The church wall paintings date from the 12^th through the 15^th centuries, we learn.  What little remains of them leaves us to wonder: what must the church have been like covered in story?  (And what old stories did they choose to tell?)

Everybody knows the Thomas Wolfe line “You Can’t Go Home Again.”  Who knew that artist Alexander Calder appears, fictionalized as “Piggy Logan,” in it?[7]

Well, neither did I.  But that’s not the point.  Why exactly make the onerous assertion in the first place?  (What holds anyone back from going home again?)

We went back, & we’re glad we did.  The church still held for us its sacred feel. Right size and age.  Right stone and light.  Something about it suits our hearts.

(More later about the painting cycles.)

Knowing it won’t be long before we’ll be returning home,

the carriage begins to return to all its old familiar haunts.

First Chiesa di S. Gregorio Maggiore (whose belfry we own)

because stopping inside here a year ago started off our jaunt.

Click here for a twelve minute “youtube” video tour of the place.

Or await whatever eventually passes itself off as a short flick.

Seen here, in reverse, with “shall remain nameless” dallying behind

(probably gazing into one of the by-ways as far as they can be seen)

Until we reach the first of our many unanticipated stops, a hidden grove

Just the perfect spot for our cappuccino and a view of the distant hills.

Don’t know how the new Bill Cosby biography is being reviewed.

But Spello, tiny sister-city to Kraft Foods, gets high marks from us.

Apart from speeding cars, a lovely little town.  With more and older remnants than most.  Three Roman gates, and many well-preserved walls.

Nothing here, clearly, to rival Assisi.  Even if (on first arrival) one pair we met asked if we knew the route for hiking there, and much later (upon reaching, so we hoped, the top of the hill) we thought we could see it in the hazy distance.

Yet just that “nothing much to write home about” is part of Spello’s charm, part of what draws us near, part of what invites us to slow down, enjoy here the time there’s always room for.

Almost anything you buy comes gift-wrapped.

Not at all because it’s your plan to do without.

Rather caring is what the shop-owner crafts

Even when it would pass for our take-out:

Armed with more than sets of directions,

The tour guides wait outside the church

With a purpose and a set of instructions.

Our time’s spent admiring the buttresses.

Once inside, the groups hustle into place.

Neither cameras nor talking is permitted.

Poor Clare, she does not stand a chance.

We return, after the crowds have exited.