At ninety-four, Silvano was only trying to resist. To force the body to do what it could no longer do and the mind consequently had difficulty keeping up with the will. Sabatina was confined to a wheelchair. She barely could walk and hardly. She was too fat. So many times he had told her she had to lose weight.
— Me fat? I only have a swollen stomach - she answered. She did not see herself fat. Quite the contrary.
In that old-age-fog that enveloped his brain (high blood pressure, prostate, varicose veins, medicines in large amounts) he tried to find his way. To reorganize his vision that he felt close to be extinguished.
He understood that if he switched off that vision he would lose contact with the rest of the world. It was the last link between him and the outside world, that vision which desperately he grabbed. And the past years he had fought to keep it alive.
Until the collapse of Bettino Craxi had been a lion. A fighter, a beast. He never gave up. He could fall asleep at midnight and wake up at four in the morning every day. He worked for the Socialist party and he commuted every day (Rome – Florence) to save on the daily allowance that the party gave him.
When the PSI collapsed, he realized that he too had come to the end. After Craxi fall he wouldn’t raise again, ever. He understood that the party he dedicated his life to was bound to disappear forever, that all those who would come after Craxi would be nothing but names, adjustments to delay an agony that could not be delayed. The end had been decided long before the end.
That day was another 8 September, for Silvano, the same day that Italy died. The First Republic was dying. And the Second was certainly not better. If the First was an icon of Italy yet, still Italy for Italians, the Second was nothing but a nightmare, the fear of becoming another Mexico.
And then came the Third and most devastating Republic: the juntas of Monti, Renzi and the PD. A governance under the Brussels bureaucrats whose goal was to suffocate identities, to impose the dominion of finance, to destroy societies through a new weapon called mass migration.
After months of complete discouragement, of hoping in a return of Craxi from Hammamet where he had taken refuge to avoid arrest, an escape allegedly with help from the same judge who was prosecuting Bettino, Silvano realized he was feeling a loss of that vision which until then had guided him.
He was conscious that if he had lost the ability to visualize the direction he would have broken the oath made to himself on the very day Rocco had left him at Firenze Santa Maria Novella on September 11, 1943.
Rocco had spoken the language of honour. What other language could he have used? He who refused to surrender and fought for the Decima Mas and Junio Valerio Borghese despite of the collapse of the Kingdom of Italy, the Fascism and the dissolution of the Italian Royal Army.
— Me fat? I only have a swollen stomach - she answered. She did not see herself fat. Quite the contrary.
In that old-age-fog that enveloped his brain (high blood pressure, prostate, varicose veins, medicines in large amounts) he tried to find his way. To reorganize his vision that he felt close to be extinguished.
He understood that if he switched off that vision he would lose contact with the rest of the world. It was the last link between him and the outside world, that vision which desperately he grabbed. And the past years he had fought to keep it alive.
Until the collapse of Bettino Craxi had been a lion. A fighter, a beast. He never gave up. He could fall asleep at midnight and wake up at four in the morning every day. He worked for the Socialist party and he commuted every day (Rome – Florence) to save on the daily allowance that the party gave him.
When the PSI collapsed, he realized that he too had come to the end. After Craxi fall he wouldn’t raise again, ever. He understood that the party he dedicated his life to was bound to disappear forever, that all those who would come after Craxi would be nothing but names, adjustments to delay an agony that could not be delayed. The end had been decided long before the end.
That day was another 8 September, for Silvano, the same day that Italy died. The First Republic was dying. And the Second was certainly not better. If the First was an icon of Italy yet, still Italy for Italians, the Second was nothing but a nightmare, the fear of becoming another Mexico.
And then came the Third and most devastating Republic: the juntas of Monti, Renzi and the PD. A governance under the Brussels bureaucrats whose goal was to suffocate identities, to impose the dominion of finance, to destroy societies through a new weapon called mass migration.
After months of complete discouragement, of hoping in a return of Craxi from Hammamet where he had taken refuge to avoid arrest, an escape allegedly with help from the same judge who was prosecuting Bettino, Silvano realized he was feeling a loss of that vision which until then had guided him.
He was conscious that if he had lost the ability to visualize the direction he would have broken the oath made to himself on the very day Rocco had left him at Firenze Santa Maria Novella on September 11, 1943.
Rocco had spoken the language of honour. What other language could he have used? He who refused to surrender and fought for the Decima Mas and Junio Valerio Borghese despite of the collapse of the Kingdom of Italy, the Fascism and the dissolution of the Italian Royal Army.
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