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From the Terrace

And in the end, they put me on the terrace.

Not that I wasn't comfortable: after all, I've always been a writer from the terrace. Yes, I know that classically it's called Ivory Tower. Except I'm not so classy. And above all the elephants have done me no harm. So I don't need to obtain an entire building out of their fangs. The metaphorical principle, however, is still valid, albeit with a small variant: from the terrace people see you, it doesn't work as well as a den.

This world increasingly invokes the participation of writers in social contexts, it asks to those who write to give voice to the masses, to leverage the power of words. I've always pulled back. I admit it. My writing tells about individuals, in their fallible and partial vision. My stories are all embedded in the belief that the existence of each of us unrolls mainly within us.

This is why I love being on my terrace. Sometimes, though, I need to go out. And then I hide inside a crowded bus, I try to palpate the mood of the street with my ears. Why not? I also feed on the recurring speeches in the offices or the inertial ones of the rare social occasions in which I'm forced to take part. Better to not throw away anything of conversations, not even wastes. So I rummage through them, hoping to find a piece of inspiration still in good condition.

Yes, I am the most unexpected one: the guy sitting on the seat behind yours who seems to have nothing to say. And maybe it really is. But don't worry too much, that guy has always been too busy perceiving himself. He will retain about you only what is most functional to him, I would bet. He won't steal your soul, because then he won't know who to sell it to. On the contrary, he would gladly give you a piece of his, since it's too bulky inside him.

I have been thinking this for some time, I was already writing it about ten years ago, in one of my novels:

And this is precisely the difference between me and those who have always been around me: the others live while I watch myself living. One who lives feels truthfully a good part of the range of human sensations. I, on the other hand, have always spent a lot of my time making myself a guinea pig to study. Heisenberg states that it is not possible to know the position and momentum of a particle simultaneously with absolute precision. This assertion is known as the uncertainty principle. So, in an equivalent way, it is not possible to live and at the same time analyze one's life, as if we were strangers: because when we are studying, in the act of spying on ourselves, we inevitably change our behavior, our spontaneity, (in short ) life itself, which we make no longer authentic. On the other hand, if we just live, we will never have a correct interpretation of ourselves.

Maybe that's why I need my terrace. From there I can look, but without interacting. Times can dilate, my thoughts can linger slowly, drag on for minutes, because after all, participation is not required. Even at the cost of missing something.

Then, one day, I've been put on the terrace by law.

Physically, I mean. No more buses, no conversation bins to rummage through. Just me and my thoughts. Everything could happen only in my head. Even what I could see had to be processed within me, without any external confirmation.

Spring has arrived and it is thanks to that terrace that I noticed it. The days began to warm up, to invite us to go out. But it wasn't possible to do so. Most of the time there was no one outside. They were all on their respective terraces or completely enclosed within very solid walls. Some reassured, others impatient. Let me admit it: having my terrace was a privilege and a great fortune.

And I end the metaphor here, because it's getting boring. Quite right?

Like life is sweet to most people in the early years, similarly I serenely get up and look out in the morning. Something has changed, but not much: there is a strange feeling in the air, people do not speak, they remain at a distance. But they're there, waiting. A bit like me, I try to decipher this new reality. I live in a place that cannot completely close. Near the house, I have some essential services. And the users of essential services are providing me the most essential service: the certification that a life apart from me exists. Unless everything is my construction. But I've never been a big fan of solipsism.

“Stay there, don't leave. I beg you." I am going to taste this new dish of existence and I wish the morsel is not so bitter. But everyone does what they have to, then they go away. They continually replace each other.

Except for the old man down there. He is there, walking in the parking lot. Alone, at best he greets someone from afar. I don't know how he does it, if he is good at escaping the invitations to return home or if he's simply tolerated. But he is always there, for several hours of the day. He will be my angel, the most reassuring thing of these cursed days.

In the afternoon, apparently, essential services become a little less essential and people begin to thin out. A bit like in life, when you enter adulthood. Few remain around. Nobody does it on purpose, but often this is how it happens.

I stay on my terrace, with my coffee, but all I see is the spring that goes on. And the old man who walks almost until sunset. The first one is too slow. It mutates, I notice it from the thickening foliage. But I can't perceive it. It is a painting that I would have appreciated at other times, now I can't wait for the next morning.

I realize that I love being a sentry, not a hermit. As I believed instead.

Evening, who is my favorite playmate, betrays me. It escapes from my hands, goes to spread in a quiet that is asphyxial, mediocre, devoid of poetry and suggestiveness. I, who hate the noise of the scooters that rev up under my house, now I would pay to hear one. Even a car would be fine, but often my wishes are not fulfilled. I drink a glass of wine, it helps me to fall asleep, but not to dream. Perhaps because the daytime landscape is already too dreamlike.

And finally some divinity of an unknown and distant sky changes again the rules of the game: the terraces are no longer mandatory, but they should still be considered trendy. People don't seem to be convinced, anyway.

The road comes to life again, spring advances and makes people want to uncover their arms. I glimpse beautiful female figures walking. Only the figures, the beauty of the hidden face is granted on trust. The old men are not isolated, they walk in groups, talk, laugh. I can only guess so, but with a vague certainty.

Two youngsters, a boy and a girl, sit down there under the lamppost. They are perfectly in the cone of light, but the beam is a patina that shields them, that makes them unreachable. With a gesture of tenderness, they return to kiss. They first try to bring in contacts only the fabrics that cover their mouths, then even those fall stealthily.

A group of friends arrives, they're boys in their early teens. They are all on bikes, they seem organized to ride to the Moon. But their feet remain still. For hours. It is their thought the one that's traveling. Their words, which reach me only in the most daring trills, convey all the charge accumulated over the weeks.

Older boys return to play the ball. In a circle they try to launch it with almost acrobatic gestures, they discharge energy even where it's not needed. There is also a dog that joins the group. It is the happiest of all, it hasn't understood anything of this fickle humanity. But in the end, it doesn't care at all. The ball now takes all its attention.

And I stay here on my terrace. Drinks go down my throat more smoothly. And I go back to cursing the noisy scooters that tie the flow of my thoughts.

What did you say? Should I judge, make my voice heard? No, don't ask this to me. I'm just the one watching from the terrace.

Oh, I forgot: now the old man no longer walks under my house. I don't need it anymore.