Hard as it is
Along with the questionnaire on Ombre e Luci, I'm enclosing a list of people who might help us spread the word about the magazine. The real hope that this year we'll finally reach the subscription goal we've set is a great encouragement to all of us to make the magazine known to more and more people. We're aware of the vital role this quarterly plays in the lives of those affected by disability. It's true that it's hard to get people's attention, especially in a country like C. But I take heart from the fact that we've grown from two to five subscriptions.
P.C.
We Play Together Always
I've renewed my subscription to Ombre e Luci for '85. Thank you for reminding me about the '84 renewal—I'd completely missed it (my apologies). I receive the magazine with such joy. I read and reread it, especially the latest issue, which is full of things that make us feel closer to one another. It feels like we're living together, truly. It consoles us, it gives us the strength to keep walking, always looking forward. My Massimo turned fifteen on March fourteenth. He's growing so fast—to wash his face I have to bend his head down, and he loves it because I say, "How tall you're getting," and he claps his hands and laughs. He can't see me—he's blind, along with everything else—but we talk, we play together always. He's very affectionate and wonderful. He needs my help with everything. He's happiest when we go for walks. He hears the people passing by; he greets everyone. I thank God for the health and strength He gives me to care for him. I ask only for the grace to live as long as he does. Many people ask me how I manage to stay so cheerful and content. My warmest greetings and best wishes to everyone at the magazine.
Maria Levorato
With You, I Walk Better
Thank you for everything you give us. I'm an eighteen-year-old girl, the sister of a handicapped boy. But when you think about it, it doesn't really matter who I am. I'm one of many who, reading your magazine, finds wonder in seeing so much misfortune, so much love, so much solidarity. You help us find strength. It's consoling and beautiful to know you're not alone, that you're together with others—in the shadow and in the light alike. Often, in the face of life, we need something that helps us rise again in spirit. We are small. But when I read the experiences shared here, in this newspaper of life, I recover my hope for the future. In the dark moments of my life, you help me take courage again, help me not give in to pessimism. I'm not an Ombre e Luci addict, exactly. It's just that with you, I walk better.
Ombretta
We Want to Find Him a Safe and Beautiful Home Now
I want to thank you for the magazine, which I found very interesting, with articles that are all beautiful and moving. Now I want to tell you briefly about our situation. I'm forty-four, my husband is forty-five, and our son L., sixteen, is mentally handicapped. He contracted meningoencephalitis at four months old. Until he was eight, he stayed at home; then he was in an institution, and now he's home again. During the day he attends a socio-educational center twenty kilometers away, and in the evening he's at home. For now everything is going well, and we're very happy to have him home, but like all parents we worry about "tomorrow," when we won't be able to care for him anymore. That's why I'm writing to you: if you could give me some advice and some addresses of homes where he might be welcomed, where he could find love and family feeling—he gets attached to people quickly if they're kind to him. So we're already thinking ahead about finding him a place that's safe and also beautiful.
B.P.
Armando, How Much Light You Scattered Around You
On February twenty-eighth, Armando flew to heaven at fifteen, after years lived under the shadow of muscular dystrophy, which constantly ravaged his frail body. Armando was not only a precious gift to his family and to us who followed him for nine years. He was also a living, enriching presence for all the parents who frequented the "Angelo Custode" Institute. To complete this journey of hope—a message Armando gave us, for he never uttered a single complaint—I want to bring to every family who believes in Ombre e Luci the epilogue of a brief life, but one lived intensely, with peace and spiritual joy. Let us make our own the prayer of the disciples on the road to Emmaus: "Stay here with us, Lord, for it is growing dark." We truly need Christ to remain with us, to give meaning to our lives, to the lives of so many people who feel lost.
Armando, you are no longer with us. Your great eyes, pure and luminous, have closed to the things of this world, but have opened in the blessed light of heaven, where at last you understand what neither you nor we could comprehend. You were six when we first knew you, and already the marks of your illness were visible in your fragile body. You lived in an ideal family: your mother and father loved you with indescribable tenderness; your brothers were always caring, deeply affectionate with you. Bound together, tightly bound, you walked a calvary, you a bearer of the cross, that lasted fifteen years. In your brief life you were denied many things—even the simple joys every child knows, like running, jumping, moving about freely. But from the day you knew Jesus, chose him as your companion on the road, your inseparable friend, day after day you offered him your stillness, your suffering, the fact that you could not be like all the other boys your age. From then on you became a light for all of us. How much brightness you scattered around you! The "thank you" you spoke with all the love you possessed repaid us for every effort. So those fifteen years of yours, spent between your wheelchair and your bed, gave us a message: that of suffering transformed into serenity, into kindness, into patience. Now you rest in the cemetery of Burligo, small and quiet, a patch of earth that holds your body. Your face lives vividly in the memory of your family; you are present in us who tried to tell you that God's goodness never dies; you are present in your friends whom you gladdened with your gentle expressions, with your drawings, your simple mosaics full of poetry.
Liliana Morandi
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