Listen to this story.
It happened yesterday in Gallarate, near Milan. Luciana Baroffi, 36, was letting her daughter Cristina, 16, sleep on the balcony.
It was five degrees below zero.
The neighbors called the police.
In fact, Cristina slept on the balcony all the time, but yesterday it was snowing. Cristina is handicapped.
They arrested the mother.
That's what happened. But the story of Cristina and her mother began 16 years ago, and it continues.
We say: "Good neighbors!", "What an unnatural mother!", "How could a mother treat her own daughter like that—a sick daughter, no less?", "Lucky the neighbors stepped in. What if instead of calling 113 they'd just gone to bed?"
I would have done the same. So would you. And we would have been right. Or would we?
We don't know this mother's story, but we know the lives of other parents with a child who is different. A life without hope, beginning the day you realize your child is not normal.
The others grow. He stays small.
The others run. He drags himself.
The others talk. He makes sounds.
The others... and he does not.
You find yourself carrying this weight alone. By day, wash him, feed him, clean him, push him. At night he wakes you. There's never a celebration. There's never a vacation. Month after month. Until you can't do it anymore and you put him on the balcony. On the balcony where the neighbors see him, and they call the Police. The only thing they've done in 16 years.
The neighbors are good people, fathers and mothers who did nothing before. People of conscience like any of us, who wait for disaster to move us and never think that the disaster—silent and hidden—is happening to those others every single day.
Doing something other than making a phone call would have meant effort—spending a few hours, going to see Cristina, taking her out, giving her mother some breath to live; risking, perhaps, the stirring of something inside yourself that would no longer let you sit comfortably.
Because comfort belongs to those who think only of themselves and don't see others—especially those who ask us for help, even without speaking.
And if someone then asks us what we think of the handicapped, the answer is ready: "They're like us, they have the same rights we do!!".
Our rights are protected by law. Their needs must be met by law too.
Once they were shut away in institutions, but we learned that wasn't the answer. Now we've decided: reintegration. Bring them back into our communities, into our schools, our neighborhoods, our workplaces. And in doing so we've seen the limits of this solution.
Telling the handicapped person "You're equal to me" doesn't erase their difference.
You can't tell a blind man he's equal and then have him drive a car.
You can't tell a crippled man he's equal and then have him run with us.
So in what way is he equal to us?
In his dignity as a human being—if you are human.
In his value as a brother—if you feel yourself a child of God.
But in the life we live every day, in using a spoon, tying a shoe, understanding the world around him—he is different. Completely different.
Then comes the suspicion that telling him "You're equal" is just a way to ease your conscience.
"If you're equal, you don't have any particular need of me. I'll get politically involved, when I have time, to make sure you're protected by good laws, treated in good clinics, given the money you need." And of course if I see you on the balcony I'll call the Police.
Conscience is clear.
Or is it?
The truth is there's still no solution. The handicapped person gets by a bit better, but he remains isolated, until we decide to really take care of him—even if it costs us dearly.
Don't forget: there are different kinds of handicapped.
A blind man just needs you to offer your arm. But a crippled man you have to lift. A paralyzed man you have to do everything for; and a mentally disabled man whom you don't hear as human—you have to treat him as a person.
And that's every day, not one hour a week, when you're feeling altruistic, because if he's truly integrated he's constantly beside you: in the classroom, at home, on the bus.
It's a heavy commitment to take on. And I have to take it, you have to take it, by entering a different way of thinking—different from the one we're used to, the one that tells us to live well and not worry too much.
A change of mind.
Listen to another story.
It could have happened yesterday in Gallarate, near Milan.
Luciana Baroffio, 38, went to the cinema with her friends.
Her daughter Cristina was at a neighbor's house listening to music. Cristina does well with them. There are many families she often spends pleasant hours with; she's found many places that welcome her. Her mother is more at peace, she doesn't live in constant nightmare. Now everything is simpler.
It could have happened, but it didn't. Cristina was sleeping on the balcony, and the Police arrived.
Manuela Bartesaghi, 1978
