The snow on the day of Epiphany 
E 'two-way because my story that has been awarded is entitled The snow flakes and why we have to be accompanied to the entrance of Rovereto' highway.
The reception of the Friends of the journal The fury of the books "was very warm and I especially thank Bruma Zaffoni Maria Luisa Mora. The award ceremony was held in the auditorium in nothing less than beautiful complex Mart (Museum of Modern Art of Trento and Rovereto) in the range of City band concert.
For those who want to read, here's the story.
SNOW
The lobby of the station Santa Maria Novella is a huge corridor. No more afternoon and evening is not yet.
The bulletin boards of arrival and departure delays on delays in the order of hours. A female voice to the speaker is anxious to give notice without explaining why. Mysteriously, the movement towards the north is blocked at Milan, but also trains the Tyrrhenian line - the word contains the suggestion of the sea - they seem to follow a particular conception of time and inscrutable. The Red Arrows are no longer the symbol of speed.
A row of homeless shelters is placed under the external and internal. On each board a number of different roofing materials consist of a being who seeks hidden in his sleep a little 'heat. From a distance resemble huge shells.
Among the huddled bodies, smells of sleep and breathing noises that you meet.
In the small waiting room, which will close at midnight, there is very hot. Yes travelers departing crowd, just a seat, now is occupied, even from a bag. Close to each other, young Japanese couple doze with his hands clasped, looking for an intimacy too shy to be revealed in public.
A man sleeps with his head back, snoring loudly. It has the smell of travelers for days.
A young girl dressed all in black with several layers of clothing superimposed. He has a hard case lacquer red that contrasts with the rigor of its monochrome figure. Keep on talking to your phone to inform the whole tribe of his friends in the tragedy that is coming down on you: lose the plane for London. All these are forced into direct his play. He approached the door
an African girl. Find someone. Launches into a shifty eyes and walks away.
The woman's suitcase in the back of the room
in the closed part of the glass, a woman of uncertain age, is wrapped up in a big coat beneath which one perceives the heavy breasts and bellies full. E 'blonde, those that tend to reddish blond hair, face off. Beside him, a suitcase of an outdated model, which has now disappeared from the windows and wardrobes, so much out of fashion.
Brown with squared corners, the snaps and many old labels stuck here and there. The woman holds her close, almost on the right foot. The monitors continuously.
The door to the waiting room shutter opens by bringing a breath of fresh air. A skinny young woman enters dragging two trolley, disproportionate to her. It is jerky as if the stiff knees. The eye rests uneasily here and there, as you choose the place to sit. There is no choice and must decide on a place on the bottom of the room, close to two other women, one with the old-fashioned suitcase and the girl leaving for London. The woman's book
baggage system, then gets up twice, please use the monitor with the trains departing from and defers to sit disconsolate.
The thermometer in the lobby of the pharmacy +1 ° marks the station.
A guy comes in and says loudly "It's snowing!" Excited by the news. Suddenly, the mass of people half-asleep he wakes up in unison. Italians go out to block dragging your luggage, make a few steps toward the exit of the station and return inside.
The Germans get up noisily, without understanding exactly what's going on. Outside the waiting room has been made muffled sounds. She is not skinny
exit; has just raised his head from the book he is reading. It seems bothered by that diversity which has caused havoc. With one hand holding a book with the other mobile phone. Do not call, but it seems to wait a call or sms. Let the book fall to the ground. The bag lady picks it up and hands it to her.
"Oh, La musique d'une vie" reads the title directly translated into French. I did not know had been published in Italy. You like it? "
" But I do not know, I just bought "stammered in amazement.
"Makine tells a night at a station in the Urals paralyzed by a blizzard, full of passengers awaiting a train to Europe. A metaphor, or a true story, who knows. "
The woman of the book I had not noticed, I had other things to think about. The woman with the strange case, seemed to come directly out from an image of the 50's. After I was ashamed to think, but then and there I thought it was a homeless person asking for something. Instinctively I touched the bag to see if it was properly closed.
had a strange smile, sad and fading at the same time. It was not Italian, we have no woman would go around in clothes so out of fashion. I was surprised at the attention the book that I casually bought at the last minute. The author does not know anything. Who was this Russian who aroused so much interest in my neighborhood in the waiting room?
He began to speak with the voice of calm and persuasive who tells stories to children to make them sleep. He said the station of each city is a great observation point. "We are all waiting for: someone has to come to reach a place to start. Stages of a journey. "
I started to listen as a courtesy, and his speeches had caught my attention. For a while 'time I had managed to forget the reason for that trip and the phone call I was waiting spasmodically. The woman spoke of streets and squares of a magical Venice. He had the tone of one who is missing for many years and remembers a city filtered through all the charm of memory.
I had to be asleep because at some point I felt a light hand on his shoulder that shook me.
"Here comes the train to the Brenner pass, if that's what awaits you hasten: the track is already full. " I ran to the track, dragging my bags without even thank her.
He was right, the train was already full, and many tried to get pushed by any means. I managed to get help to pull up the trolley but I avoided the evil words of those who were in the hallway and you had to move to let me pass. When I finally arrived at my place I found him busy. The lady refused to get up saying he saw me with the controller. His neighbors turned her head away and no one offered to yield me the place, even for a leg of the trip. I would not have made to spend hours standing and was already thinking about going down and wait for the next when I heard someone call. "Come here."
recognized the voice of my neighbor in the waiting room. For the second time in a short time I felt inadequate in the face of the mysterious woman.
We settled in a narrow space between two cars, but at least it was not an obligatory point of passage, nor was it in front of the toilet. I put her back in a suitcase and sat on the other. The lady with her coat became instead a kind of pillow and sat on it.
could see the snow crystals that flows around the window glass. The woman's suitcase
was little snow that was falling than I had seen for many years during the winter, yet all those people it seemed fascinating, almost excited. Who does not dozing looked out the window. E 'Italy, the country of the sun by definition. The lady next to me
seems ill. It 's so thin that the bones appear to fall. His suffering is all within, and a lump of pain that prevents her from breathing.
The phone is buried in the pocket. He stopped to wait. Her eyes are closed but not asleep. I hear her sigh. I can not help but open my suitcase. First pull out the photos, then reread for the umpteenth time the court ruling condemning the soldiers to a ridiculous penalty, most recently the newspaper article of 2003 with the inauguration of the monument to the memory Chris. The lady opened her eyes and looks but does not ask for anything.
The woman of the book I still wonder if I have no regrets in leaving behind years of life with Stephen. No, no, even if something does not add anything, the only certainty is the feeling of having lost. Difficult determination of the suffering, it would take the balance with which the ancient Egyptians weighed the heart of the deceased to assess their weight. I have long suffered from the indifference, worse than indifference. I analyze my anxiety: I do not know what to find at the end of this trip. Hans not called me or sent a message. I'll find the station? I seem to feel the roughness of his beard and the warmth of his arms. But what has
this strange woman in the suitcase? It 's almost empty. Bring out documents in German, old photos. You're not some psychic problem! The woman's suitcase
"Where is it going?"
"In Bolzano. You? "
" I continue to return to Monaco and beyond Berlin
"A very long journey. When will it arrive? "
" 5, time to go to the cemetery where Chris is buried. I will leave a rose and a book of Brecht near the monument dedicated to him. If you want to tell her story. You see the guys in this picture? We were. Was taken from a customer outside the restaurant where she works. We came out with the waiters apron despite the cold. This has taken rather
Margaretha, my roommate, a Sunday in spring. Chris monkey in front of the lens. That 's your funniest photos, one of the few memories that still make me smile. He became a friend of Christian, a young waiter who was with us in the same room. The two boys had the same ideas: do not do military service under the scheme, go west. The two
There, as I call them. They are in front of the church of St. Thomas in Leipzig.
always think back to the snow that night when Chris told me he wanted to pass the Wall, I had to be quiet because he had come to the Swedish Prime Minister and that the soldiers would shoot. "We one step away from freedom, "he said. But it was a step away from the end.
That night, cold and clear, Chris Christian and waited it closed the restaurant, then headed for the Harmonie private garden plots on the banks of the canal. The Vopos demanded a halt and then fired to kill.
He died on the strip between the outer and inner wall. Courses when there had already been taken away. The snow was not white. There were fingerprints left the boots of the soldiers and the blood. "
This is the monument that the government has erected a few years ago. E 'horrible, but at least it's a sign that the big story also came from there. Tears streaming down her face thin
lady.
"A wound that has never stopped bleeding ... did not have a life, then?"
"Yeah, sure. I got married, had children, I divorced. Like everyone else. But the story of Chris I've never forgotten, not for sentimental reasons, as you might think, but because that night I felt the breath of history next to me and I've never been the same. An icy breath and intoxicating at the same time as the snow crystals. The mine will be a journey in memory of Berlin. Imagine moving from east to west, as the children hop from one foot to another.
Only later, I see with eyes as an adult, what is changed. Everything flows nicely, perhaps too much, and we have women preserve their memory. The men do and undo, the women stop to collect the memories, piece by piece, and put them back together. "
In Bolzano the woman with the book prepared to descend. After the conversation with the unknown, she felt lighter and stronger. It was about reclaiming their lives. If he had not found Hans
the station waiting for her, it would be granted a hot chocolate in the oldest coffee, without haste.
E 'two-way because my story that has been awarded is entitled 
