For the last month preparations were being made for our Comune, or City Hall, to be renovated. First they built fences for all the equipment and daily I hear the crash of the debris being wheelbarrowed to the shoot into the dumpster. It is a big building, once a beautiful Palazzo, and still has the frescoes inside and a magnificent staircase.

The last four or five days they’ve been erecting the scaffold on the entire front of the building. Since we are across a narrow street from the Comune we have a birds eye view of all these proceedings. Now that the scaffolding is up I cannot see the equipment down below. I can, however, see at eye level the guys working on the building who will use the scaffolding. A little disconcerting on the fourth floor! Used to my privacy. This we can look forward to for a minimum of two years, and being in Italy if it progresses as usual, it will probably be twice that.

I will miss the weddings I used to watch from my window. And the weekly markets are squeezed onto one side of the Piazza. I feel for the businesses on our little street who are not nearly as accessible or visible as before. And it remains to be seen if there is room for the Christmas tree. Which, by the way, is due any day now!