La Matriarca

Eric Leohner
Aug 27, 2017 · 13 min read

The hardest thing to do is put words on a perfectly blank page. So, you leave the cream-colored notebook empty, because you think it’s prettier as is. But time goes by and you grow older while the pages stay just as empty. Out of fear of ruining the book, nothing gets written at all.

And that’s the saddest thing of all. It’s tantamount to a life unlived. The days go by, but nothing worthwhile fills them up. By the time we start to think about scratching up the paper, half the book is mysteriously gone. The pages fell out. There’s less space to write. So you panic. You panic because some of that pristine paper is no more. It was comfortable. It was easy. But now it’s gone and you have nothing to show for it.

So you go about life thinking you’re an imbecile. But the paper is still so nice. That’s where people get caught up. And the sum of civilization falls between two extremes: the people with blank books and the people with scratched up and beaten books. And it’s the people with the ragged books covered up and down with ink and tears and rain and tears who actually mean anything to the world.

We sat at a table. Ferdinando preferred his gin over just a bit of ice and drank it religiously. A glass is as much a sacrament, he’d declare. Something always has to die for something to be made. A sign of the cross for the juniper.

Dark hair, dark eyes. A thin face with lightly tanned skin that ran to a point. He looked like an Apennine wolf. Sweat beaded around his glass.

“What I’m getting at,” he paused as he lifted the gin, “is you’re going to die.”

He drank the spirit. “We’re all going to die. And the morons of the world wander nowhere with their unwritten books. That’s where it’s all wrong.”

“And what do you think of your book?” I countered lightly.

“It’s full and I’ve never read it. I’m too busy writing it to read it. Still, I could tell you all about it.”

We continued drinking and bantering for half an hour.

He got up to put his hat on. Taking one last drink of gin and turning toward me, he said, “You know, Niccolo. Rise soon.”

With that he turned away and threw some coins on the table.

“Non ti preoccupare. Offro io.

Then he vanished into the city as he always did.

I finished my drink. By now it was mostly culaccino. There was not much else to do, but then also everything to do.

Stupido, stupido, stupido! All the hours. Gone like flies. Am I not one of them? How easy it is to chastise yourself.

I awoke shortly before eight. Nothing new. Old sun. Old windows. Old curtains. The bed was small and hard. It was a Saturday. There was nothing to do.

What use? The day ahead had no preoccupations. The breeze would dance in and out of the window.

My head ached a bit. The city noise streamed in. The dim room lit with sound and streaks of sunlight. The coffee almost finished. A chunk of bread and coffee as black as night made as good as any start to the day.

I thoughtlessly raised the cup. Just before it touched my lips, the waking world struck me. Today. Now. Oggi. The offwhite cup trickled with marron drips down the side.

Basta!

I wasn’t hungry anymore. No one needs bread. Not now. I threw on some clothes and drank the remainder of the coffee quickly. A sin, for sure. But now is never the hour for repentance. The day sat outside. It’s age only ticked forward.

Through the streets people wandered. Everyone went somewhere to wind up nowhere. Or nowhere to wind up somewhere, if they were lucky. And I likewise went. And as habit I would go nowhere. Everyone looked magnificently unique. And yet everyone still looks plain. It’s easy to think of people as thousands of passing photographs, and the majority are painfully similar to others you’ve seen before. They get lost in the sea of photographs, of people, of faces.

The train rattled out of the station. The sun passed behind some passing clouds. Across the aisle from me sat an older man. He poured a glass of wine. The delicate gestures of his hands moved everything precisely. This was a ritual for him, one that he had mastered long ago. All the more impressive when met with the jolts of the train.

And at some point he noted my existence and my observation. He turned with a smile and beckoned me over.

Ciao, grande!

Giorno.

“Wine?” he offered as he pulled a glass out of his bag. “No need to be shy or polite.”

Perché no? I replied after a momentary hesitation.

And we drank in relative silence. All the while he looked pensively at his glass, up at me, and out the window.

“Where are you heading?” he broke the stillness after a few minutes.

“Alevino.”

“Ah, that’s beautiful country! Nestled right among the large hills.” His cheeks swelled up and turned bright.

“And you?”

“I decided to take a trip to the far coast.”

“What’s taking you over there?”

“Honestly? I’ve never been before. In all my years, it seemed like I had no need to go.”

“What changed?”

“I woke up and realized I’d never been there before. And what kind of a sin is it to exist not so far from someplace and never go?”

I took a large sip of wine at the thought of that. So many people get stuck in the details of life that they forget to live it.

“How long will you be gone?”

“As long as it takes.”

He said it sincerely. Looking at him, I knew he’d be gone until he came back, however long that would take. And it would take exactly that long.

“How are you paying for it, if I may ask?”

He laughed and drank his wine.

“Enough money is always around if you’re willing to go out for it, to find it and get it. I used to work the routine desks. All well and good, but you’re a sad sap if you get stuck in them. I just built up enough odd skills that I could offer to people just about anywhere. I decided to press my luck with it. Money’s not always so flowing. But it’s what I did, and so it is”

The countryside blurred by. The landscape and trees and hills and fields all became flowing painted abstract. Everything looks as if it had never been seen before; a layer of unclear haze gets stuck in the eyes. And the wine shook in the glass as the train surged along.

No matter how many times you see the scenery, it’s always a new experience. The old eyes process the nuances never quite the same. And then there are the new sights. Like the man with his wine. Through some desperate chance we could meet again somewhere. But the world is large and the chance is small. No sound man bets on chance. And an absolutely deranged man bets on chance when all the odds are slim to none.

But so many people bet on chance when there is none. It’s easy to get lost in that. It’s easy to get lost in the dismal odds of something else. And life for many is dismal odds of something else.

I looked over at him. He smiled contentedly with wine in hand.

“Remember to enjoy life. It’s trite. But people forget it.”

The train pulled away behind me. The sky shone brightly. And in that moment came a passing realization there are no words to accurately describe anything. A gush of wind rushed against me with the train. The narrow streets before me twisted through the giant hills. But there’s nothing that can replicate that moment to someone who didn’t live it. The beauty and travesty of life is that it all must be seen through one’s own eyes. And if you pass up any opportunity to do that, it’s gone.

Nothing more than a passing fancy.

The uneven streets held more history than all the history books and museums of the world. Some Romans placed the stones a couple thousand years ago, and before them the Hirpini, all unknowing that I’d ever be walking on them or they’d far outlive their civilizations. These people, though probably great in there time, are now completely forgotten. All that remains are the roads that wind through the town.

Up a hill and tucked away behind some ancient road sat a little café. La Matriarca. The place was lit like an old church, just as it had been for years. A few people were inside. Everyone was a half-shadow. The heavy door was propped open by some crate filled with fruit.

A minute later and up a couple flights of stairs I was on the rooftop. This was the gem of the place. The unassuming café in some offstreet hid one of the best views in the city. All around the hills towered. The city expanded beneath it and around it. Tucked away against a hill this place was a luxury. And it was a luxury reserved for the few who chance upon it.

Hot wind brushed through my hair. A faded blue umbrella dropped shadows around me. A few moments later, the cameriere returned with glasses of water and a spicy wine.

“Cosa desidera?”

“Per ora solo il vino, grazie.”

He nodded and quickly vanished down the stairs. The art of being a great waiter is only being around when you’re wanted.

The entire city, though familiar, felt foreign in just the slightest way. The same way places always feel foreign when you haven’t seen them in a while. But it wasn’t a faraway foreignness. Everything was regular, and everything was the same. It was the foreignness of knowing nothing’s ever the same.

Some time passed before I heard footsteps coming up the stairs. The cameriere? No. The footsteps weren’t fast enough. Waiters are always in a rush. I sipped the wine as beads of sweat trickled down my brow.

The footsteps slowly climbed the stairs. Each one in a gradual rhythm ending with a light thud. As they drew closer to me, I turned toward them. There emerged a head of light gray hair with a voice emanating I thought I’d find you here, my dear Niccolo before she could even see me. The old voice echoed through the low walls. For the slightest second her words filled the world. And for the slightest second the world resided entirely in my ears.

“Cathalina!” I cried out.

“Don’t think you could get away with a trip to Alevino without seeing me,” she replied with a smile as her body rose from the steps.

And then immediately and quickly she ascended the remaining stairs and embraced me.

“My dear, Niccolo! You came to see me, no?”

I had hoped to see her on this sporadic adventure, that much was true. And though every time I came she looked tireder and older, she always had the same smile. The same loving smile that you could feel from continents away. And her words spoke with the same accent, the same dialect.

“Always at this café,” she exclaimed.

“The wine,” I replied.

She smiled again. And she took my hand.

“How are you so grownup, il mio tesoro?”

There was nothing I could say. She warmly embraced me with the light of the world.

She sat across from me. “How long has it been?”

“Too long,” I said with a quick, sharp pain quietly subdued by wine.

Her cold blue eyes stared into me. The thousands of years of Mediterranean history drowned themselves in her eyes and overflowed.

We talked as the sun drifted through the sky and several glasses of wine passed among us. Old age could never take her vibrancy from her. And while her face and skin became wrinkled with time, it did not stymie her passion.

“…back in the days of Garibaldi, mio papà, mi ha detto che le strade di Napoli erano…

And she would interject with a non sequitur story.

“And then Gualtiero, my father, he was chased by these bad guys. They wanted to kill him. But he was about the same age as his uncle. And they looked a lot like. People would say they looked like twins. So, when these men came up to him late at night, he said no, no. I’m not Gualtiero. He’s my cousin. And he said cousin because these guys wouldn’t know better. So without any proof, they couldn’t prove otherwise. And they weren’t about to kill the wrong guy. They also didn’t know his uncle was away on a trip for a long time.”

After the stories ended, we made our ways down the steps. Out through the café and the heavy door and out into the street, our feet fell against the bricks. The old city felt like a wondrous dream. It always felt that way. It always felt surreal. And by now the sun was falling through the sky. The sky turned that afternoon orange that peels and unravels evening. Breezes swirled through my hair. All of history whirled into this moment.

Beside me Cathalina walked with heavy footsteps. They echoed out from beneath her as if commanding armies. And the empires of one’s life would fall below them.

“So, tell me, Niccolo, what’s going on in your life?”

And that’s a question I always hesitate to answer. I feel I’ve done so little, so I come up with little things to make it all seem less bad. So I rattled off some sideways answer.

“It’s not worth it, Niccolo. All of it. You’re worth more than that.” She exclaimed as if some better alternative sat nearby. But she followed up, “You’re going to do great things. All of this is just precursors for what’s to come. Just remember never to set aside life. That’s always so easy to do.”

And the streets and buildings around us seemed to tower. People passed around us, all living individual moments of their lives. And that’s how it all goes. Everything winds up being this endless tirade of life. But next to me walked not so nearly an endless tirade. Though short, she walked as if mountains sat beneath her feet.

“Whatever happens, Niccolo, I just want you to be happy. Go after everything in life with endless passion. The road will not always be so easy, and you will have to work nearly to death for anything you want in life. But always remember that the fruit of labor is sweet. And every minute you spend on something that doesn’t help create your dreams is a minute wasted. And you’ll never get it back.

“Time is the most valuable currency. You’re born with as much as you’ll ever have. You don’t know how much. So, you have to spend it wisely. All you spend is gone forever.” She was adamant.

We walked in silence through some streets. We walked in tandem. It was being in the company of someone that made the evening. We could have been anywhere and it would have been the same. Everything comparatively is tangential and insignificant.

As the evening set in and the orange sky folded into washed-out blue and pink, we passed the same bakeries and storefronts we had likewise passed so many years ago. And in the evening musk they sat vacant. Their empty windows glanced the street reflections. The dark insides sat suspended. Everything for a day ended.

And there we walked, continuing, without direction. Alevino was something of home. To her, it absolutely was home. And the cool fingers of evening on a hot day wrapped around us. In these moments, Cathalina’s pace slowed. All of the world slowed to almost still. The evening gently moved. The people in the street and the nightly commotion dimmed.

“My dearest Niccolo,” she began, “you know I always treasure your visits. And I wish you could come more often. But I know life has a habit of getting in the way. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t know that. Capisco. It’s life. That’s how it goes. And it vanishes when you want to hold it most.

“We are all stuck in it. You’re stuck in it. I’m stuck in it. Whatever you do, don’t let a day go by where you feel you haven’t done something worthwhile.” The wind twirled around in her thin hair. Her old voice cracked slightly. The shaking of her hands made her all the more sincere.

“I know you came today because you’re uncertain of everything in life. But you just have to throw that out. Everything’s uncertain. That’s how it goes, Niccolo. That’s how it goes.

“And maybe things will work out. Maybe they won’t. But you won’t know if you don’t try.”

She paused momentarily as her breath caught back up to her.

“All of these buildings. All of these shops and cafés and everything. They only exist because people tried. And maybe, sure, they were able to make it in Alevino. But it’s a start. We all have to start somewhere. And for many that’s enough.”

She reached up and brushed her fingers through my hair.

“You’re so young. You’ve got life. You’ll do great things. You remind me so much of your grandfather. And he did great things in a small way. And whether or not it was enough for him, it was what he had. And he brought all the love in his life to it all the same.”

We continued walking until a place where the roads diverged on the Via Fuoro. Night had settled. Only a pale glimmer of light remained at the far edge of the sky. All else was that indescribable dark evening purple.

Just down the way was her old house.

“Now don’t walk me home, now,” she softly said. “But one last thing. Whatever you do, make life matter to you. Because at the end of the day you’ll only have to be accountable to yourself.” And she smiled that smile that would tear heaven to pieces.

“Ti amo, cuore mio. I hope I’ll see you again soon.”

“Me too.”

“Be well. And always remember I love you.”

As we parted ways, she seemingly vanished into the night as she always did whenever we met. And while I walked down the streets to the station to catch the last train back, I knew her house would be empty. All the furniture gone. No lights in the windows. Only the broken idylls of time gone by.

And as I sat alone on the last train, the darkness of Campania passed by. The rolling hills and mountains came and went as they had for thousands of years. I watch as it all unraveled and raveled. Night spread out, and with it every single dream. Every promise of tomorrow was somewhere out there. And everything here was liminal.

In the back of my mind I still heard her echoing words. In the distance the far towns passed illuminated with their little lights. And outward toward nothingness I thought of it all. Of all of my hours and all of my life.

And in the empty nothingness, I returned, “I love you, too.”

)

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