November
by Giulia · 18 June 2026 · Biography & Memoir
Giulia describes Florence in November when the tourists leave — the light, the quiet, the city returning to itself. Ends with a sentence from a restaurant owner that says everything.
People who live in Florence will tell you the same thing: November is when the city comes back to itself. I believe this more every year.
In summer the streets near San Lorenzo are nearly impassable by ten in the morning, and I have learned not to go near the Uffizi between May and September unless the work requires it. I don't say this bitterly. Tourism is what keeps the museums open and the museums are where I work, so I have no standing to complain. But there is a version of this city that exists only when the numbers thin out, and November is when it becomes available again.
The light changes. In summer Florentine light is aggressive, flattening, the kind that makes everything look like a postcard of itself. In November it comes in low and sideways and does something to the stone that I find difficult to explain to people who haven't seen it. The buildings look considered. The shadows are exact. I walk differently in November — more slowly, looking up more often.
Last November I ate dinner alone at a place I've been going to for twelve years, at the same table by the window, and the owner brought me a glass of wine I hadn't ordered and said: welcome back. As if I'd been away somewhere.
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