EDITORIAL

“T

he tired liturgy of hope which is renovated every end of the year, seems this time to be even more threatened by the national and international situation, weighed down with problems. A devastating economic crisis which here, in Puglia, has its most tragic aspect in the huge problem of the foundries of the Ilva steelworks in Taranto. I have used the words “weighed down” in a metaphoric sense but, exactly in Italy and in the United States, there have been real hurricanes, evidence that the scientists, who for decades had been dreading the greenhouse effect telling us to begin to respect nature more were more reliable than the jinx who were spreading the Maya prophecy, already proved untrue about the end of the world coming in 2012.

If reality is an enormous jigsaw puzzle of individual actions, we can only play our part in trying to improve things, by gathering the tools of goodwill and optimism, worn out by time but still intact and usable.

And then try – which is the most difficult thing – to “regain possession” of time.

I can remember, as if it were yesterday, an article in an English study book. The author reported that a few years earlier, as he was going into a telephone booth (cell phones were far from existing), he had found a notice stuck with adhesive tape, almost like a post-it, by an unknown person. On it one could read: “This isn’t a rehearsal, this is life, don’t miss it”. This message, which was a bit obvious and banal, had changed his life. He had reflected on the continuous postponements of things we really care for, on the illusory idea that we start to live as we want at the end of the numerous tasks which we think cannot be put off. “How often have we postponed that sailing, golf or horse-riding course that we really would have liked to do?”. But more and more duties arrive and “the life we would like to lead” moves further and further away, in a future that perhaps cannot be grasped.

Sometimes, instead, we should decide to ignore “duties” to start that sailing or horse-riding course, to buy and read a book of poetry or to go and listen to them read out by poets themselves. We should, even in the heart of winter, try and treat ourselves to a walk on a beach or in the green of the countryside. Simple, “sustainable”, at zero cost but crucial in order to regain possession of the ancestral and vital relationship with nature. We should find the time to talk to the people we love, the time to do volunteer work, the time to re-design and reassess the plot of human relationships which are the most valuable nourishment for the heart and the mind.

Among our end-of-the-year thoughts, instead of plans, let’s try and treat ourselves to choices and actions.

Happy New Year to all of you!