One day I discovered that Papà sells Mamma’s paintings to his one-night stands and makes them donate to his Third World volunteer project of the moment. They buy them without batting an eyelid. I yelled at him, ‘You make me sick!’ But I didn’t really think that.
‘What do you want from me?’ he started yelling too. ‘Your mother’s been able to quit work and devote herself to shades of colour. Dozens of starving people can eat thanks to the money from her paintings. And she believed she was a painter. For years I watched her ominous skies as I tried to make her laugh. Have you ever wondered whether I was enjoying myself? You always just explained it away as “Papà’s a strange guy.” Fucked if I’m a strange guy.’
Mamma collects postcards. Our favourites are Punta Is Molentis and the long series of the beaches of Chia. But even though they’re nearby, we can’t go there because we don’t know the way.
We imagine the broom on the rocks, or the sea stock with the water as a backdrop. Or those yellows and purples all velvety and mossy in the silence. We imagine what it must be like to moor at a wooden pier and walk along the path to the lighthouse, with that strip of light passing across you over and over again like a caress on your wounds.
And they’re all things that God has made for us, so that we can enjoy them.