venerdì 1 gennaio 2016

Golden Virgil.

Mainly for Aiste who, because of my sobs (sobs of happiness, because only Manuela Pasquali and I knew) didn’t have a clue until the second to last line, but also for those who weren’t at Mantua’s Palazzo Te on Dec. 28th…
And for those who were there but, because of their neighbor’s sobs (I don’t speak but I also have eyes on my back) didn’t get the whole message…
Virgilio d’Oro.
Warning: the reader, Manuela Pasquali, will read the following text in the name and on behalf of yours truly, Marco Sguaitzer, to avoid all misunderstanding.
Today is a special day.
This reward isn’t for Marco, but is a slap to the bitch and to all it represents.
The physical helplessness exists for those who accept to be dominated by it.
Mind is all-powerful (well, almost. We need to learn to renew sick cells, but the Minister doesn’t allow us to use stem cells, so we’d better use the power of the mind, I’m afraid…)
I fought from the beginning, at first incapable of believing I was the «lucky» one in 50.000 to receive this «gift»; then, once acceptation kicked in (believe me, it doesn’t come in a day, it’s something very hard to digest) I reacted.
I thought I was somebody «normal» like you, only with the vice of writing with my eyes…
Being incapable of moving, walking, eating, drinking, driving, cycling, taking a bath, scratching myself, running, embracing, kissing, sleeping on my tummy (and here I stop so as not so seem a crybaby), I consider all these «temporary emergencies», because I’m sure I’ll heal, sooner or later (I’d like it to be sooner, seven years of purgatory seem enough).
Yes, purgatory, Hell is something else.
All considered I have an easy life, I wake up when I want, I sleep when I feel like it, I don’t work, I don’t have to worry about food (I forgot what cooking, grocery shopping, dishwashing, clearing the table is like). Beyond my still body I have no limits, no barriers. I feel love, I travel everywhere, with the book and with my fantasy, I dream of myself always healthy, walking…
Yes, but many, many people feel worse than me, so why complain?
Dedications. It’s a necessary chapter, for such an important award in this Ducal setting…
First, to somebody who died a couple of months ago.
We chatted without pitying each other, between her chemos.
We met only once, it was summer and she was more bubbly than the cocktail in her hands, at Venezia bar. We were both celebrating, and it was a magic moment.
She went away with a pretext, confessing, while chatting with me later on, that emotions were overwhelming her and she didn’t want me to see her crying…
Dear Paola, one day I’ll explain to you that the real King (oops, Duke) of tears is me!
Second, to someone who went away 13 years ago.
If I find the fool who said that «time cures pain», I’ll probably take advantage of a very short span of miraculous healing, the right time to punch him in the stomach, just to understand how much time he will need to be cured of THAT (asshole).
We fought like cats and dogs, he was introverted, I was extroverted, he was constant, I was fickle. He was the boss, I the underling.
A passion for sports united us. Soccer (with my mom, he missed none of my matches) and ski.
He made me wear skis at 4, we went to every mountain resort you can think of, from Campiglio to Tonale, from Cervinia to Bressanone, although his favorite destination was Val Gardena (the more German they were, the better he was, maybe because, shy as he was, since he only spoke Italian and Mantuan dialect, in two words he solved the problem…)
He left, alone, at sunrise on Saturday, he did the Quattro Passi skiing, and came back in the evening, as cool as ever. Other times, and another temperament.
Dear Dad, I dedicate this award to you because, with all the disappointments you had to stand down here, I hope that this satisfaction makes you proud of me, at last.
Third and last, I dedicate this award to the sweet person near me.
She gave up her family, her country, a secure job to fight at my side the disease, even if I was healthy when she met me.
She’s almost crazy, I’d say!
She was the one insisting for the trip to Vietnam, to try stem cell therapy.
Without her I don’t know if I would have accepted the tracheostomy.
She learnt all the emergency techniques, the functioning of machines, nutrition and dressing techniques (do you think it’s easy to dress me, 70 kgs of skin and bones, whose movements are those of a corpse, with a tube down his throat?)
If this wasn’t enough, I wake her up for or five times every night (I understand why she learnt to stand the piston of the ventilator, the irregular ticking of the writing device: poor her, she’s dead tired).
To give to Aiste what Aiste deserves, I took a solemn decision.
Bebe, eight years of Life, surviving and fighting together made me understand that without your presence I couldn’t live for week…
Life brought us together and not by chance, we learnt to love each other for what we are (it didn’t cost me a whole lot…), we complete each other. I understand I can’t offer you a future of trips, holidays, dinners, warm embraces and kisses, romantic walks, sports…
You know by now what awaits you, if you accept to live by me the few or many years I have left.
I’d love to kneel, now, but:
A) I can’t to it.
B) I’d need a crane to put me back in the wheelchair.
C) I’m a coward. I asked a person you have total faith in to do it, knowing that, shy as you are, you’d kill me in your heart for asking you in front of all these people.

Bebe, do you want to marry me?

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