I miss you dad

It is a time when I’m thinking a lot about my daughter’s future. She is growing up, and among the various considerations I make, there is one—clearly the least hoped for—that at some point in her life, she will grow up without me. I’m talking about his next recent life, because as far as I’m concerned, dying is the last thing I want to do. Inevitable, but final.

However, I was saying, I have no pain, no illnesses, I do sports—it’s still strange for me to say it—and my latest blood tests were perfect. But life can play strange tricks, especially for someone like me, living in the Land of Fires¹.

And that is why, when I heard² the story of Jessie Glen and her granddaughter Alice, I was moved.

Alice’s father has passed away; he attempted suicide. Her aunt, the father’s sister, managed to access the phone and some of her brother’s accounts, including the email. From there, both aware of the precarious balance of what they were doing—or perhaps not, go figure—they began to exchange messages. Alice wrote to her father, and Jessie responded as if she were her brother.

The girl wanted to talk to her dad³, wherever he was. She wanted to ask how he was, how his workday had gone, what he was thinking about. Normal things, things she could no longer do.

The next day she wrote: “how was work dad”

“very busy!! I am on break!! Missing you!!! Love you Alice!!!”

“I miss you dad I love you”

I don’t know what Alice thinks of these exchanges, which continue to this day, though with less frequency. She knows we are pretending, of course, but who can say what goes on in her mind? She never says anything emotional. She just wants to chat with her father, to say she misses him and loves him. She wants to be able to ask questions and work through this in whatever way feels right. And I want the same things.

When I listened to the postcast episode—I invite you to read the original article ( archive) if you can’t listen to it in Italian—I felt enormously and emotionally involved. I was at the train station, returning from a work trip to Florence, there were people around, and if I hadn’t been deeply ashamed, I would have stopped in a corner, crying my heart out.

I resisted, but my eyes were glistening and soaking wet. I was walking toward the car, in the parking lot, happy to go home and embrace my family again. I’ve smiled, moved by Alice, by her emails, and by my sweetie one waiting for me at home.