my wednesdays

MY WEDNESDAYS

Every Wednesday evening I come home and I can't park my car in my
garden. Her car looks at mine, a challenging silvery glance? I pretend
not to notice and park elsewhere. Once a week, just once a week I let
her occupy my gate entrance and two hours of my life? years ago that
was the rule. Now she is a very busy woman, too many appointments fight
to find a proper place into her planner and she manages to accomplish
to all of them. It's astonishing to think she attends two hours of
karate and two hours of belly dance lessons in the same night,
different disciplines in different places, she drives for many
kilometres in the fog, one hand on the steering wheel the other one
holding a mobile phone? Amazing?one never knows a partner until the
marriage is over.
As I walk towards home, I can see her through the kitchen window: she
is talking with my kids, well, with our kids? no? two of them are ours,
the boys only, the girl is mine, a standard family of a transgenic age?
we don't know about tomatoes genesis and get confused on ours as well.
My hand is opening the door, my legs are moving an unnatural way not to
walk on the dogs, I'm in.
The atmosphere is that of a TV advertisement set. The dinner is ready,
she is wearing a sexy black dress, her make up is a magnificent example
of faultlessness and glamour, her perfectly styled hair frames a
smiling face. She comes close and kisses my cheek, her lipstick enjoys
the contact and decides for a sudden relocation. She always stains me,
she has to act as a perfect wife. I have the uncomfortable feeling to
be a guest in my own home. The kids start immediately talking to me,
all together, I can't understand a word, she puts a glass of white wine
in my left hand, a cracker in my mouth? I need a break in this comedy,
I do need my lover.
She says I'm her best friend, my best friend is my lover, maybe my
lover has a best friend?
Once upon a time, our ancestors used to have lovers too; they often
met, secretly, with the help of faithful servants, they used to live
close at hand, but loved to feel parted by an incommensurable distance,
they spent their days reading perfumed letters and their nights
watching the moon, the same moon from different windows. Actually we
are modern, sorry, modem lovers: we hardly meet, we feel close because
we live on the same planet? I watch the moon during my lover's
lunchtime. We meet on the net. Our feeling travel on wires, converted
into electric impulses, called bits. A high impulse means one, a low
impulse means zero, it takes seven bites to represent a character,
seventy of them are necessary to say "I love you".
No more servants, ink, paper, flowers, glances, breathing, whispered
words, trembling fingers exploring a desired body ? a keyboard and a
screen are considered far more reliable. Servants have turned into
servers.

My head is spinning now. I sit. No hopes to reach my computer, my
daughter is playing on it and the dinner is ready. After our divorce,
she discovered she could cook, so she picked up recipes from every
Country in the world, she mixed them up obtaining an international menu
she improves every week. The traditional granny soup is followed by an
Indonesian salad and by some Arabic sweets. Wines still understand my
language, but they are loosing in taste. Sometimes I think she tampers
with them.
The kids leave the table. We are alone. I serve the coffee, she talks
about her job, her friends, her new performance, her actual teacher,
her last boyfriend, her doctor's suggestions. I smile but I'm absent.
She is sorry tonight she can't stay, she has got a date with a friend,
they will go somewhere to dance, after they'll have a drink. She likes
to show herself in public, I need to hide in my bedroom. She lights up
a cigarette, with her silver lighter, I get nervous 'cause I'm trying
to quit. The golden nail polish and the rings twinkle from her fingers,
smoke and other words come out of her mouth: she can't go home now, her
friend is waiting? could she check for messages from my computer? Sure,
why not? A pity my daughter is still there playing. It seems we will
have to wait some minutes, she can't save the game before she exits the
current level. She worked very hard to gain that stage she will not
quit right now. Her impatience fades away while she observes my six
years old girl, typing with determination to move her hero on the
screen. She sits beside her and both of them get excited observing the
score. I feel hopeless. No way to reach my lover, no way to send an
email, no way to read my sweetheart's messages. Maybe I could watch TV,
it's news time. Maybe I could feed the dogs. Maybe I could read the
letters from my real box, near my real gate. Maybe I could change my
dress. Maybe I could relax for a moment. I'm feeling lonely in a too
crowded space. I'm feeling a stranger, a foreigner, a kind of sad
pilgrim passing through an unknown land. I can hear a hard-beating
music coming from the boys room, the noise of the game the girls are
playing at, a speaker's voice from TV, the dogs barking outside? All
these bizarre sounds are confusing me, I want to breathe the air of the
night. I go out, the dogs come in. I close the door just in time to
avoid hearing her complaining about dogs hairs on her black dress. Our
two cars are still facing each other in an unpleasant way, like two
enemies, like us during our marriage. An husband and a wife, one
against the other, the dark and the light, the fire and the water. We
had to build a wall, to put a division between us, to change
drastically our way of living. I left our house, I took the boys with
me. She changed, I survived. She found new interests and new friends, I
closed my heart and went through a long lethargy, every year became a
never ending winter. We kept in touch only to discuss about the
kids.
I watched him changing? his dresses, his shoes, his hair, both in
length and in colour, his face, his habits, his tastes. I watched a
male turning into a female creature. I lost sight of the man I had
married, I finally saw the woman hidden inside him, the grub and the
butterfly, the revealing of metamorphosis in Apuleio's ancient tales.
The old life converting in the new life, no mercy for those who can't
transmute.
She startles joining me from behind. She is leaving. The games are
over, hers and mine. I walk with her towards her car, in the pale light
of the night I catch, for a short instant, the imagine of what she used
to be. It's just a darkness trick and I'm tired. As soon as I open the
gate, the happy bird flies out of the cage. She waves a hand while I
lock myself inside. I'm a woman, I don't need a wife.
Now I can walk back to my home. I can breathe deeply, I can smile on
myself.
I take my little girl to bed, she talks and talks about her school and
friends. She will sleep in few minutes. I go and say goodnight to the
boys. They decrease the music volume and swear they already finished up
their homework. I finally succeed in sitting in front of my computer. I
like the familiar sound it makes while connecting. I sign on. This is
for you, piccolo, my far away friend. You are still working now, I'm
going to bed. When I get up, I'll find you here, ready to sleep. I
watch over your nights, you watch over mine. We take care of each other
from such a distance.
I lay down on my bed and close my eyes. This is not the life I had
dreamt of, but it suits me. Outside, the peace of the country night is
complete. I go on caressing slowly my blanket. It's so soft and warm on
my bed. I'm falling down into a sweet vertigo. In my last conscious
instant, the final spark of a long day, I reach his hand and fall
asleep.