Viva la vida (english version)
Page 8
8. The old Mario.
To one month demanded by the departure I have decided to go to find Mario.
Mario was a friend, you/he/she was mine ex neighbor: Mario was old and was to the hospice.
It lodged in the room twenty-four, nothing of eclatante: a bed from hospital with cranks to lift or to lower headrest and legs, a desk in walnut-tree with writing desk in glass that was brought from house, a small white and impersonal bath with handles for disabled shed anywhere and a great closet of modern design, a lower part thing cost in clean contrast with the desk, where Mario held covers of raw wool, gilet, cardigan demodé and old lines white uniform.
Two great windows gave a good light and the show of the lake and the whole country grown beside him to the room. That view cost a considerable supplement to Mario in the monthly straight line, but he was justified saying that, when he is old, a proper bath and a good panorama do the difference. For many years Mr. Mario had been for me to kind of grandfather. It was the gentleman that looked me play to ball in the courtyard; the man that had scolded only me with the eyes when Chicken, throwing a glass from the balcony to the party of my birthday, you/he/she had upset some orangeade on the white hood of his/her curatissimo black Maggiolone. Mario was the person to which I brought the cassettes of the water when I met him/it to the beginning of the street, returning from the oratory. His/her memory I have had for a long time him, you/he/she had been there always, in the apartment beside to ours, Mrs Luisa and he, his/her wife.
You/he/she had worked as manager of bank for a life and you/he/she had also lent a hand to my father for the history of the bookstore. It was a separate figure, that also not dressing particularly formal and also having a round face and a benevolent aspect, it aroused to almost all a natural respect.
Until we have lived near Paolino has always called me, diminutive that I didn't love, but I have never told him him, it bored me. Mario had a patience and a wisdom from old man, you/he/she has always had her, not only with me. When, as all the teen-agers, lifted the volume of the stereo to inhuman levels, you/he/she has never come to play to the door shouting or complaining himself/herself/itself, rather it waited for to meet me on the landing, and the name of that song asked me and of such the singer saying that, considering that it was forced to sip them to him, he/she wanted to know at least of what music he treated. I could do him any question, because Mario was a human version of internet: you found us any information, was enough to ask and he responded agreeable and correct as him same telling fables happened indeed. He/she knew a lot of things: he intended of economy and of banks, but also of law and architecture; you/he/she could speak to you for times of every European plant, but also of animals of Asia or the Sudafrica; it perfectly knew the traditions of this place, but also the uses of the aboriginal tribes of the New Zelanda or the Amazzonia. It was unbelievable as that man, that had practically never stirred from house, pits so perfectly to his/her ease in to speak of distant worlds. It was as if everybody the things of the world you/he/she had seen her or lived, but it was not true.
From small, when I entered his/her great apartment I had a strange subjection, it was as to enter in a catacomb or in a place of cult, because in the house of Mario you/he/she could feel the breath of the history.
Mario had a lot of objects, you/he/she didn't practically throw away anything. It had heirlooms of every epoch and every country, things of value and dump things. Its saloon was a small museum, wound by the odor that they have the houses of the old ones, with furniture and beliefs full of objects of every type and with the walls full of pictures, apparent advertising and electoral of the years 50', autographed portraits, photo of heads of is famous. All without a crumb of dust, all rigorously orderly.
A true Japanese katana, an authentic thing, a thing of value, camped to the entry of its room from bed. It was my preferred object and I observed her/it attracted but pervaded by a light fear. I liked the idea to be able to use her/it and to go around to do justice with my Japanese sword to save dames in danger and to rout criminals to dozens: it was my dream of child.
From small I felt me destined to a future by Chuck Norris.
If I looked too much at the sword and Mrs Luisa it realized the same sentence it always told me:
«It cares more to the things as that that to his/her wife!»
I responded her that if he/she wanted you/he/she could give her/it me, of hidden, without telling nothing his/her husband, but she has never surrendered.
In 2002 Mrs Luisa is dead and Mario has not been the same anymore.
You/he/she has had two ictus and you/he/she has been paralyzed for half body. You/he/she has decided alone to go to the hospice and, when I have asked him because you/he/she has done him, you/he/she has answered me that a man not to be of weight to anybody has to understand when you/he/she is the moment to retire himself/herself/themselves and that the old ones of the Indian tribes when they lost the ability to be self-sufficient they went to die in the desert, alone.
Mario had chosen the rest home as desert of his/her end, an end to be lived only, because only you/he/she was, despite you/he/she had a child that however he lived in France and he never saw.
I sometimes went to find him/it, I did him/it please personal, not as it forms very disengaged of volontariato. We spoke of everything, of politics, of books, of the time and of the women. He/she didn't call me more Paolinos, because by now a man considered me to all the effects and rather often happened, that you/he/she gave me of the me and she, some sorry, conformed me.
The rest home where Mario was you/he/she was an enormous, clean and well kept place, staid as a hotel of luxury on a hill that looks at the lake. Despite pits a place with an unexceptionable structure, the content was that of a hospice and the idea to enter that place however it didn't make me go crazy. Certainly it was not one of those structures lager, with old legacies or abused, of which had felt to sometimes speak to the services of the newscast; it was a more decent place with airy and bright environments. However I went there for Mario and I would never have entered there of mine.
Usually to the afternoon the old men were all reunited ones in a great saloon; who to play cards the, who to color and to draw as children to the kindergarten, who to remember with a song or a film the years distant of the youth, who to complain about himself/herself/themselves of this and of that, of the time, of the seasons, of the governments, of the young people, of the food, of the life.
Every time that I crossed the entry there was always someone that asked me to bring him/it in bath and it had to be us a kind of passaparola, because it was a systematic thing. I responded:
«I don't know... and... he is not able... and... I tell him/it someone...» And despite very often the applicant it was completely disorientated, I wondered me if my presence didn't have in effects diruetic or laxative powers.
Mario didn't participate in those gatherings some sad ones of had a good time old men, he was closed in his/her room the whole day. As a wild cat, went out unsecured only to eat.
Arrived to his/her room I have knocked as usual.
«Before!»
It was on his/her mythical armchair: a chair from office with revolving wheels that allowed him to turn the room in long and in wide. To see him/it so, armed with spyglass to beware of the great expensive windows the lake and the life of the others, he/she remembered the protagonist de" You window on the courtyard" of Hitchcock.
«Oh, good morning!» you/he/she has welcomed me. As always it seemed happy to see me. It had an enormous sign on the face, a blackish hematoma that wound his eyes and the nose widened him. Despite the drammaticità of that livid in face, it absolutely had a relaxed expression, almost had a good time, as it was child that had just combined a prank. I have forded well him and after the first embarrassment I has felt like laughing because it seemed me to have before Mr. Mario with The wears the mask of Rey Misterio.
«Mr. Mario, but has thing combined?»
«Eh... I have meas
ured the floor.»
From his/her entry in the hospice Mario had embraced the way of speaking of the elderly ones, a way all of them, made of dialect expressions, of ancient proverbs and of opinions by now anachronistic.
«I am fallen. The head is turned me, I have not understood anything anymore and I have found in earth. However I have not broken anything, I have made only the tests, still few and I go from the Luisa.» It laughed, it always did him/it. Mario had the power to render less dramatic on everything and to never become angry. In effects from when you/he/she had hospitalized you/he/she was worsened quite a lot and I didn't understand if it were due only to the fact not to often see him/it: it seemed me that it grew old more quickly them inside, three years in one.
When, to spur him/it, asked him because it was not with the others elderly in the saloon or because it regularly jumped the sessions of physiotherapy, he made spallucce and he/she answered me that you/he/she was waiting only that the other half died its body because, for the rest, he had already died. I knew that it was not true, not entirely. Mario took an interest some movements of the purse, he read the daily paper, he wrote poetries and you/he/she followed the championship of kick. So much to change, if I made him notice that a corpse could not have all that affairs, he snickered under the made yellow denture.
«Doesn't say certain things that if Mrs Luisa felt her/it it would put her/it in line her» I have beaten to his/her considerations and for infinitesimal once I have glimpse in the eyes of Mario a veil of nostalgia and I have realized to have said a cazzata.
However Mario has put again fast its agreeable oldie mask, has put back the spyglass in a drawer of the desk of walnut-tree and you/he/she has asked me:
«Then Paul, as do the things go? And his/her parents? Is everybody well? Has his/her brother taken her the licence?»
I usually did to Mario great general accounts and some generic ones, but that time I didn't have a big desire to speak of superficial things, I had gone to find the depth looking for him/it that he/she knew how to give to his/her own considerations, it was as if I was thirsty of it.
«Yes, everybody well, the licence has picked her up but it is still raw» I have answered without adding other.
«You will do. Me when I have taken for the first time in hand the steering wheel of the Juliet I have risked that it was the last» you/he/she has replied and you/he/she has begun with the history of the Juliet, that I already knew, but that I have made him tell however. When you/he/she has ended Mario you/he/she has expressed perplexed «Perhaps this I had already told him him.» I have hesitated an instant, he has understood and you/he/she has started laughing, then you/he/she has pretended that did two footsteps.
To walk with Mario was to go for a stroll just, almost literally. The first times we succeeded in crossing the whole long corridor of the tent where the room was found twenty-four, subsequently our runs had inexorably shortened, up to become exhausted himself/herself/themselves to few footsteps over the door of the room.
Mario has lifted with the times of a tired old man. The mechanics that brought him/it to build was almost tragic: of fact the good half of its body dragged, as a spoiled child drags him the corrupt part.
When Mario has been stable standing, ready to go out of the room, you/he/she was already tired, the head turned him and breathed with light puffs.
I have thought to how much absurd was that such a simple gesture could become an ungrateful work and Mario such it owes to have read as on an opened book my bitterness because he/she anchors red in face you/he/she has considered:
«You see him/it because the old ones are not afraid to die? When true life passes, he/she doesn't remain but a substitute. Do you understand how much this situation is tiresome?»
Mario was a person aware of his/her words and didn't hesitate to begin existential discourses, although you/he/she did him/it with lightness. It was an old man that taught and he/she knew him/it to do well, also thanks to the contrast between his/her sour words and his/her serene air absolutely.
We have crossed at the most about ten meters, me me oscillating and looking around at attending his/her footsteps, him dragging the feet one after the other as a slow skater.
Then Mario is gotten tired. «We take otherwise two chairs we make night.»
«You don't worry him, I am not in a hurry» I have answered him and two chairs on which there is sat have taken.
The corridor was almost cold because of the conditioned air that continually blew from mouthpieces set in the against white ceiling. Despite the whole space it enjoyed some sight of the lake given even more by great windows of those of the room of Mario, the light that arrived it was out and as polluted by that of the neons. The correct place was not certain in which to exchange confidences, but in the middle of that corridor, looking at the lake with Mr. Mario, burdens exchange of words you/he/she has been enough for pushing us to level of intimacy that The hads alone with my friends.
«How it goes with his/her fiancée?»
«Eh... he/she knows me that the bombonieres will never arrive to her. We have been being left for one month there, it was not the case to go on anymore.»
«I regret.»
«To me I don't know, I have not understood him yet if I regret or less. For now, for how much sad to say him/it is, I have the feeling to have thrown away a lot of time. Only this.»
«I don't believe, because if was true would be serious! How does it do him to throw then away the time? Rather the time is spent badly it, but also the errors have a value.»
«I know him/it, however I have as the impression not to have been able to manage our relationship in correct way. Mario, the last year we have exclusively passed for inactivity, as if we were a couple after fifty years of marriage, accustomed and incapable to change the indolence of the time. At least I have been so.»
Mario has remained bonario and you/he/she has taken to give me of the you as you/he/she often did when we spoke to this way. «Street, not to be too much severe. Apart that little time has passed because you can appraise the quality of your relationship, but then, the fact to consider certain aspects is already very positive. You will see, you will learn not to fall in the dead times and to take decisions for yourself and for the one who is nearby you. Are you young, do you know how many errors I have done me? Also from old, not to believe, to realize is already of it very!»
It was a pleasure for me that Mario talked to so much boldness of himself, you/he/she did me him to feel nearby and solidale. Moreover, even if you/he/she would have been able to allow him him, Mario it was neither pedant nor pedant, Mario was a marvelous man.
«Not to think that all realize of it! There are people that even go on with the blinkers without I handed the question if they were or less satisfied than their life, of what you/they have built, of the relationships that have interwoven, if has respected the preset objectives or less and that continually gives of new. Simply they go, they beat as dull flies against the glasses of the life, trapped, without looking around at himself/herself/themselves and inside, even enslaved of the success professional or absorbed in flat but stable relationships and therefore approved because they don't need any emotional effort. Paul, the world is made of men so, I am not speaking of the characters of the films or the novels, defined and perfectly delineated. All, me and you understood, also only in least part we behave there in this stupid way. It is a form of energy saving of the soul. Now that you have realized you are afraid of it that becomes a rule to be, but not to think, is you to decide that regimes of consumption to maintain!»
I have contested definite that didn't like me to feel me as a dull fly and that I was striving me to change the draught of my life.
«Ah him? Well, also this is a positive thing, but doesn't believe that I/you/he/she am so easy» you/he/she has started over giving me of the" her."
«I try there if nothing else» I have said, but it was as if I/you had already disheartened.
Mario to
that point has changed expression and you/he/she has become thoughtful. Again you/he/she has started over giving me of the" you."
«You see Paul, when I was young I was a train. I worked in the bank to ventun years, I directed a branch to trentacinque, to forty I was mayor of this country. I was delighted me to have put my family in a stable economic condition and to have social consideration, to have the respect of my wife and to be feared and honored by my child.»
«You/he/she will certainly have been good to build her/it to him his/her fortune» I have interrupted him I almost wanted to gratify him/it.
«You know him/it that for cinquantadue years my wife has made me find the pajamas folded up on the bed before going to sleep?»
I didn't understand what he/she wanted to say.
«For cinquantadue years have been convinced to move me long the runs of the life with the safety of the people that you/they are thought essential. Beh, are the cemeteries full of essential people and, if the world has gone on the same, does he/she want to say that they were not then it so much, no? I would have been able to thank Luisa, at least once, for that gesture that I considered only an automatic action and however due. And instead certain times it was as if her almost it didn't exist, perfectly lowered in the part of granite head of the family which I felt me.»
It had the almost shiny eyes while he/she was speaking and I have begun to desire to be able to return with our discourses on a less binding plan and coinvolgente. I felt me to uneasiness and I wanted to recover.
«But you/he/she has always loved her!» I have said hoping to improve the things.
«And when is dead I have realized not to have him/it to him ever says and shown how much has done her! Now, with this regret and with a distant child that never phones, do tell me, have I/you/they been good to build my fortune or have I spent very bad my time?» you/he/she has answered almost angry.
The way bothered me in which reorganized him and the mental construction that I had made of him since child notched. I had nearly considered always him a perfect person, a model to which to extend. I have tried to change discourse
«If Mark remembers him/it, the German?»
«Yes.»
«He gets married him, it becomes dad. We depart in one month to celebrate him/it. We make together still a vacation everybody, all of us. Does it have it foresees my friends? If he/she remembers them?»
«Yes.»
«Here, another occasion to be together with the great one with them.»
«Well have a good time you,» you/he/she has said, but it seemed that the thing didn't interest a lot him and it was strange because Mr. Mario had to kind curiosity toward what happened me.
«We will certainly have a good time, because I always feel me as that little boy that played with them in the courtyard, what he laid down under his/her car when the ball ended us under!»
I wanted to communicate freshness and enthusiasm to Mario, I liked to give him of me that image, but Mario maintained an unusual separation.
Then I have begun a pathetic discourse that I would have been able to avoid very well, on as to my age I still felt me so spiazzato, immovable, ever assembled on something. I have spoken to him of as by now I went to work only for inactivity and than idea to build me the future or a family was a bother angosciante to hold well far. Stumbles speaking of values and of generational crisis, of failure and of sense of responsibility; I am fallen speaking of oppressive Catholic education, giving more unassailable motivations to the why I didn't believe in God. With an expression of absolute conviction I filled me the mouth of index book paroloni of psychology and the same simplifications that I hated to listen in the television magazines. I tried to read in the eyes of Mario sharing and solidarity, but I didn't find anything.
Mario has not pronounced word, serious, you/he/she seemed almost worried. Then, its features are slowly, as extended and its benevolent nonnino face is returned him
«But as he/she doesn't believe in God? have not I ever told her as then I have discovered that God exists? From child, my father has made me plant a seed of the wheat. I have waited that budded, and incredibly, the wheat is grown. The wheat is not the bran!»
While he/she was talking to the usual metaphors, I looked at Mario with affability and as I would have been able to look at an any other old rincoglionito to tell odd histories of divine cereals. I thought that in the rest home Mario had also gone out some.
«Not to make that face!» you/he/she has brusquely interrupted.
«What face? I don't understand» I have beaten trying to bring the comparison on binary known.
«Yes, in fact, you have not understood a beautiful anything! Do we allow to lose God and the faith, if you believe or less they will be well done yours, but have I listened to all of your boring complaints and do you discount without replying nothing and you now that you do? Look me conceited as him same listening to an old crazy person. Call her/it as you want, call her/it faith, hope, call it conceives her/it, but I was trying to tell you that there is an order in the things, in the things. And as in the things, an order there is also the people!»
You/he/she had become angry seriously, the mask of Rey Misterio had ignited him in face and in the gross I didn't understand well because.
«But Mr. Mario, didn't want to make to become rabid her/it.»
«Mr. Mario to horn! When you will decide yourself to understand what are you? Do you think that a life made of vacations with the friends both enough? I have seen you venir on porca poverty and you have become by now a man. Come here now as a capricious and selfish child to say that are afraid of that and this, that don't want to become great and that of here and that of on and that of down! The life spend you her as better creeds, but at least fault with dignity!»
While it was reproaching me, you/he/she is not not at all taken care of of as the distances among our positions you/they could lengthen.
«But then you ask yourself too questions, you give yourself too importance. Do you feel yourself wasted? Dissatisfied? Meanwhile, instead of keeping on thinking about you as the only person of this planet, it tries to understand what the order is that there is inside of you. Are you wheat or bran you? You have to understand who are more than to think about thing wants to be, because if you are wheat and don't make the ears, then you don't follow your order and so indeed you are wasted. If you are not aware of what six, you will keep on asking you what you want and life will pass waiting.»
Mario has dwelled on the matter with the redundance of elderly man, as if he wanted to be certain that that concept that with insistence you/he/she passed you/he/she settled in my head.
The abrupt voice of a nurse of the east has interrupted only it.
«Mario, goes to your room that you have to make insuline!»
Mario has calmed abruptly, with the docility of a pup of kennel you/he/she has obeyed and slowly is returned in his/her room, in silence.
Just reentered, Mario is excused.
«I didn't want to attack you, only that is not is not liked me me your softness» you/he/she has said with the voice by now calmed.
«You don't worry him, it is right» I have answered some embarrassed.
In reality I felt me as if I/you had taken a slap in front of everybody. I had the open and livid soul.
Mario has made a hit of cough and a rivulet of expelled catarrh you/he/she has dirtied him the shirt.
«You excuse me» you/he/she has sincerely exclaimed embarrassed.
«There is no problem» I have answered as many embarrassed.
Then the nurse stupid has entered and you/he/she has looked me as to say" Beh, does mo raise yourself from the balls"?.
I have greeted Mr. Mario and him you/he/she has smiled returning imprisoned burdens old age, while the stupid put him hurry inciting to lie down him/it him on the bed.
«Hi Paul, tries to think some less and if I/you/he/she enjoy her/it the beauty of his/her years, that true.»
«It is right, good-bye Mr. Mario» The have answered observing the torch scazzata of the nurse of the east.
Before going out of the institute, passing in the corridor, an image has captured my attention. An old, in his/her room, it combed him with a brush in front of his/her specchiera. Despite looking, verse of me is not turned and you/he/she has kept on combing himself/herself/themselves, serious and fair of its beauty that didn't have anymore.
I/you/they are gone out of the hospice that they were the five of the afternoon and it made a merciless heat.
Driving the car to return home, I considered to all the words exchanged with Mario and to the energy that emanated that old with the brush. It seemed really it had an internal order to drive her/it.
Yet really it didn't come me to compare me to the bran.