Madrid, l’11 marzo di tre anni fa era una città diversa.
Madrid, tre anni fa: i ricordi raccolgono presto polvere, pare; scivolano via… nonostante eventi del genere non possano che scuoterti fino alle ossa.

Madrid, tre anni fa si svegliava con tre attentati in successione in cui morirono 200 persone. Perdonatemi la retorica, se la leggete fra queste righe, ma allora vivevo lì, a poche centinaia di metri dalla stazione di Atocha. Queste "Footnotes from Madrid", come le descrissi il giorno dopo agli amici a cui le spedii, le scrissi rapidamente, istintivamente, nella lingua più accessibile: alcuni di quelli che lessero la mia email sentirono il bisogno di inoltrarla ai propri contatti: ricevetti presto moltissime risposte, anche da sconosciuti. E il naturale esorcismo di cui sentii allora la necessità, esige di essere replicato, di tanto in tanto.

Madrid March 11th, 2004 : if you’re feeling sinister

Hello there, my friends,
with a mixture of empathy and shame, all eyes are focused on Madrid.
Being involved in a bizarre world of opinions on these breaking news, the occasion to participate into the definition of even one pixel of the tableau seemed like a duty, while writing in english is an obliged choice to let you all share.
The strident contradiction between the image of normal life I am used with and that horror-like showcase of blood, smoke and grey weather I had the sad opportunity to see with my eyes, revealed something surreal. The facts occured are perhaps the first of the new century to have such a lasting impact on European people popular imagination, letting me think that in this very moment Madrid has a bit of everything going on in terms of fear, frustration, impotence…
I would not be involved in this soccer supporters-like forming groups of opinions on "who did it" or "who didn’t", that’s another topic, I just ask myself, showing off my banal condition of an ant-like man, if could exist a reason, an idea, something, to justify this mankind perversion. It could not, evidently..
So i spent the entire daytime of yesterday leaning against the wall, looking pensively on the ground, losing strength as the time went on…
Later in the evening I attended alone to a concert, "Belle and Sebastian" playing after a minute of silence and letting the audience fall in its peaceful, acoustic and dreamy-space sound cleaned through the years. A weird sense of melancholy was producing, I could not resist to a tear crossing my face.

So it goes,

fosco