Foxes Hill

Foxes Hill 2

Rosetta is a pretty girl: dark brown hair, big bright eyes, dark pupils, full lips not very big, small and pretty nose, upturned.

He is twenty-five, a sincere face, not handsome but graceful; she will continue to be a farmhand if it does not find, eventually, a good husband.

I like the position that I am in; unfortunately, however, it does not last long: the bus at a certain point began to slow down, and then stop.

It stops at the crossroads with a country road, which on the right, going up the hills, leads to the territory of Ascoli Satriano.

Before going down, Rosetta gives me one last kiss: "See you then, bye!"

A farm wagon is waiting for them: there are two mules attached and a man, the carter, who whips in his hand, holds them.

Everyone, except me, gets off the bus.

The farm wagon is a large wagon, of those used for transporting the sheaves of harvested wheat from the field to the barnyard where, once the large sheaves are ready, the thresher will arrive and be positioned.

During threshing, these same farm wagons are used to transport the straw.

Standing on the bus, I saw the group get into the farm wagon; the women behind, sitting on the platform, and the men-standing, leaning on the sides of the farm wagon.

The driver exchanges a few words with the carter, greets everyone and goes up again; off we go.

I see Rosetta, which, with the hand, waving goodbye to me one last time and I respond in the same way as the bus quickly moves away, and the farm wagon is getting smaller and farther away; after a curve, it has disappeared.

Rosetta, I have never seen her again.

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It is strange but, even now, the people I remember most willingly, and with pleasure, even if with a hint of nostalgia for past tense, are the ones I never met again.

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Shortly after, we arrive at Candela station: it is on the railway line Foggia-Potenza-Avellino.

I go down and sit on the sidewalk opposite, and I look at her; it is a country station, far from the village, further downstream and isolated: nothing around, only wheat fields; there is nobody.

The bus is stopped with the engine off and the driver, sitting on the running board, smokes.

I, sitting on the hot sidewalk and with the suitcase between my legs, wait.

Shortly after, while the driver continues to smoke, I stand up, look around and, high up on the hill, I see the small town.

A beautiful panorama: a common feature, moreover, to all the villages perched on the hills of the Italian Apennines.

I imagine, beyond, Rocchetta and grandmother's house and the Foxes Hill vineyard and the Traversa Valley farm.

On the opposite side, on top of a hill, I see a farm; busies men and women in the yard below it, and, down the valley, grazing animals.

Around always and only fields of wheat, blond with black ears, that here too it sways caressed by the wind.

The air is still warm: I take two steps, back and forth, without leaving the bus and always keeping an eye on the suitcase.

A lizard emerges through the now dry grass and, with a like a flash, catches an insect, which it immediately devours.

I stay still to look at her: I stare at her, she too is still and turns her gaze in my direction; sometimes tilt your head from side to side; suspended on her paws, breathes quickly.