The House in Via Manno by Milena Agus

Author:Milena Agus
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Scribe Publications
Published: 2010-10-22T16:00:00+00:00

12

When Nonna realised she’d grown old, she told me she was afraid of dying. Not of death itself, which must, she thought, be like going to sleep or going on a trip, but because she knew that God would feel hurt because He’d given her many beautiful things in this world and she hadn’t been able to be happy, and for this He would not forgive her. Deep down she hoped she really was mad, because if she was sane, she’d definitely be going to Hell.

She’d argue with God before going to Hell though. She’d point out to Him that if He created a person a certain way He couldn’t then demand that she act like she was someone else. She had put all her energy into convincing herself that this was the best life possible, and not that other one for which she felt a yearning and desire that took her breath away. But there were certain things she would genuinely ask God’s forgiveness for: the cashmere dress that Nonno had bought her in Milan that she’d ripped on the escalator at the station; the cup of coffee, like a dog’s bowl, at the foot of the bed during her first year of marriage; her inability to enjoy so many days at the beach, when she’d been thinking that the Veteran might arrive at Poetto, walking nimbly on his crutch.

And then there was that winter’s day, when Nonno had come home with a bundle of mountain gear he’d borrowed from who knows who, and had proposed a trip up to Supramonte, organised by his office for the staff of the saltworks, and she, even though she’d never been to the mountains, had felt only irrepressible annoyance and had just wanted to tear that ridiculous clothing from his hands. But he stubbornly kept telling her that true Sardinians needed to get to know Sardinia.

They’d lent Nonno an ugly pair of sports shoes and a heavy jumper, also very ugly, while the nicest things were for her and the boy. In the end, Nonna unenthusiastically said, ‘Alright then’, and started preparing bread rolls, while Nonno, who usually would have helped her, for some reason made sad plin plin sounds on donna Doloretta and donna Fannì’s piano. They went to bed early because they had to meet the group at five in the morning and go to Orgosolo, up to Punta sa Pruna, across the Foresta Montes, and then continue as far as the Dovilino megalithic circle and across the mountains that join Gennargentu to Supramonte, up as far as Mamoiada.

Everything was covered in snow. Papà was beside himself with excitement, but Nonno’s teeth were chattering, and others in the group recommended the warmth of a fireplace, and potato ravioli, pork on a spit, and fil’e ferru in a local restaurant. But, no, he was stubborn. They were people of the sea and the plains, and they had to get to know those Sardinian mountains.

The Foresta Montes, one of the few old-growth

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