon Natale !

Marjorie