I've got it.

Italy is LOUD and salami crustis
and crying babies and homemade wine
and neighbors shooting fireworks

(only 5 people a year die in Sancile from New Year celebrations, the locals assure us)

Italy is disappointment in dying flowers
and fruit stands and overflowing canals with ducks paddling for dear life upstream and soft snow in starlight and gelato and old farmhouses and warm smiles and moving hands and secrets and too many blue arrows

and too much time

too much time.