Friday 29 December 2017

The Doctor I'll miss the most

I really have no idea why, but for the first time in my life as a whovian, I'm still crying because Peter Capaldi left the role.

Maybe it's his amazing acting, which left me breathless in more than one occasion, or maybe it's all the magnificent episodes that I loved - "Mummy on the Orient Express", "In the Forest of the Night", "Heaven Sent", "The Husbands of River Song", "Smile", "The Eaters of Light", "Twice Upon a Time" to name but a few.

Maybe it's because I had the honour of translating all his episodes for the Italian adaptation and dubbing, trying to do my best to transfer in Italian the magnificent words all the writers have scripted for the Twelfth incarnation of this legendary character.

Or maybe there is something deeper, maybe I needed support in my long years of mourning and the Twelfth Doctor arrived just in time, a year or so (about which I don't remember much) after Alberto's death.

I really have no idea, but I loved the Twelfth Doctor like I never liked any Doctor before. He got under my skin and he's still there. Probably for as long as I'll live.

Now the circle has closed. I started loving Peter Capaldi's Doctor since his first moments, and I adored his last.


I'm looking forward, when my time will come, to tell Alberto all about him and his adventures!









Sunday 10 December 2017

Chi non conta i soldi che ha...

... è perché ne ha così tanti che sarebbe inutile visto che può permettersi tutto, oppure è perché ne ha così pochi che non può permettersi niente.

Non so dove sentii questo detto per la prima volta, ma è verissimo: quando Alberto è morto ho continuato la buona abitudine che mi aveva insegnato, ovvero contare ogni centesimo per sapere in ogni momento quali piccoli o grandi sogni potevamo permetterci. Poi...

... poi tra prestiti che ho fatto e non ho mai più rivisto, spese che non avevo previsto, la perdita del lavoro continuativo e i debiti con lo Stato che ho scoperto di avere, nel giro di un anno ho esaurito il piccolo gruzzoletto che ci eravamo messi da parte per rinnovare l'Ammiragliato.

Da allora, non conto più niente. Da allora la banca è diventata solo il posto dove i soldi arrivano e poi sfumano velocemente. Non mi ero neppure resa conto che la mia banca è stata comprata da un'altra banca - ironicamente la stessa che aveva comprato la prima banca in cui Alberto ed io aprimmo il nostro primo libretto di risparmio insieme!
E col cambio di banca è cambiato anche l'IBAN del mio conto.

Visto che da allora vivo del buon cuore di molti amici e familiari che mi aiutano a integrare l'assegno sociale di mia madre con cui paghiamo cibo e bollette, è bene che io comunichi questo IBAN se non voglio farvi avere problemi.

Ecco dunque le mie nuove coordinate bancarie... e se vi chiedete perché le renda pubbliche... beh, c'è talmente poco sul mio conto (spesso in rosso) che chiunque volesse prenderlo di mira per prelevare quel che c'è non mi cambierebbe la vita di una virgola!


Grazie a tutti coloro che sempre mi aiutano. Senza di voi sarei dimagrita ben oltre quel che sto dimagrendo per la gastrite!
Vi voglio bene!

******

[for my English speaking readers]

Those who do not count the money they have...

... it's because they have so many it's not worth the effort - they can afford everything - or it's because they have so few they can't afford anything.

I do not know where I heard this saying for the first time, but it's very true: when Alberto died I kept on counting - as he taught me - every cent in order to know in every moment what small or big dreams we could afford. Then...

... then with loans I made and were never returned, expenses that I had not foreseen, the loss of my steady jobs and the debts with the State that I discovered I had, within a year I ran out of money - the little sum we were setting aside to renew the Admiralty was gone.

Since then, I no longer count money. Since then my bank has become just the place where money comes and then quickly goes away. I did not even realize that my bank was bought by another bank - ironically the same that had bought the first bank in which Alberto and I opened our first bank account together!
And with this change, the IBAN of my account has also changed.

Since I have been living on the good heart of many friends and family who help me supplement my mother's social check - with which we pay for food and bills - I better communicate this IBAN if I do not want you to have problems.

So here are my new bank account details... and if you wonder why I write them on a public blog... well, there is so little money on my account (often negative balance) that anyone who might hacker it to steal what's in it, would not change my life at all!


Thanks to everyone who always helps me. Without you I would have lost more weight than what I am losing for gastritis!
I love you!


Wednesday 6 December 2017

Ghost of life past

The days from December 8th to January 6th are the worst for me, every year, and the feeling of terror is growing.
Terror of facing those days without the usual festive activity of buying a new Christmas tree (a real one, which we planted in the garden afterwards), of putting on the lights in the kitchen and outside, of thinking about which present we would be buying for ourselves. I miss Alberto and me doing those things!
This time of year is the moment when the ghost of life past visit me. It tells me of the life I lost, it opens the drawers and the doors of wardrobes forcing me to look at all those things that belonged to that life.
At first, the year after Alberto's death, the visit of the ghost was kind of welcome, because I could plunge into a sea of nostalgic and soothing memories. Now it is the opening of an abyss of pain and terror.
Every time I look at Alberto's collections there is only one though in my mind: he is not here to enjoy all these things. He will never be able again to take some old comic book or magazine and smell it, smiling with joy.
Our home is as dead as he is, soulless, empty. It's always like this, but more so during the end-of-year's festivities.
I wish I could skip these days, go to bed and wake up in mid January... or better... not wake up at all!

Saturday 18 November 2017

What's real?

Today I miss Alberto so much that my mind is blurred - I can't seem to know what's real and what's not.


Six years have passed since I made this wallpaper for my computer, when I was working side by side with Alberto on the same desk. And yet, it seems like yesterday when he smiled at me watching himself as a wallpaper along with some of my favourite actors at the time.

Now I have the same wallpaper on my new computer, along with many other Alberto's pictures. Only his smiling or smirking or serious face watch me from my screen now, and today I feel that my life is inside those pictures, while out here everythins tastes unreal...




Tuesday 24 October 2017

Stressed & depressed

Why am I giving up all the little stressing activity that I can, even if I wished to continue? Because I have ongoing stressing things I have no power to avoid!

Alberto is dead, nothing and nobody can bring him back to me. Every joyful moment I live is also a horrific reminder I am alone! This year, 2017, would have been our 30th anniversary together., but he's not with me. To watch the new Star Trek movies and series is like having my half- heart ripped in pieces and stitched up, over and over...

Our money was stolen and I still waiting for it to be returned. And because of this I am in debt with the State. I always hated to own money to anybody, Alberto and I never ever bought something unless we had the whole amout to pay for it.

I have no steady job, no daily routine, no fixed schedule. And I can't work for the same client twice or I'd be obliged to have a VAT number again! If my income goes over 5000 euro per year I'll be fined!

I don't live on my own, I have the responsibility of caring for my mother and those rare times I go out the house I have to contact her every ten minutes or so to avoid her panic attacks. I love her, she let me be the woman I am today. I can't  and I don't want to avoid this responsibility.

Our (Alberto and mine) house is starting to fall apart, and I have no mental or physical strength  to patch it up.

These are things I can't do anything about. These are the things that I face every single second of my half a life, while I am awake and when I'm asleep.  That's why I cannot endure more stress. I feel like a rubber band stretched to its limit and I'm about to snap...

------

Perché sto rinunciando volontariamente a tutte le piccole attività che mi stressano, anche se vorrei continuare a farle? La ragione è che ho continui stress che non jo il potere di evitare!

Alberto  è morto e niente e nessuno me lo restituirà. Ogni momento di gioia che vivo è anche un orribile promemoria che sottolinea il mio essere da sola! Quest'anno, il 2017, sarebbe stato il nostro trentesimo anniversario insieme,  ma lui non c'è.  Vedere nuovi film di Star Trek e la nuova serie è come sentirmi il cuore fatto a pezzetti e ricucito ogni volta, in continuazione...

Ci hanno rubato i soldi e sto ancora aspettando di riaverli. E per questo sono in debito con lo Stato. Ho sempre odiato dovere dei soldi a qualcuni, Alberto ed io non abbiamo mai comprato qualcosa se non avevamo tutti i soldi per farlo!

Non ho un lavoro stabile, nessuna routine giornaliera, nessuna scadenza fissa. E non posso lavorare per lo stesso cliente due volte o sarei obbligata a riaprire la Partita IVA! Se i miei introiti superano i 5000 euro l'anno vengo multata.

Non vivo da sola, ho la responsabilità di prendermi cura di mia madre e quelle rare volte che esco di casa devo tenermi in contatto con lei ogni decina di minuti per evitarle attacchi di panico. Le voglio bene, lei mi ha lasciato la libertà di essere la donna che so o oggi. Non posso e non voglio togliermi questa responsabilità.

La nostra casa (di Alberto e mia) comincia a cadere a pezzi, e non ho la forza mentale né fisica di riimtterla a posto.

Queste sono cose su cui non ho alcun potere. Queste sono le cose che affronto ogni singolo secondo della mia mezza vita, sia quando sono sveglia, sia quando dor o. Ecco perché  non posso più avere altri stress. Mi sento come un elastico teso al limite e sto per spezzarmi...



Tuesday 17 October 2017

30 years ago...

...our lips touched for the first time. And we bonded forever and beyond.
The last time your lips were cold, but I hope one day soon our souls will start kissing each other again.

Wednesday 14 June 2017

Round figures and alternate universes

30 years ago tonight, at 19:30, I was born and I didn't know it. Not back then.
Now I know.

And I know that if Alberto was here, we would be preparing a nice party - only for us or for friends too - to celebrate. Thirty years and 6 of marriage. And since traditionally, the 6th wedding anniversary material is "candy", we would have certainly prepared something very sweet to eat - maybe a huge tray of bomboloni with custard, or a big mille-feuille cake, like the ones Alberto had for his birthday parties!

But, alas, I'm not living in that reality. I live here, in my personal nightmare where my life has gone.

I could be writing about the many things that I didn't like in the past years, months, weeks, days, but that would mean to hurt people I love, to expose friends, and to make my usual and biggest mistake - talk without lying.
I could make a list the many things that happened in these years since I lost my life, I have to remember them in details to tell Alberto when I'll meet him again, but my memory is already forgetting a lot and I'm afraid I will not be able to make the list complete enough.

So I'd rather start a trip...

A trip into another dimension. Into that alternate universe where Alberto still lives. I will be only a visitor, because I don't want to spoil the party to the other Gabriella, the one who's happy, the one who's whole.
I'll watch with my mind's eye, imagining all the wonderful things Alberto and Gabriella will do today. On their happy 10959th day together, trying to forget that in my reality we lived together only 9333 days...

June 14th, 2011
Our wedding 24 years after we first met



Sunday 26 March 2017

Distractions

To be distracted from my nightmare is increasingly difficult. Each day is harder than the day before.
Nothing I do, or say, or watch, or think have lingering effects. As soon as I stop what I'm doing, as soon as chats with friends and family ends, as soon as the movie or episode I'm watching ends... immediately my mind is inundated by this one, huge, terrible nightmare.
The more I strive for distractions, the more my nightmare grows strong. And the worst thing of all is that I know I will never wake up from the nightmare, all my efforts will amount to nothing - Alberto will never live again.

Saturday 18 February 2017

Poche parole...

... poche parole perché queste sono tutto ciò che la mia mente oggi riesce a mettere insieme. Ho passato le ultime ore immersa nella (ri)lettura dei post del blog di Giacomo Pueroni, che ha lasciato il mondo orribile dov'era vissuto negli ultimi tempi per andare... da qualche parte. In un "luogo inesplorato" dal quale non si torna. Lo stesso luogo dov'è Alberto.

Eravamo nati nello stesso anno, noi tre, a distanza di pochi mesi. Prima Giacomo, poi io, poi Alberto. E quando ci incontravamo per i compleanni, invariabilmente io dicevo a Giacomo "Ti ho raggiunto!" e Alberto diceva a noi "Vi ho raggiunto!" come se fosse una piccola gara in cui le posizioni erano quelle che il destino aveva scelto per noi.
Per qualche morbosa emozione, pensavo che per la nostra dipartita il destino ci avrebbe riservato l'opposto: prima Alberto, poi io e poi Giacomo. Ma non è successo così. Io sarò l'ultima, stavolta, a dire "Vi ho raggiunto!"

Prima o poi accadrà, nel frattempo aspettatemi e divertitevi!






For my English speaking readers

Just a few words, because that's the best my mind can do today. I spent the last few hours immersed in reading (again) some posts on Giacomo Pueroni's blog. He left the horrible world where he lived lately to go... somewhere. In an "undiscovered country" from where nobody returns. Where Alberto is too.

We were born in the same year, the three of us, a few months one from the other. First Giacomo, then me, then Alberto. And when we met at our birthdays I invariably told Giacomo "I reached you!" and Alberto told us "I reached you!" as this was a little race where our positions were those the fate had decided for us.
For some morbid feeling, I thought that our way to leave this world fate had in store exactly the opposite: first Alberto, then me and then Giacomo. But it didn't happened. I will be the last this time, to say to you "I reached you!"

Sooner or later it will happen, in the meanwhile wait for me and have fun!


Monday 2 January 2017

Perfect words...





Let the dishes wait, no need in dusting
No reason to clean the dirty floor
'cause I'm sure it doesn't matter
Now that he has gone away
I have no plans for the future 'cause he's not here today
Let them go to the park and I'll sit alone here in the dark
No joy left in my heart anymore
Let me hold on to my memories

And if I die this way just let it be
I have no plans for the future 'cause he's not here with me
Why should I comb my head when I know I'm not going anywhere
Why should I keep right on giving when I've lost my only reason for living
So go on, just go on and have yourself a ball
I have no plans for the future 'cause he's not here
I have no plans for the future 'cause he's not here at all