Dinner with the Neigbors

Our neighbors are so nice, I don't know why I look terrified, but I though the picture was pretty funny.

We started painting early today, but by 11:00 I thought I was going to faint. Jim picks a spot in the shade; that is his way of making a choice, but when I see what I want I do it no matter what. We were up very high; as high as one can go with the earthquake destruction. I was standing out in the sun on the terrace with all the stones radiating heat. I was happy with my painting and felt it was my most accurate drawing so far. I am starting to have an understanding of the architecture here and pay more attention. It proves the problem of how memory interferes with reality. In Vermont the window frames are small. Here they are half the width of the window. The window frames are made of stone or they are painted to look like stone. The walls are thick so all the windows are set back. At first I was drawing what I knew: thin window frames. Now I am seeing.

In the afternoon I went back and worked on a picture I started the first day we were here. I was so annoyed with it, because the drawing was so hard. I wanted to abandon it, but Jim said I needed to work on it again. I thought there was nothing to be done, because it was so bad, but here it is and you can decide for yourself. I do like the way it shows the pueblo nature of the town.

In-between I took a two hour nap. The workmen from next door are gone then and it is easy to sleep. Later I painted the walls and the window frame in the “living room”. I have painted almost everything I can reach in that room. I even got on the ladder.

We had dinner with our neighbors. They are renovating three floors of their house. They have a fourth floor that opens on to the street above us. We also met the people that live directly above us. They have a tiny apartment. The back of our building is on the edge of the earthquake destruction. Heavy rain this week has not helped the situation of the road. It looks like a Vermont road. We had such a good time at dinner. We laughed and laughed about the language problems. I ate sardines! What I will do to be gracious. They served us so much food. It was a little embarrassing that we did not feed them more. Then they sent us home with pizza for today. My other friends that I see every day gave us zucchini and eggs from their garden and chickens. She said that we could make a fritato. One can not get ahead of the Italians in gift giving or hospitality. She talks so much to us and I am lucky if I understand a word. It is hard. I felt better when I heard how much trouble our neighbors had with English.

Jim and the neighbors.

Jim at our coffee place with my completed painting mentioned above.