Silver Kisses
Dear friend,
The moon is blowing silver kisses. It’s cold out under the stars. Indoors the TV is pulling hard at my attention. My dad used to love detective series. Angelo too, though he often loses interest and wanders off to do something else.
Chiara’s mum picks up the remote and turns it off with a look.
She thinks I’m working. I’m not. I write for pleasure, and because I committed to it, and for other reasons that I don’t yet understand — which may turn out to be the best reasons of all, if they ever make themselves known to me.
We spent the day at the new apartment, selecting colours and trying them on the woodwork and the walls. It looks like we have a winner. The last day of the year will be an early start, paint brushes in hand. I don’t know how I feel about the year that’s passing. It went so fast. That might be one of those unknown reasons for the daily letters, if I ever make time to reread them.
I imagine I will, some date in the future.
There’s a subdued feeling here. Everyone’s knocked out with what’s now known as the virus. Not only that - we’re thinking of loved ones going through some really tough times. Private stuff, but I wanted to name it. I don’t want to pretend to understand what the world is going through right now. All I know is how deeply it’s challenged me, and how many of the resources I’ve built up over the years it’s insisted I draw on.
Not to lose my shit.
It’s shown me, if I needed reminding - which I do - the absolute necessity of friendship. Being a friend to ourselves. Being a friend to others. I’ve not always measured up to either, but who needs a measuring stick to beat themselves with? We’re living through times where not even the confidence of youth is a refuge for the young.
At the market in Chieri, sunlight spills so brightly that behind sunglasses the world turns soft-edged. Old men gather near a lorry selling farm equipment — big-bellied and big-boned — passing the time of day in little knots. Stallholders respond to their audience, selling fruit and vegetables, cheese and honey. Wine.
A young mum brings her baby to see its dad.
The dad looks tense, his stall quieter than the others. Reputation takes time in a small town. The cheese stall where Angelo and Bettie shop began as a single crate in the street in the sixties. Purchases were once made from the grandmother when she first moved here from the south. Now there’s a ticket system and a wait.
I grew up in a small town, wishing I could be satisfied with it but knowing I couldn’t. I look at the young parents and wonder how it would have been to stay, to grow a family there. I know I’d have had itchy feet. That doesn’t stop me longing to belong somewhere, to be known.
Known by who?
I close my eyes and place my attention on the question. The answer floats into view.
To know thyself.
This new year — the year ahead — feels more than any I can remember like a crossroads. Or at least two roads diverging in a yellow wood.
Even no choice is a choice.
Which way now then?
The word that came to me for 2025 was transformation.
The word that comes for 2026 is discovery.
Till tomorrow
Love
Mikey