Giovà loved the mountain.
He wanted to draw it and had tried many times but the picture never made the Cerdolimoli peak look right. Sometimes it was round like the elephant’s head in the teacher’s flash card of the letter E. Sometimes it was steep like the giraffe’s neck in the G card. He had never seen a real elephant or giraffe.
He had been promoted twice and was happy to read and write in proper Italian. No more practicing rows and rows of letters. Now he could start to write short paragraphs called “Saggio” based on a theme the teacher gave. Maestro Elvino had told his father about him being smart but impatient and undernourished. Giovà hated to have to wait for another three school years, until Prima Media, before taking the Design subject.
The bright, blue morning-sky made him feel happy. The mountain stood out like a giant paper doll cut out. He traced its silhouette against the sky with his index finger as if with a pencil on a sheet of paper.
This was a Spring day in the 1950’s, post-war Italy
It was the mid-morning recess. For fifteen-minutes, the third grade children were free from classroom restrictions. At the teacher's signal, they had rushed out of the dim classrooms as one screaming body. Dozens of arms and legs longing for play finally flayed wildly as one creature. Dozens of stomachs, longing to be filled, communally welcomed the bread and jam treats stored carefully in a pocket, or in a desk, since the day had begun.
Recess was always loud and active but confined to the space underneath the great arches covering the second story terrace, the location of the elementary school. The building was the former convent of Santa Chiara , a decaying medieval structure that had long been without nuns. It had more recently been used to house fascist bureaucrats and black-shirts, and had survived the Second World War, and their political demise.
Underneath the arches, running was not permitted. In the Spring the children enjoyed the morning sun and the brisk mountain air and stayed protected from cold winds gusting from the mountain and the river gorges. The second of the three arches in the large balcony faced the boy’s classroom door and it was the boy's favourite place. Climbing the long, straight flight of stairs to the classrooms every morning was hard work for the small boys, but going back down to the spacious courtyard when school ended was always welcome. Only then could the children run about freely in the large yard for a few minutes before closing time. At half-past noon, they were expected to go home, like the rest of the school staff, the caretakers and the teachers. "Pranzo" the biggest meal of the day was waiting.
The boy’s breakfast was traditionally small: a little milk with some bread and sugar. The ten o' clock snack was a small help in quieting hunger pains because by one o'clock hunger would take over as everyone rushed home. After pranzo if there was homework, freedom and physical activity would not begin again until late afternoon and remain unsatisfied until very late in the evening.
The second arch was the place for temporary relief from the boredom of paying attention in the classroom and being still in your seat. Because it did not give a full sense of freedom, it was just a good place to dream about boyish quests. It had the best view of the mountain. From the second arch he could see Cerdolimoli. This peak was a minor peak not the real top of Monte Giano, as the whole mountain was called..
On such a clear day, the peak had all the majesty of a much higher climb. It stood-out against the azure sky, brown like the artificial beauty of crumpled cement bags, sprinkled with flour in the churches nativity scene at Christmas.
The boy had always viewed the peak with both exhilaration and fear. It was the largest he had ever seen; larger than an elephant or a giraffe. He did not really understand that this was just the front of Monte Giano. Giovà had been borne in the warmer valley near its base where the town of Antrodoco
Large mountains all around watched over the whole valley. Monte Giano however, stood out from the others. It was closer and large enough to dominate the village and the whole area. It acted as an ancient overseer, an omnipresent and benevolent force, referred in village stories both as a father and as a mother. For the boy it felt as protective and stimulating as a buxomly, outrageous grandmother.
His own mother feared the mountain; but the boy thought she hated it. She had always warned him to stay away from it, always refusing permission to let him go even a short distance up its slope. There were many legends about the mountain: werewolves, wild boars and brigands. All had been known to roam freely in the remote areas at one time or another. Some of the local stories had been exaggerated with events such as landslides and avalanches; howling wild animals; hissing, enormous snakes; and the cold, suffocating darkness that enveloped all creatures that roamed the mountain on moonless, winter nights.
Once, on waking on a day with no school, from a night when legends are born, the whitest snow he had ever seen in his seven years, had arrived to the high ground of Monte Giano. This was a good omen because though he liked snow, only once or twice could he remember it coming down to cover the whole town and keep it covered for a few days. The snow in fact, only rarely lay its white mantle below the half-way mark down the face of the mountain. It usually melted into rain as it got closer to the valley town. And every time that the snow teased the boy this way, he felt even a great aching desire to touch it. But the snow that he could see this time was still out of reach. He dreamed of winter bliss: throwing snowballs, making a snowman, and simply walking and sliding on cobble stones polished to a glassy finish by ice and packed snow. And snow was always welcome! It made everything look and feel exciting and new.
The climate was such that most likely the next morning the snow he saw would no longer be there. Every January since he could remember, he had for many days patiently checked the snow line, hoping that it would get colder and the whiteness he liked so much would also come over the houses, the roads and the fields of Antrodoco. To his dismay he had awakened each new day to see that just the opposite had occurred: the snowline had crept further back up the slope, destroying all his hopes that it would ever come down for that year.
That winter, the snow had found him older, braver and more impatient than ever before. He was no longer like a first grader, swallowing disappointment while waiting to grow up some more.
He had nagged his mother for the whole morning on the way home from grandfather’s L’Orto. Carrying a “sporta” of winter vegetables, the woman breathed heard with the effort of the climb and the additional load of a boy yanking at her coat. He asked a hundred times, if he could go touch the snow, forestalling objections by adding that the mountain wasn't so big anymore, because he was bigger now, and could go up and be back at one o'clock for pranzo. He whined, he sobbed and he grabbed angrily at his mother’s coat when she repeated an equal number of times
—No, you cannot!
As they came across a clearing, on the way home up the Mantella, the mountain came into glorious view, every nook and cranny covered by the beautiful white powder.
—But I want to go up there, Ma!—said the boy pointing to it.
—What? Are you joking? There are wolves up there, it is too far and you cannot make it!
—Then you take me there. Let us go tomorrow.
—Sure, tomorrow . . . —she said ironically—I never went up there when I was young, but I am going to go up there now with you? You can go with your uncle to Fallarino or Lacanale, if you want to scale mountains.
—But I already went to Fallarino with him before. It is not high like Monte Giano, and there is no snow.
—Sure there is. When there is snow, there is snow in Fallarino and Lacanale too.
—It is not true, Ma! You know it is not true!
He knew his mother’s well-meaning lies. Fallarino and Lacanale were the hillside properties which his mother's family, the Paulucci, farmed for a living. They were located on hills opposite to the mountain. One faced East and the other faced West. They were less than two hundred meters higher than the town.
—You can wait for the snow to come down, then.— She replied exasperated—There will be plenty, do not worry. Plenty enough for your feet to be always wet, and cold enough for your knees to make you cry from the hurt of your rheumatism.
Growing up in the shadow of the mighty Giano meant being fed a steady diet of popular myths based on fears, whose purpose as only to stop curious children from venturing into the surrounding mountains. Invariably, no matter what the season, the boy had heard that the mountain would punish him appropriately, if he disobeyed. In winter, it would be either with colder temperatures that would hurt his knees with rheumatism. Worse, hungry wolves would come to relish a meal of young boy as a welcome break from a steady diet of lamb, old sheep, and occasional lame shepherds.
In the summer, the mountain was unapproachable because small boys were not strong enough to climb. And the seasonal dangers? Vicious vipers at every step would gaze at you hypnotically, neutralize your will, freeze your limbs, and make escape impossible. If there was no one to cover your eyes to break the magnetic gaze of the viper, you were in for a slow death. Vipers were more insidious than wolves and even grown-ups discouraged each other from mountain excursions in the summer. Vipers, he was told, were known to amuse themselves for hours by coiling around the arms and necks of their victims, especially young impatient boys, who would either die of fright, or be choked to death.
But Giovà was beginning to question the barrage of mountain-bashing propaganda that he heard. He largely accepted it especially the matter of wolves and vipers. Many said that wolves looked like dogs. He considered wolves more honourable than vipers because they would kill you quickly and eat you out of necessity. He was afraid, but also felt sorry for them. They were just very hungry, and not bad animals; just unlucky not to have enough food in winter.
Vipers were another story. He believed that their only appetite was for torture. They could not eat you, because they could not chew anything and human beings were too big anyway. He knew that they attacked for pleasure and would kill a person with their poisonous bite, but only after they got bored torturing their victim; and only if the person was still alive after enduring the horror of the serpent’s embrace.
Vipers were really mean and did not like to waste venom. If he ever saw one, he would be ready to always look at it sideways and to use a stick or a rock to kill it.
He would then throw it in the fire for revenge.
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