I have never been a natural at packing light, and our trip to Rosignano Monferrato proved it in spectacular fashion. There we were, three hours into the drive from Turin airport, winding through the Monferrato hills with the sun beginning to dip, when I realised my suitcase was still sitting on our bed in Yorkshire. My husband said nothing for a full minute, which in marital terms is absolutely deafening. The children found it hilarious, of course. I spent the first evening of our holiday in a borrowed oversized t-shirt from the property's emergency lost-and-found box, eating takeaway pizza in Asti and pretending this was exactly the authentic Italian experience I'd planned.

The cottage itself made up for everything the moment we crunched up the gravel drive. It is the sort of place that makes you exhale without meaning to. Low stone walls, a proper terracotta roof, shutters that actually shut. Our particular property sat among vineyards that rolled away in every direction like someone had laid out bolt after bolt of green velvet. The children immediately claimed the pool, which is not enormous but perfectly sufficient for the essential holiday business of splashing about until fingers go wrinkly. My husband discovered the covered terrace and that was essentially the last I saw of him for reasonable portions of each afternoon.

What struck me most was the quiet. Not silence exactly, because there were cicadas and distant tractors and the occasional church bell, but a kind of settled stillness that felt almost foreign. We are used to the constant low hum of urban life, and here the absence of that hum made me aware of how much noise I normally carry around in my own head. I found myself sitting with a coffee in the mornings, just watching the mist lift off the vines, and not feeling the usual pressing need to be doing something more productive. This is not a feeling I am accustomed to, and I suspect the novelty showed on my face.

The kitchen became our headquarters in that lovely way that holiday kitchens do. Nothing flash, just solid and workable, with space to spread out and make a proper mess of making pasta. We shopped at the small alimentari in Rosignano village, where the owner patiently endured my GCSE Italian and rewarded effort with extra slices of salami for the children. The local wine, Barbera del Monferrato, is dangerously drinkable and absurdly reasonable. We may have brought more home than is technically advisable.

Evenings followed a pattern that felt almost embarrassingly wholesome. Barbecue on the terrace, children finally exhausted from pool and exploration, that particular golden light you get in Piedmont that makes everyone look slightly more attractive than strictly necessary. We played cards badly and argued about rules we had invented ourselves. Someone was always dispatched for more bread or another bottle.

I kept thinking about my abandoned suitcase and how little it actually mattered. The borrowed t-shirt went into the wash and came back out again. I bought a cheap dress at a market in Nizza Monferrato that I will probably never wear at home but which felt exactly right there. There is something about this corner of Italy that gently loosens your grip on how things ought to be done. The hills have seen too many centuries to be impressed by anyone's carefully laid plans.

By the end of the week I had stopped checking my phone entirely. The children had turned a fetching shade of brown and developed that particular feral holiday quality that comes from too much fresh air and not enough structured activity. My husband had read an actual book, cover to cover, for the first time in years. We drove back to Turin with the boot full of wine and local honey and a slightly embarrassing number of jars of gianduja spread, already arguing about when we could reasonably return. I have still never retrieved that original suitcase, and I find I do not much mind.