Half September, summer hasn’t gone yet and autumn
must still come.
It’s afternoon, a lot of sun, so much light but also a lot of wind and dust making your skin feel dry.
Francesco is working on the top of a hill with a gorges outlook, not fare from
our little town.
You can see the Salento, the Adriatic Sea and when there is a dazzling winter day… even the hills of Albany are visible.
I find easily my way up to Francesco who is cleaning up the place with his wor
kers.
“It’s enough for today.”
He’s very happy with this interview; he knows that, on his level, he’s becoming a celebrity.
“They didn’t let me work this summer, this place is far too visible.”
“Who?” I ask. He’s talking about the too many people passing by who cannot resist to stop the car and have a look at the construction in progress. To see a trullaio at work is a happening, almost like an archeological discovery.
“So much people stopped their car, a lot of foreigners. They where fascinated by the quality of the construction and the way we use the stone.”
And than the words came like a windmill. He talks about the quality of our chalkstone, the fossils hiding in it.
The stones he tries to extract from the earth with more and more difficulty due to his condition, health problems, his back, his recent surgery. But he’s just telling, not complaining.
“Things just happen at my age…I’m passed seventy. It’s not due to my work. I must be grateful that I had the opportunity to live all those years in the open air absorbing the smell of the earth.”
While Francesco is talking you can hear the emotion, the love for his trad
e.
Till the trullo is finished he considers it his own. He takes all the decisions, he chooses the stones one by one and tells his workers where to place them.
I’m following his art since a long time now and I never saw two identical truly. He is never banal and invent every time a new way to put scales are arcs.
He also has a great faith in his workers, his son, son in law and all the young boys who are with him.
Thanks to him they learn a very special trade with a good salary.
Ciao Francesco, see you soon.
