psychologically new

It's just a date, one second after another, because in fact we are still the same we were the second before, there was no real break, no interruption, no coming back to the beginning. But when the year changes, there is really a feeling of starting over. And starting over is again being able to feel the possibility of doing what we have never done, of changing what we have not yet changed. Of creating new discipline, organizing priorities, setting new - or old - goals. And avoiding the same mistakes. All with the intent of improving ourselves, and grabbing life harder than ever before.
It's a fact that most of the times plans are forgotten, or swollen by the strength of life itself, after only a few days of the new year have gone by. But just this feeling of a new beginning, of a fresh new opportunity, is so many times all it takes for a new thrust, to feel expectation for the future, to believe once again that all is possible. And who knows, maybe all really is!

When he hear on the news that one of our teenage years idols has suffered a stroke, we realise there is only one thing to conclude: he are getting old.

Old

Closer to us or farther, it's a strange feeling when they go away. The old. As time goes by, sooner or later, each one of us must learn the lesson that, as each old person leaves this life, we become orphans of the past. The guardians of the child we where, where them. The guardians of the rocking wood horse, of the pedal race car, of the warm sweetened glass of milk, of those stirred eggs, of the chocolate bar on weekends, of the afternoon learning how to make pon-pons or the morning learning how to pray while making the bed, or the nights listening to tales with friends. Things we let fade for we rest asure, the old will guard them, while we are busy living. To them we have trusted our oldest memories, they are the trunk where we let our infance kept safe. But time takes one, then another. They depart, the houses are emptied, objects are scattered, all fades. Almost as if the precious safe places of our past have been violated. And suddenly it all comes back to us, those little unimportant details, in a vain attempt to hold on to the content inside that trunk.
It was with the old that we could be kids. It was with the old that we could still be silly and naughty, without being reprehensed. It was with the old that we were still only ten. They leave and take with them the child we will never be again. The adult stays behind, now the lonely guardian of faded memories. Trying to figure out how was it that time passed. In the blink of an eye.

These are the ones...!

These are the ones that most irritate me. Great defenders of nature, truly offended by the lack of civilized attitude and the indifference of others. The firsts to point their fingers at whoever doesn't give a damn about ecology and lives without ever thinking that it's their duty to recycle.

These are the exact same ones I watch everyday, carelessly throwing huge amounts of paper into the trash can. After all it's so much closer, here under the desk, so much closer than any recycling point.

These are the ones I just want to pick up from the floor and throw in the organic trash can. The world definitely doesn't need to recycle these ones.

People should never have the presumptuousness of thinking they know what we feel and why we feel it. They would have had to have lived their whole life in our skin. And even then....

Little great courage

It was a Saturday night. But that fever had been in him for years, perhaps since he could remember himself.
For the first time ever he was doing that. He was nervous. Nervous and alone. But he was even more tired. Tired of watching others – and himself gutless.
He slipped his feet in his slippers, rolled up his jeans, put on the glasses on his kid face, and forced his chubby body out of the house.
The way over seemed three times longer, but he walked it with no hesitation, with determination in his steps and expectation in his heart.
He entered alone. It was a Saturday night and the bar was packed. Waiting for him was no wave, no smile, no friendly face, no table with friends, no word of incentive.
Still, he walked through the bar like it was empty and he listed up his name and the music that for many years only the walls in his room had heard him sing. And alone at a table, he sat his chubby body and waited. Minutes dragged but the moment came swiftly.
Half of the people in the café didn’t even hear is name be called. Of all of those with their back to him, one or two turned their heads for an instance, to see who was next.
I was one of those seating towards him. That little square that was used as a stage lifted him an enormous few inches above the rest. And exposed the kid face behind the glasses, the chubby body not yet a man, the jeans rolled up to his knees and the slippers on his feet.
That kid, with that look, was really going to sing, before all those beautiful well dressed people. And that precise music?
Without knowing him, I feared for him, and for the shame he would very soon go through. I was sure. But now he was up there and it was too late.
The music started. And when the voice spreaded through the air, through the people, through the tables, the kid face, the rolled up jeans, the glasses, the chubby clumsy body, all was gone. And to surface came a man, a courage, a talent. The only unpleasant thing that came to surface was my prejudice.
Damn world where we learn to judge by the image. How much talent must remain forever forgotten in a corner, because the outside doesn’t correspond to it, according to our preconveived ideas?
I watched him go back to the table alone. Everyone applauded but no one spoke him a word. I too remained in silence, giving thanks to those that, like him, have these little great acts of courage. I didn’t have one to go and talk to him. But I entrusted myself with the hard task of never again seeing a person before knowing it.
Thank you, chubby boy.