"Letter to Pinocchio"
by Albino Luciani
http://www.papaluciani.com/eng/teach...pinocchio2.htm
When you fall in love...
Dear Pinocchio,
I was seven years old when I read your Adventures for the first time.
I couldn't tell you how much I liked them nor how many times I have read them again since then.
The truth is that in you, boy, I recognized myself; in your atmosphere, my atmosphere.
How many times you ran through the forest, through the fields, by the beach, by the streets!
The Vixen and the Cat, the dog Medoro, the children of the battle of the books were running with you.
They seemed my races, my fellows, the streets and the fields of my village.
You ran to see the covered carts that arrived at the square; so do I.
You complained, you twisted your mouth, you put your head under the sheets before drinking the bitter medicine;
so do I. The slice of bread with butter on both sides, the cinnamon pie, the lemon candy and, in sometimes,
even an egg, a pear, or even its skins, represented an exquisite dish for you, glutton and hungry as you were;
the same happened to me.
I also, when going and coming back from school, I saw myself involved in "battles": with snow balls in winter;
with punchs and kicks in all the seasons of the year; sometimes I "incased";
or gave, always trying to balance "credits" with "debits" and not to snivel at home, where, if I had complained,
perhaps they would have given me "the rest".
And now you have come back. You speak from the pages of the book no longer, but from the TV screen.
But you continue being the same boy of other times.
I, however, have grown old. I already am, if it is possible to speak like that, to the opposite side of the barricade.
I can't recognize myself in you any more, but in your advisers:
the teacher Gepeto, Beppe Grillo, the Blackbird, the Parrot, the Glow-worm, the Crab, the Marmot.
They tried - God!, without success, except in the case of the Tuna - to give you advices for your child life.
I try to give them for your child and adult life. Be careful!
Don't have the idea of throwing the hammer on me, you either, because
I am not willing to end like the poor Beppe Grillo!