A man of peace

Simplicity, honesty, kindness and humility can change a territory and the relationship between people

There are men who enter the memory of a country not for reasons related to popularity induced by social media, television, cinema or some involuntarily received artistic gift, but enter it for a humble life spent in truth. And these figures are the ones I prefer.

Valerio was a dear friend of mine. He was the first person I met when I moved to a small mountain village in the province of Varese, and he was the one who facilitated my family's integration into a context that promised to be rather closed. Head of the local Civil Protection, as well as a fundamental pawn of various voluntary associations present in the area, a man who with his life has shown the difference between those who choose to take care of the common home and those who instead decide to suffer their liabilities deterioration. But unfortunately Valerio left us soon, too soon. A sudden illness interrupted the many projects he was pursuing, leaving his friends and family breathless.

Beyond the infinite physical absence that death produces, there are people who, due to what they have built, do not allow death itself to extinguish its light, thus continuing to live in the actions and memories of the community that loved them. Forever.

Valerio was a simple, honest, kind, humble, thoughtful man, and this unusual normality made him special. There are men attracted by public affirmation, by wealth, by power, and unwilling, except in rare cases, to share a world that is less screamed, less interested, and which would ultimately be even more profitable for them, but Valerio was perfectly 'opposite to. I shared with him how to look at a forest, how to listen to it, how to experience its shadows and empty spaces, how to make it even more useful, how to recognize its gifts, but above all how to spread the importance of its existence and the need for its care. I don't know if he ever understood the importance of his presence in my life, and I don't even know if he himself considered himself an exception to the ugliness we are used to; what I know for sure is that Valerio managed to light a flame of hope, passion, love, in so many people that he can never be forgotten.

A year after his death, the community where he spent his entire life felt the need to underline the importance of his life in all of them, and continues to celebrate him tirelessly: a group of friends dedicated him a memorial stone on the summit of one of the mountains that he climbed continuously, others an open-air museum among the trenches built on the edge of the Second World War, and which tells of Peace as the only response to the madness of war, and there are many other occasions where remembered as an example to follow. Even if, and I am sure of it, that Valerio as a meek man, humble as he was, will not much appreciate our need to assign his name to a stone, a path, or any other large or small building that we could dedicate to him, and I I imagine him intent on tidying up the clouds while laughing at us still attached to our earthly habits. But we, his villagers, are like that and I am convinced that he will forgive our weaknesses with the same smile.

After all, I too, writing this article dedicated to him, have been looking for a way to remember him once again, and it certainly won't be the last. Valerio is a perfect protagonist of my column, because It starts from 1 wants to tell the beauty that exists everywhere and, in Valerio, the beauty was kept in his soul.

Valerio showed the difference between those who choose to take care of the common home and those who instead decide to suffer its passive deterioration

Max Laudadio

NP Novembre 2022