ABSTRACT
In October Adamo and Maria go about their farm in shirtsleeves, picking the last fruit from the trees and the first ripe clusters from the vines as they wait for the moment to gather in all the grapes and begin the production of the new wine. Waiting for the vendemmia, after the months of care and attention to the vines, the pruning, fertilising, hoeing, cultivating, tying up of new shoots, the spraying on of copper sulfate, the continual anxiety about the weather, is a tense, expectant moment on the farm, but a cautiously happy one if the grapes have developed well and the weather remains fine. The warmth of the season increases the pleasure of bringing in the fruit. The light is softer and hazier than under the dry glaze of the high summer sun. The air is as thick and white in the morning as the bloom on the skin of the yellow grapes. Pears, apples, figs, late peaches and the grapes are warm to the touch on vines and branches; dessert is festooned about the farm.
