fireflies

Fireflies have started appearing in my garden. Beautiful, fragile things, flitting between the olive trees. Like fireworks for ants. I love them. Often I sit outside in the grass and watch them dance about me until it is time for bed. Apparently Tuscan children try to catch them in jars and their parents give them coins for the ones they manage to catch. It isn't easy work and they release them in the end ( thank goodness) but it does conjure up a wonderful image of children playing and laughing amongst the cypress trees

I often see fireflies on my walk home when I am too late for the last bus. I have a rather steep climb up to my town but have found a short cut through an olive grove which literally buzzes with these beautiful creatures whenever I pass through. Even though the walk can be exhausting at the end of a long day, when the moon is full and the fireflies dance it makes it all worthwhile.

Last Saturday evening I had to do just this after I missed my connection from Florence. I had been at an all day writers' conference in the city and my feet had simply lost their rhythm by the close of the day.  The conference was the usual mix of awkwardness and enthusiasm which seems to colour these things but it was good to identify myself with my writing again.  It's time to ride that pony again.
One thing that became very apparent to me though was that I need to start working on my blog again (oh and I need to finish some stories.) I did manage to meet with a publisher ( who doesn't accept unsolicited manuscripts but had read some of work and  said some really wonderful things) and the first thing she said to me was ' you need to get an agent.' I found this both insightful and amusing since she made it sound like something you just pick up at your local grocery story.

'Um a bottle of red wine, three tomatoes...oh and one agent please. Preferably a good one!'

A good agent though, I suspect, is a bit like a firefly. A beautiful, lively things that can bring such joy into your life...but damn hard to catch.

Time to get some bigger jars.