CONVERSATIONS WITH ITALIANS, BRITISH, FRENCH MEN AND…1 GERMAN

Conversations, one to one, how much have I learnt?

In those times living in a 19^th century building, Palermo’s city centre.

MB, engaged, 10 years younger.

I was living on my own.

He gave me a call from time to time on my mobile phone to come and visit me and talk about…..?

His life. My life.

Sitting at a round table in the living room, after dinner.

He used to drink a bit, as I recall. Sicilian, factory employee (now living in Northern Italy).

Confessions of having cheated  her girl friend with a common stunning Sicilian 28-year-old

girl. Common acquaintance. In those times living with their parents.

They trusted me to have a talk, to confess and give me a company once or twice a year.

He thought I looked too hot, but just looked like.

Invitation to a Mexican restaurant to go on talking about his confessions, his perspectives, his views

about me but on the whole pictures of events of his life.

Girl suspected of being a daughter of mafia related family sent to Tuscany for good.

MB, I made him laugh, helped me with a moving out and said good bye.

He got married and became daddy.

Confessions, he was disturbed by his previous sexual adventures, just before marriage.

Cried in my flat when he told me that her mother had a bad breast cancer.

Another beer, the heat in those times was unbearable.

Her perfect life companion was chosen long time before, not a beauty he said, but good

companion and much better in bed then many available beauties.

One son. Had a better job and moved away from Sicily. 2 customary cheek kisses.

Today we hardly ever talk.

 

Next confessions: Sicilian MT, today 53, not in those times.

Invitations to go to the beach from time to time to talk about thoughts that were tormenting him.

His work in Northern Italy, and the several married or unmarried Northern Italian women,

CHASING him, lying on the beach, taking a look at him, a shallow one, not intense, I could not have

handled it, unattractive, bad language every 5 words. He offered me a tiny, quite tiny pizzetta on the

beach.

Next invitation, confessions, he would have liked to marry, have a family, he was getting older.

Met him after 8 years, he was happily married to a country rich Sicilian woman, flat owner.

They hardly ever spent time as man and wife, they conceived a daughter.

‘’Listen to me’’ he used to say: yes? And went on …on ….on….on… and on….

He sent me his cv across to have a look at it. Weird! He got a better job as Sales man executive

for Thermofisher.

He started a new path in meditation on the beach to cope with job stress, no wife present.

Buddhist, Taoism, Confucianism, and ….most and foremost ‘’Confusionism

@’’.

His last sentence 2 years ago was that he could not complain after all, ugly, stingy, hard worker,

clean, a wife with a good dowry and that’s all.

Every once and while he used to ask me, ‘’what about yourself’’? How is your life going?

Since once he sent me a personal confession concerning Bill Gates, I decided not to contact him.

He used to provide very incoherent suggestions not related to Bill Gates whatsoever.

If I call him and I will get a long list of complains of all sorts ending with the typical Italian

sentence: Non ci possiamo lamentare!

 

 

They trusted me these men; you can talk to her and she listens.

 

Next confession, French, a French poet met in the internet, Fabrice.

He dedicated a good bunch of poems to me.

I must say that he had a good and deep imagination Fabrice from Paris, he imagined me as a sweet

flower, that makes days less gloomy. A flower, a sweet one. A wonderful smile, and open one

for everyone.

I confessed to myself that Fabrice had a huge and wonderful imagination despite his despair on

his recent separation from his wife and his financial issues due to the payments he owned to her

for that. Devasted, looking for a companion. He admitted that he was in love with love, not

with a woman of any kind!     

Invitation to a nice café, a cappuccino. Poems, of all sorts, some sent to me, romantic,

He was in Love! Yes indeed! He was in love with Miss or Mr Love.

All in French.

 

Met another French men, my own age: long phone confessions of his devasted heart,

suffering a lonely life, he used to call me before meeting me many years after: ‘’mon petit

coeur’’.

He raised 2 sons all alone, their mother left them when they were toddlers to run away

with another man.

On his birthday he invited me to go and participate to his well-organized Normandy small

village party.

Picked me at the airport, looking at me, not staring, we shared the tobacco smoking.

He had a contagious and wonderful laugh, a frequent one, white, very fair skin, former blond

green eyes.

He introduced me to his whole family, ‘’une amie, une Italienne’’ He introduce me to his 2

grown up sons, to his elderly mother: immediate reaction, in French, ‘’we do not like her’’!

My immediate reaction: ‘’I am not in love with him’’! He is funny, energetic, he is attractive on

his way, my own age, I am not in love, and…..moi non plus, on est  bien d’accord? Chere famille!

Only long talks and confessions of a devasted heart. Disappointed, betrayed by the mother of her

sons.

The atmosphere at the party was sometimes tense, I sat on purpose very far away from him at the

party table he organized for the occasion.

He gave me his son’s bedroom, on the second floor. 2 floor house, all glazed, garden in the country side.

Long talks after breakfast, heavy drinkers most of them wine, champagne, cognac, no relaxation of

any kind………………..

From the virtual ‘’mon petit coeur’’in 2005 turned into a long stroll on the Normandy beach, windy, chilly, in 2012,

castle visits, chats about his current job, his problems with the second son, weeds smoker, he was

beaten up by him, he used to beat him up from time to time, the weed smoker.

My son. He often avoided school, his son, not studying despite his father’s sacrifice to provide him

a decent education.

Confessions, MD confessions, his son will drop school and do a hard manual work for 2 years.

Beaten up by the father. Confessions. I did my best to grow my children all alone.

Beautiful landscape, Normandy, good listener la Italienne, with good English.

Invitations to a nice small typical trattoria in a stunning small village in Normandy:

He paid the bill, he was much sweeter with me, MD, but not flirting never ever.

He was honoured to have me among his guests.

He kept his 2 beautiful paintings with his 2 sons as toddlers in the living room wall.

He offered me an ice cream at the airport and said good bye.

He grabbed my long hair before entering the gateway and said: t’es amusante, et sympa.

We are not in love; we are not attracted. LA NORMANDIE.

I forgot to mention that he had a cat that’’ pisse partout’’ inside my small trolley, jealous.

 

Next confession: IT employee, long talks on the phone, not in the street. From our homes.

French long-term employee of a multinational company in France, professional exchange from

far away. Unix expert, Linux friendly. Lotus Notes expert. Single, the second of 6 children from

Nantes, home owner, isolated from all the rest, dogs hater, and horse lover.

Confessions on his ambiguous relationships with women since he was 23.

Not sure. After 2 years we decided to meet. New Years’ eve.

He confessed that he was attracted by my picture, company intranet photo!

That year he decided not to spend Christmas holidays with his family, all sisters,all married.

Not to strain his already troubled mind, with nieces and nephews.

He picked me up at the airport, pleasantly surprised by my presence.

I was not. Long brown unclean hair, green eyes, unpleasant smell.

Guitar player, during his free time. He dedicated me some nice French songs.

He used to eat a huge amount of frozen food. His fridge looked like a factory fridge more than

a home fridge.

Confessions started soon: ambiguous sensations with women, only 1 long relationship at the

ange of 23, she got pregnant and commanded an abortion of the child they were both expecting

without even asking him. Broke off.

Confessions in front of typical countryside huge French cup of black coffee: he was unsure if he

liked women or men?

Suspicious about everybody and everything, he monitored in coming calls of any kind.

He hated marketing, he hated my smoking small cigars. He ended up thinking that I was probably

a bit of a whore. Suspicious, sweet, nice smile and bad smell. He possessed a great pornographic

filmography, that he thought might help him!  Increasing consultations with doctors, and psychologists.

Long talks, good listener, myself, left wing politically speaking, he after 3 days asked me if I was

attracted to him, I gently replied that he was good looking but definitely he was not my cup of tea,

he was not even my glass of water; I can drink from.!.

One morning ready to go back after a Happy New Year and best wishes for the new year with an

 

authentic French Champagne, he came out saying: t’es laide.

Obsessed by long walks, very long ones in the mountains, and high blood pressure, his, not mine, he

was turning into a bit of a nightmare.

From bisexual, to homosexual after years of something he could not admit not even to himself!

Confessions. Men’s confessions. Not met in any dating site, on the job. Last observation: a Middle Ages house entirely refurbished and a nice thing from him: I gave him good suggestions.

 

Next man’s confessions: the German man.

3 years younger. Met him at Leipzig Central Station after a single phone call on mobile phones and

1 photo.

I was not a tourist; I was an employee. We decided to meet, because he spoke no word of English,

but he spoke a decent Italian instead.

He presented himself with yellow flowers, extremely elegant, very elegant! Wearing a dark blue suit

and a nice shirt and coat. All Dark.

I was surprised by his height, he was short, few centimetres taller than me. His first ‘’confession’’

only 1.70. Dark clean hair, and dark blue eyes. He recognized me at once, one kiss on one cheek and

another on the other. Piacere di conoscerti. Mild smell of cologne.

No expectations of any kind. Not expectations of meeting any right one of any kind.

Restaurant, Italian restaurant, a simple one. He was a self-employed, he owned an office furniture shop. His business was going quite well, good quality furniture, only 2 employees.

The second confession started: he was not in love with no one. Neither was I I said.

His marriage ended up in divorce after 18 years. No love, no reciprocal interests of any kind. Third confession: he had no bravery to ask for the legal separation and divorce. She did it.

Natural death of a marriage, no lovers, no fuss no drama Natural death of the once love story,

 

through the years. No quarrels of any kind. Fourth confession: he decided to accept to live with her 19-year-old daughter, in a house close to his shop. The daughter decided to live with her father Herbert, not her mother. The conversations went on smooth, only a couple in the restaurant.

He hardly ever laughed. He asked me about my idea of leaving the Leipzig in the coming years and go back to my country. He made only 2 compliments: my German was not good at all but my pronunciation was nearly perfect. The other your eyes communicate quite well every single variation of your mood and soul.

 

Your eyes, he said, you can read quite a lot: anger, sweetness, anxiety, worries, calm, affection, and even indifference. We ordered, very short talk during eating.

He paid and we left the restaurant. That evening started raining. He took his car’s keys and he took me home. Beautiful Opel and latest model, metallic blue. Sweet vanilla fragrance inside the car.

In front of the building I lived, he said: shall we meet a second time? It is meaningless asking you if you are attracted to me, you are obviously not. Neither am I he said. Quite normal perhaps?

No kisses nothing of course.

 

He gave me a call after 2 weeks and made me another confession: he dated 2 German women who wanted to meet the right one and become mothers, one much younger than him. He stopped meeting them.

 

He started speaking in Italian, not a good one, he was still studying the language. He wanted to practice. He would give me the third call after 1 week, we went to a café to get a cappuccino.

He wanted to practice more, he said that sometimes I looked stressed, but it did not bother him since he was not expecting anything from me.

He gave me another call and started speaking about the trip he had already organised for a safari. No other confessions.

 

Confessions from British man: a short invitation to go to a café at London bridge.

We met, very short conversation mostly music, we shared the same tastes. No interests of any kind.

I briefly spoke about my job. His English was quite smooth. A piece of cake and a coffee.

He was not expecting anything else, neither did I. A nice afternoon café that would not be repeated.

Tall man, not attractive. Not even shaking hands. I find it quite normal.

He was a man who was not disappointed about life, not disappointed about job, not disappointed about anything. We never spoke about love.

 

We said good bye. We only had 2 hours conversation. It was a nice afternoon in London. No Love no made-up stories!

 

A good listener I was, and I am.

 

GOOD BYE.