The day started idyllic: a nice long walk with the dog while taking pictures of all the wild flowers on our valley, then a bit of work on our gigantic wisteria tree … That tree would cover our whole house by now if I’d let it grow. A friend of mine came by and asked if she could take some pictures in our lavender field. She brought her daughter, a friend and a picnic box full of goodies. During the lockdown, when going to a restaurant was out of the question, she came up with the idea to sell picnic boxes with typical products of Piemonte, she calls it “Picnic Chic”. A wonderful initiative, don’t you think? So of course I said yes.
I accompanied her to one of the fields where the lavender has just started to bloom and we looked for the right place while talking about our plans for the summer. We kept at a safe distance of the bee hives as I’ve been stung once when I got to close while taking pictures. It was my fault. They warned me by zooming louder and louder and the bee only stung because he was stuck in my hair and after franticly trying to escape he unfortunately saw no other solution than to sting me. But in all these years of working in the fields that was the only time this happened.
Sunday however it was a real attack. I just stood there and “pouf”, out of nowhere a wasp flew right to my face and stung me in the middle my cheek, then he almost got caught up in my hair and while I fled in a panic I heard the others scream that he was still following me. (luckily they didn’t think about filming this)
A picnic in the lavenderfields never seemed less appealing to me than in that moment. While I went home to put ice on my cheek, the others just went on with their fotoshoot … pretty courageous ladies ?
The day after my cheek started to swell like crazy, Nicolas says I looked like a hamster. Only now, 3 days later, I look more or less normal again.
Today we went working in the fields again … luckily, we only encountered weeds, lots of weeds.