Both my husband and I are 'forestieri', outsiders, here in the Liguria. He was born and grew up in the navigli of Milan and started coming to Monterosso when he was 7 on summer holidays with his family. He moved here permanantly in 1984.

I never came to Monterosso as a child but have lived here consistantly since 1989.

So, between the 2 of us, we have 45 years of residency and 2 children that were born and raised here. The locals love us as we are 'bravi fanti' but I will always be 'l'americana' and Fabio 'U Milanese'.

Almost in an attempt to prove our capacity for Ligurian-ness, we have overcompensated. We fish, we mushroom hunt, we farm, we hike,we cook. We study history and traditions, we understand dialect. It's kind of funny actually.

Anyway, I digress- I wasn't planning on having our acceptance issues be the point of this entry.

The focus of the entry was to be about my husband's hands. This morning he collected produce for his daughter Cecilia. He brought the basket in to the kitchen to show me how pretty is was and said that we should take a picture of it.

I took the basket outside and placed it on our green metal patio table. Alongside it we stood up the plastic bag with the green beans and parsley. As I started to take the picture Fabio decided that the eggplant should be moved so he arranged the basket to his liking.

His hands remained in the photo as I was taking it, and of all the 10 or so pictures that I took of his basket, this is the one I like best.