Some new year advice for me (and you)

Raise a chalice to the resolutions that work

Some lovely plump bottoms to kick off the year

Well, we survived the fireworks. They were unleashed, in true Italian fashion, a few minutes after midnight and sent us all flying to the edges of the tiny piazza or cowering on the stairs. We all grinned with relief as we recharged our chalices (calici, according to the menu, which must surely be chalices) and grinned to find that coats, hair and limbs had all emerged unsinged. Yes, we are still here.

Our stomachs survived the onslaught, too. At one point, we told the waiter that we had just had our pasta courses, grazie mille, but were gently informed that this was a different one. This pasta dish followed the paccheri with gorgonzola and walnuts and speck, which followed the puff pastry with lentils and the truffled polenta crostini and the smoked salmon profiteroles and the pistachio mousse, and came before the fillet of pork and vegetable flan and lentils come da tradizione (“as in the tradition”) and the nougat and caramel semifreddo. This was after the prosecco and Grechetto and SanGiovese-Merlot but before the Moscato d’Asti and the coffee with brandy, which I believe is known as a “sharpener”, but which definitely didn’t sharpen anything except a vague feeling, as I stumbled into bed, that I was never eating or drinking again.

But today is a new day, new dawn, new me, a vita nuova, as Dante put it. The new me, it turns out, is just as keen on eating and drinking as the old me, with a stomach, brain and tiny devil or angel perched on my shoulder, whispering that it’s time for another treat. Yes, darling, I hear you! Your wish is my command! I am my mother’s daughter, nothing if not obliging. My mother could turn every bite of every cake and every sip of every cup of coffee and every peanut and every slurp of gin and tonic into a little party. I love a party! Who cares if it’s a party for one, two or a hundred? Give me a crisp and a tiny drop of Vermentino or Verdicchio or Vernaccia or Gavi and I will give you a party!

Yes, we must celebrate because we are still here.

To those who are reading this for the first time, hello and welcome! My newsletter is called The Art of Work and it’s meant to be about how we find fulfilment as we pay the bills. Which covers, you will find, pretty much everything. Work is an art, life is an art, joy is an art and I believe part of what Dante would call this journey through dark woods is about discovering the mix – the cocktail, if you like, the Negroni or Aperol Spritz – that works for you. And when life adds a dash of something a little too bitter for your taste then we just have to adjust the cocktail. There is, alas, no formula that hits the spot every time. Molto irritante, but there we are.

I give you, for example, Paradiso. Yes, the house in Umbria we bought two years ago really is called Paradiso. How could the fulfilment of the dream of a lifetime not be called Paradiso? There are, we have discovered, an awful lot of insects in Paradiso, the odd serpent (not yet in the house, thank goodness) and a lot of wild boar. There were also, it turned out when we arrived last week, an awful lot of leaves that had blown up the valley and into a drain. And yes, you can probably guess the consequences. No animals boarding an arc two by two, but a stagnant pool of water that had managed to wreck two antique leather armchairs, one new side table, four new (specially made) cushions, one new (specially made) sofa cover and oh yes, our new, beautiful, extremely expensive terracotta floor.

In an act of touching solidarity, the new washing machine has also decided to flood and two of the radiators have gone on strike. We are now just waiting for the locusts.

It’s not what we expected when we signed the contract for Paradiso, but who ever gets what they expect? We are having to learn, as the Italians say, to stay tranquillo. A flood does not make an Inferno. It’s just another mess you have to clear up.

Last night, before I went out, I wrote a list of resolutions. I like writing resolutions. I can’t remember what I resolved to do last year. I hope I didn’t resolve to do more exercise, because I didn’t. I hope I didn’t resolve to drink less, because I didn’t. I probably did resolve to eat more healthily, and didn’t. I signed up for the Zoe app, wore the contraption, did the tests and subscribed to it for about six months, but apparently you actually have to change what you eat for it to make a difference. I’m still hoping that my many subscriptions to my many publications, journals, language apps and online courses will gradually transform me into the hyper-informed, multi-lingual polymath each click promised. I thought I was buying extra hours in the day and deeper reserves of self-discipline and brain-power. The key thing I have learnt, from all those standing orders, is that I’m very good at clicking.

I can’t remember if I resolved to sell my flat, and help Anthony sell his house, and find and buy a house together. Anyway, as regular readers of this newsletter will know, I did. We did. Amazing that you can write such a thing in a single sentence when it’s such a palaver.

My achievements this year, if you can call them achievements, have not really been to do with work, which has just been ticking along. They have been about bricks and mortar and clearing and packing and unpacking and sandpapering and painting. They have been about building the infrastructure for the next phase of my life.

Today, my email inbox and Instagram is full of advice. Quite a lot of it has made me feel inadequate, so here’s my advice to me. And, if you want it, for you:

1)    If you have eaten a ridiculous amount of food, drunk a ridiculous amount of alcohol and spent a ridiculous amount of time scrolling on your phone or staring at a screen, you are not a spineless wastrel who deserves to be sent to Dante’s deepest circle of Inferno. You are a human in the western world. It’s fine. You can eat and drink and scroll a bit less from now on.

2)    If you meant to go for energising walks every day, or perhaps even runs, but have barely left the sofa, and are feeling bad about it: don’t. It’s a necessary human ritual called hibernation. Wiggle a bit when you next wander to the fridge. Some movement is better than no movement. Stroll to a café. All exercise is enriched by a cappuccino or a flat white.

3)    If you have, for example, been staring at the dark brown stains on your new terracotta floor and feeling a bit fed up, take yourself out of the house and go and look at something different. Wander round a church. You might find some life-sized nativities or painted ceilings or murals with an array of sweetly plump bottoms. They will probably cheer you up.

4)    If you have been trying to choose presents for your partner’s birthday, which is on Thursday, and have felt overwhelmed by the options and online reviews, and know that he or she is a lot more picky about these things than you are, then just dash out tomorrow when the shops are open and buy something. Wrap it. Something is better than nothing. Your mental agonising may be touching, but it is also invisible.

5)    If you have been wanting for ages to embark on a creative writing project for fun, and have signed up and paid for masses of courses, but not done any of them because you can’t seem to find an idea that is in any way original or interesting, just f***ing pick one and get on with it. Woman seeks love/finds love/doesn’t find love/loses love, blah, blah, blah. You are not Tolstoy. It’s just a bit of fun.

6)    Nobody in the world cares what you eat or drink except you. Eat some protein. Eat some veg. Honestly, apart from that, eat what you like. If your jeans are too tight, cut back on the crisps. But don’t give them up entirely. What would life be without crisps?

There you go. Let’s put them on a stone tablet. Happy new year, everyone!