Meet Teresa. You can't see her face clearly here. She's beautiful. I couldn't upload the photo of us standing together in the square outside my house. Not skilled. Very fitting. Teresa taught me quite a lesson in skill and patience.
Teresa is one of the first people I met in Castiglione. She is 80-something and was a tenant in my house for the first few months I owned it. As I toured it for the first time, she sidled up to me and said "If you need someone to clean it, hire me. I'm good." It was less a request than an order, said with such aplomb I'd have agreed on the spot if I could have overcome the guilt of putting what felt like my own grandmother into servitude.
Teresa doesn't hear well, but her shining steely eyes miss nothing. Her voice is an unmistakable trumpet (albeit one played by Louis Armstrong) that heralds her presence everywhere. Like other older women of the town, she walks uphill to church every day and wears a photo of her dead husband on a delicate gold chain around her neck. Right from the start we delighted in the fact that our names are the same and our families are both from further south -- mine from Campania; hers from Calabria. I fell instantly in love with her.
Like many people of Castiglione MR, she invited me to visit. I took her up on it. Several times. Once, while sitting in front of the TV, a healthy fire she had made herself warming the sitting room, she railed against Berlusconi's image. I noticed it made her fingers fly faster through the work she was doing. She was making a coverlet for a new baby.
So, on my next visit, I bounced through Teresa's door with a bag containing two balls of thin white thread and a crochet hook whose end I could barely see.
"Will you teach me?" I asked.
Teresa instantly stopped, looked at me as though I'd just proposed going to the moon, then threw her head back into her signature laugh that is both cackle and girlish giggle. Then the lesson began.
Teresa made a chain. Wrap and pull. Wrap and pull. When it was about 4 inches long, she handed it to me.
"Come back when you have this much." Her hands were spread to about a foot apart - another 8 inches for me to create.
At home, I tried to replicate her moves and rhythm. Wrap and pull. Wrap and pull. Easy. I remembered this from my crochet and macrame' hippie days. The problem was the tension. My chain wasn't lacy and consistent like hers. Some rows were big, loose, loops, and others tight knots.
Italians have a saying "Fare e disfare e' l'arte d'imparare" (To do and undo is the art of learning.) Ho fatto io quest' arte tantissimo! I did a lot of the art of doing and undoing. Moreso than I was able to DO the actual art of uncinetto.After two days, I had my chain. Ran down the hill to Teresa's house, pleased as punch to know I'd be initiated into phase two of "fare".
Slogged back up to my house two hours later. Phase two consisted of inserting the hook through holes invisible to my eye, wrapping the thread several times around it, and pulling the enlarged mass back through several microscopic openings.
I fumbled. Lost the thread. Got the hook stuck halfway through the holes. Dropped everything on the floor several times. My hand position was wrong, fingers ill positioned. Teresa took them and bent them into place, putting the work into the proper position relative to hands and fingers. OW! I felt like I was being tutored by a master prestidigitator: one finger here, another several awkward inches away, knuckles up, knuckles down, one digit moving in opposition to another, wrists tilted at a strange angle. After 45 minutes of contorting my hands, Teresa took the uncinetto into her own, 80-ish, arthritic ones.
"Faccio io. E poi, lo provi. Guarda!"
[I'll do it and then you try. Watch!]
Then her fingers were off to the races. Even my brain couldn't keep up. Did she do two stitches or five before inserting the needle? How did she make the little chain that links the rows at even intervals to form the lovely windowpane pattern characteristic of uncinetto? But most of all, how the hell did she see??? Row after row formed in a flash, then woosh, she handed the work to me.
"Prova!" she said, grinning. [Try]
I did. Marveling at my clumsiness as Teresa side-coached.
"Stringi!" [Pull!]
"Troppo lento!" [Too loose.]
"Troppo stretto!" [Too tight!]
"Giri. Tiri. Metti in bucca." [Turn. Pull. Put in the hole.]
Every three attempts, she would shoo my hands aside and pull out the stitches. Disfare. [Undo] Nooooooo!
Fare. [Do]
Giro. Tiro. Metto in bucca. [I turn. I pull. I put in the hole.]
Fare.
Disfare.
Fare.
Disfare.
Over an hour later I heaved a huge sigh. The work hadn't progressed one iota!
Teresa eyed me with a mix of curiosity, incredulity, and concern.
"Sei stanca? she asked. [Are you tired?]
Body, no, I explained. Brain, yes.
"Allora. Fai una pausa. Lo provi alla casa tranquilamente. E poi torni domani o doppodomani. Vedro' il tuo lavoro e continuiamo. Cafe?" [Allora (my favorite Italian word, which has no literal translation, but begins just about every Italian's sentence. Something like "Okay, then..."). Take a break. Try it at home. I'll look at your work and then we'll continue. Coffee?]
I accepted it gratefully. Along with biscotti and fruit.
For three days now I've been struggling to duplicate Teresa's handiwork. My hands have gone numb. My wrists ache. The slender thread is so kinked from repeatedly "disfar- ing" that the work sproings all over when I try to add to it and keeps jerking out of my hands every 5 seconds. I've been near to tears several times.
"What the heck!" I think. "This is little old lady stuff! How hard can it be?"
But it is. My hands do not want to stay in position, the needle gets stuck in the tiny holes or slips out just as I've gotten it through after 30 attempts, my sweaty hands are turning the pristine white thread gray, and my eyes are so squinted up they've nearly disappeared into my head. I set aside the needle, ball of thread, and tiny patch of work. This is stupid. I'm not cut cut out for this. How presumptuous! This is a tradition learned over decades. Teresa said she began when her 40+ year old sons were babies (oh, yeah, how do you have time to focus on this stuff with BABIES!). Clearly I am made of lesser cloth. I'm kidding myself, a wanna-be Abruzzese Nonna in training. I put the work back in the bag.
Two days later, I pick it up. I saw the owner of the local stationary store sitting outside the shop door needling away. When I remarked how difficult the craft is, she smiled and shook her head.
"No, no! E' facile. Ma ci vuole tempo. Piano, piano." [No- it's easy. But it takes time. Slowly, slowly]
Piano, piano. Those are words I've heard repeatedly here. In response to everything from work I said I wanted to do on the house to having my family come visit, to being served continuous waves of food. Piano, piano. I'm not a piano, piano kind of gal. More like a get-it-done-Mario-Andretti-style type. This will be a good lesson for me. I resume the work. Piano, piano. Even though I forget how many stitiches Teresa told me to chain each time. Piano, piano. Even thought the rows' lengths are all uneven. Piano, piano. Even though my window panes are large, loose, loopy arcs compared to Teresa's tight rectangles.
Three days later, I've done enough fare e disfare to show her. She studies the piece.
"Non e' male", she says. [Not bad] I grin.
Then she pulls everything -- EVERYTHING -- out! I have to restrain a little bleat of pain.
But now Teresa really gets to work.
"Guarda! Guarda! Cosi'!" [Watch! Watch! Like this!]
Then it's my turn. Uncross your legs, she barks. You need room! Stringi! Pull! No-no! Troppo! Too much! Ecco. There. Uno. Due. E passa. One, two, and pass through. We do and undo. I work piano, piano. After an hour, out of about 30 window panes, I have successfully completed 5. She points to each one. She smiles. "Brava!" she says. I float home.
Over the next few days I work piano piano on several rows. They're still not as neat as Teresa's, but they are becoming more similar. I take her a large piece of completed work. She nods approval. Work until this is easy, she says. Then I'll show you how to make designs. I tell her I can't wait! I'm leaving soon. I'll have 9 whole months of fare and disfare.
I stopped by Teresa's house this morning for an "arrivederci" before departing for the US. "Alla prossima", I say [Until next time]
"E l'uncinetto?", she asks.
"I'm working on it piano piano", I reply. "Maybe when I return I'll be as good as you!"
She laughs her girlish cackle as we hug. As we step apart, I realize both sets of eyes are glistening.
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| Teresa's work |
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| Teresa's work |
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| My work! |
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