Subscribe to continue reading
Subscribe to get access to the rest of this post and other subscriber-only content.
#46 “The shadow returns”, a short story – Part 2
Tag Archives: Life
#45 “The shadow returns”, a short story – Part 1
Subscribe to continue reading
Subscribe to get access to the rest of this post and other subscriber-only content.
#44 What’s next? Ten years pregnant with a novel
Leave a reply
Listen to this post
More than ten years ago, I wrote a book. A novel. A draft of a novel. Actually, I’d say half of it is ready to publish, the other half is still a work in progress. I keep repeating to myself that sooner or later I’ll get it done, but until now, I haven’t managed it.
Achieving that, though, would finally set me free—and I’d be able to write my second novel, or at least start brainstorming about it.
Until now, it has felt like being pregnant for ten years—wanting a second child but unable to have one until you give birth to the first. I’m not sure if this is the best analogy, considering I’m not a woman, but it seemed funny when I first wrote it down.
Last year, while I was unemployed, I dedicated some time to polishing my manuscript and sent it to an editor—a friend of a friend—who had kindly offered to read the first part of my draft. I knew it wasn’t ready. I knew I still had to work on it, probably over and over again. Not that I haven’t already, but self-editing can be a rabbit hole where one easily gets lost in lateral overthinking.
I was afraid of sharing it with anybody at that stage—especially an editor. Besides, the experience of unemployment had left a scar on my ego. I was already so full of self-doubt that exposing myself in such an intimate way was the last thing I wanted.
Yet, I did it—I shared the first part of the book with the editor. And guess what? I was right. The manuscript wasn’t ready—according to him, too. He suggested I set it aside, let it rest, and write short stories, articles, anything but touch that manuscript. He also asked me—perhaps testing my resolve—if I was sure I even wanted to keep writing. “Why would you want that?” he asked.
It was a real setback, but it didn’t demotivate me. Not because I have a will of steel or anything like that. There are just some things I can’t live without. In other words, if I had to answer his question—“Why do I want to write?”—it’s not that I want to. It’s that I can’t do otherwise. I need it.
But as I said, at the time it felt like a setback, also because I focused mostly on the negative part of his feedback.
He had, in fact, shared valuable positive feedback. When I made an effort to develop a character with empathy and care—rather than rushing the story and piling up dialogue—he said he felt more connected to it. He also noted that he could sense when I was being honest and when I was hiding something. When I was free writing, he said he particularly liked my dark humor and sarcasm.
One always has to take feedback with a grain of salt, but this came from a professional in the industry who has analyzed hundreds of books, if not more, given his experience in the industry. Most of all, his opinion felt true to me; it resonated, and his tone was genuine.
Now, after following his advice for a while, I want to make the most of what I’ve learned and finally complete this first novel process.
To proceed, I realized I needed three things:
1) Accountability
2) A clear goal
3) A good method
And I think this blog gave me all three.
My goal, in fact, is to periodically review and publish a few paragraphs of my novel alongside what I’m already writing (spontaneous reflections, short stories, etc.). The people who enjoy reading my content will help keep me accountable. As for the method, I believe taking this slow-paced but consistent and rewarding approach—instead of trying to finish the whole thing all at once—will benefit my motivation and help me stay disciplined and loyal to my overall approach.
This whole plan or realisation is not an original idea of mine. In fact, I have to thank the WordPress community for sharing so much amazing content so openly and for inspiring me with their approaches and consistency.
If you’re interested in embarking on a similar path, I highly recommend checking out the blogs Faded Houses, Great – Almost Meaningful, and Edge of Humanity. Read their content and take note of how they structure their pages—it’s really well done!
So, to conclude, I’m going to follow this strategy: alternating between short stories, spontaneous reflections, and—primarily—my novel, which is written in Italian. I intend to keep it that way, as translating it into English, even though beneficial in terms of broadening my audience, would only add another layer of challenge, and my objective is to keep this process as lean, uncomplicated, and enjoyable as possible.
If you’re Italian, or have Italian friends interested in following a novel as it evolves toward publication, I warmly invite you to stay tuned and share this blog.
Your presence and feedback mean more than you know.
#37 The unexpected logistics of death
Listen to this post
I suppose we learn how to handle death, in practical terms, only when someone close to us—someone we are responsible for—dies. Then, we learn what to do to manage this unavoidable situation that each and every one of us will sooner or later experience, whether in first person or as observers.
Death is a topic on which I have reflected countless times. Like everyone on this planet, I have lost relatives and friends. But most of all, growing up in a small town in the north of Italy with a very old population, I witnessed on a weekly basis some aspects of the death of people I was acquainted with. We would hear the dramatic sound of the church bell’s gongs announcing someone’s death and then try to figure out who had passed away.
“Davide died, you know? The grandfather of Giulia, the girl your cousin doesn’t get along with,” someone would say, for example.
Then a few days would pass until the funeral procession, during which the relatives of the deceased would walk the silenced streets of the town with the funeral bier on their shoulders, followed by friends, until they reached the cemetery. But I was always clueless about the details of how to practically handle someone else’s departure from this world—and, honestly, it didn’t interest me at all.
I started to indulge in this morbid subject after reading the novel Of Fathers and Fugitives by J.S. Naudé.
In this book, the protagonist, Daniel, a queer South African writer living in London, goes through a series of experiences in which, at each stage, someone dies—and Daniel ends up being responsible for arranging their funeral.
There are three main scenarios of “regular” death that can occur: death in your country of residence, death abroad, and the death of a baby or a child. Daniel goes through all three major cases, for which, as far as I understand, proceedings vary.
For the sake of length, I will just try to imagine a “normal” death circumstance and outline what the main steps might be, assuming this would be the simplest and least emotionally involved scenario possible.
Let’s assume we recently moved into a shared apartment. One day, we come back home and find our flatmate lying on the floor; a glass of red wine spilled, leaving a stain on the carpet a few centimeters from their hand.
“Mike?” we say, expecting Mike to wake up from a random, early hangover. But Mike doesn’t move. As we get closer to the body, we notice that his eyes are open, his pupils in absolute stillness, his skin pale in an unnatural way.
After a moment of terror, we try to understand what to do next. We’ve seen enough crime series to know we shouldn’t touch either the body or the glass of wine—our fingerprints could incriminate us if, following an autopsy, it turns out Mike was the victim of a crime.
So we reach for our phone to contact the authorities. What’s the ambulance number? Or should we call the police? Big doubt… OK, let’s go with the police. But again—what’s the number? 112, 113, 118, or 911?
It can’t be 911—that’s from American movies. Let’s go with 112.
The person on the line introduces themselves, but we’re still in a state of shock and don’t really know who’s speaking. As the conversation with the doctor, nurse, or whoever continues, they ask a few questions to which we reply with a simple “I don’t know.”
They ask if the person shows any signs of life. “No, they are definitely dead—their eyes have been wide open since I came back, they haven’t moved, they’re pale like white paper.”
Then they start giving us practical instructions, and we become more receptive.
We’re told to wait for someone from the authorities to show up. It will take up to half an hour. They also stress that we should avoid touching anything at all, as it could interfere with a potential investigation.
After a moment of cooling down, the authorities arrive. For some reason, we feel agitated again. They behave in a strange way—they’re neither comforting nor accusative. They’re just very pragmatic, as if they’ve done this a thousand times before.
They ask a lot of questions: which room is Mike’s, his contact details, where we were before coming home, and so on. They suggest we take a few days off and contact someone who can support us.
They spend quite some time taking pictures and notes, and after an hour or so, they leave—with Mike wrapped in a white bag.
We stay in a weirdly empty apartment. And now?
Now, Mike’s closest family members are contacted and notified of his death. The first thing they have to do is obtain a death certificate, usually issued by a doctor or coroner.
The death certificate is essential for all the proceedings that follow, up until the execution of the will—if there is one. Even if you die young or unexpectedly, or if you have no belongings or wealth other than a few thousand euros, a death certificate is still required. It’s one of those things you don’t realize you need—until you do, even if you’re no longer alive to care!
While researching this, one thing that surprised me was that upon freezing the bank accounts, no money can be withdrawn—unless it’s a joint account or the deceased specified that the account should be payable to someone. Otherwise: bye-bye money—it all goes directly into the state’s pockets. One last tax payment!
Of course, upon notification, the employer stops the salary. Some employers claim to help family members resettle afterward, though I would take those promises with a grain of salt. In the end, it all comes down to contracts, signatures, and what was agreed upon when the employment contract was sealed.
The apartment. Mike didn’t own it, so his family just needs to notify the landlord.
Let’s assume he hadn’t paid rent for a few months, which might partly explain his early, random hangover: debts are also settled by the state—so that’s other people’s taxes covering this, I guess?!
Survivors are not liable… unless they co-signed a loan or had a joint account. So, think twice before doing either of those things with your partner. The relationship has to be built on solid grounds of honesty.
I’m sure I haven’t included many things here. But again, I’ve never been through such a situation. The truth is though, that the systems we rely on reduce life to paperwork, processes, and final payments. And yet, understanding these systems—even hypothetically—can give us a strange sense of preparedness, and maybe, even a little control in the uncontrollable.
One thing I am sure is incredibly important to keep in mind—during, and even years after—is the need for emotional and mental support, whether through our community or professionals. Some people’s lives are so intertwined with another’s that they’ve completely forgotten what it means to live alone—emotionally, financially, or otherwise.
#36 The comfort of a daily loop
Listen to this post
After forcing myself out of bed, performing my morning exercises consisting of some twenty minutes of light weightlifting, brushing my teeth, getting dressed, and running out to catch the tram, I finally enjoy my favourite moment of the workday: reading a book.
When I’m lucky, I find a seat near the window. I squeeze myself into a sort of one-handed self-hug, holding the book with my free hand, zoning out from everything around me as I get absorbed in whatever I’m reading. Sometimes, I glance at the screen displaying the remaining stops to calculate how many pages I can approximately read before the end of the ride—whether I can finish the chapter or not.
Before getting off to jump on the train that will take me to my final destination, I mark the line I have reached with my fingernail and put the bookmark in place. I walk as quickly as possible to beat other people waiting on the platform and secure a good spot to read undisturbed once again.
During this whole time, my biggest worries are a crying baby, a pair of talkative kids speaking a language I understand, people listening to loud music, or someone playing the guitar, singing, or begging for money. In those moments, I admit to entertaining some rather unsympathetic thoughts—not worth detailing, but let’s just say my imagination turns catastrophically sinister when the peace of my reading is disrupted.
I have breakfast at the supermarket. There’s a healthy buffet there. Very few people eat breakfast there, which gives me a few more minutes to read or listen to an audiobook before starting my shift.
During my lunch break, I return to the same supermarket buffet. I prepare my bowl and run to a park close by to find a bench where I can eat in peace, disconnecting from everything. After a few minutes of peace, I tend to speed up my eating to carve out some extra reading time before returning to work.
In the evening, I do the same routine in reverse on my way home. But once I’m home, I’m done—my body and brain just want a shower, some food, and silence before stretching into a few more pages of reading, a spontaneous blog post draft, a few scenes from a movie I’ll end up watching in episodes like a TV series, some time with my girlfriend when our schedules align, or simply a good, long night of sleep.
This repetitively pleasant routine, though, is a phase of rest. A pause that feels purposeful. I don’t yet know what it precedes, but I do know it’s necessary—an interval of stillness before the next thing begins, whatever that may be. And for now, that’s enough.
#33 Do we remember with honesty?
Listen to this post
The shape of memory
As we advance through life and its various phases, we evolve into something entirely different from what we initially were. Without acknowledging that change, we often forget what we used to be like as children. It’s difficult, though, to look back at our past objectively—we tend to use those memories to justify who we are today, rather than seeing them simply as integral parts of our journey.
Personally, I fluctuate between different emotional states when thinking about my past. Some memories I enjoy indulging in; others, I’d rather forget. However, when I think about the child I used to be—rather than specific events—everything becomes softer, more comfortable. I don’t mind stepping into that skin again. I still find myself in that child’s essence—not in their behaviors, but in their core, which remains a familiar and safe place.
Chaos, imagination, belonging
Until I was about seven, growing up in the high-crime Salvador of the 90s with a single mom, I spent most of my time confined within our residential building.
Aside from sporadic visits to my cousins or my mom’s friends’ kids, my daily social life revolved around that building. With only three children, including me, it was hardly a playground. The other two were brothers, so I wasn’t really part of their dynamic. In other words, I didn’t have much of a social life outside of school, weekends, and holidays.
After doing my homework, I would go kick a ball against the wall in the building’s garage—an underground block of cement with no trees and only a sliver of sunlight for a few hours a day. I had no dreams of becoming a Bebeto or Romário like the other kids. Hitting the ball against the wall just helped me release some stress, I suppose. On the few occasions I left the building for groceries, I got robbed. Once, I was even assaulted at knifepoint and returned home shirtless, stripped of a brand-new baseball cap I had received for Christmas. It may sound traumatic, but back then, everyone I knew had a similar story—whether kids or adults. Robbery was a disturbingly normalized part of our society.
Despite the repetitive, limited, and at times dangerous routine, I remember being a happy kid. I was alone most of the time, but I didn’t mind. I don’t recall ever begging my mom to take me to see people—maybe I did, I’m not sure. What I do remember is asking to go see a movie, buy a comic book, a toy, or a new set of colored pencils. I was really good at entertaining myself with drawing and reading. I also had strange little habits that excited me beyond reason—like memorizing the names of the cars parked outside our gate, which I would stare at for hours from our window while waiting for my mom to return from work. I guess boredom forced me to invent ways to stay entertained.
Whenever I did meet my cousins, I tried to make the most of it—even if that meant doing unusual or dangerous things. I had a constant urge to compensate for the apathy of my day-to-day life. I frequently joined street fights, often ending up beaten, as I tended to challenge older, bigger kids to heighten the adrenaline rush I craved. I would jump off cliffs, swim in stormy oceans, explore abandoned caves and cemeteries, break into buildings or stores just to steal something random. When caught, I’d deny everything with the most bizarre, creative lies imaginable.
Daring and breaking the rules meant being alive. It was my way of affirming that I existed. That need was likely unconscious at the time, but I can’t justify it any other way now.
I have to admit—I loved inventing stories, even if it drove my mom mad. I was always around when crazy things happened, partly because I had a knack for being in the wrong place at the right time, and partly because I was always nosing into other people’s business to compensate for the dullness of my life. I collected wild anecdotes and shared them with others, but I couldn’t help spicing them up. I’d exaggerate just enough to make the stories unbelievable—but I’d tell them with such enthusiasm that people began to believe them.
Once, while playing my car-memorization game, I saw a car crash right in front of our building. It was bad. The woman in the back seat of one of the cars lost consciousness and never woke up. The driver stumbled out, blood covering his face, shouting random nonsense. When my mom got home, I told her a kid had been catapulted from the car (there were no children involved), and that the driver had lost an arm and was screaming in a foreign language.
It’s hard to explain how often bizarre things happened around me. My cousin once threw a rock at a beehive and nearly died from the stings. I saw a girl drown in a stormy ocean. A friend broke his jaw and lost most of his teeth in a skating accident. I saw a gang fight. A gang member once let us hold his gun. And so on. Eventually, I began normalizing—and even seeking out—chaotic experiences. It’s no surprise my favorite movie genre was horror, which, I’m sure, made my mom question my mental health from time to time, though she often found it funny.
A different reality
What I sometimes observe is that my childhood gave me a constant state of alertness that still follows me, even after being “Europeanised”—used to a much less abnormal routine. I still double-check dark corners before walking through them, take wide turns, and instinctively keep my distance when a stranger approaches out of nowhere. The sound of fireworks? My first thought is gunfire.
By the time we moved to Italy, my childhood had already taken some wild twists. I had spent a year and a half living with my aunt and uncle, and their building was a treasure trove of experiences—a wonderland of children hungry for adventure. I bonded with them and collected a new set of PG-13, not-so-recommendable experiences. When I arrived in Italy, I was reactive, restless, troublemaking, and unreliable. My background didn’t match European standards—especially not those of the small town I ended up in. The integration process, both inside and outside my family, was difficult. I’ve talked about this in previous posts, and the re-education process was anything but easy. But that’s a story to dive in again another time.
There are parts of ourselves we hide to fit into the world. That’s a pity. When we’re in touch with who we really are, we know what we want and how to live in alignment with our core. Otherwise, we end up living someone else’s life. And that makes a huge difference. We are all a mixture of light and darkness, good and evil, boredom and excitement—whatever those words evoke in us. We do need to coexist with others, but before that, we need to exist in peace with ourselves and accept who we truly are.
