January Editorial

Do not think about what the new year – this 2022 that is so full of uncertainties – can do for you, but think about what you can do to make it better.

Let’s start from this sacrosanct truth that John Fitzgerald Kennedy, referring to the United States, gave us in the speech of his inauguration, to face in the right way this beginning lived halfway between hope and fear.

I believe the perfect words are awareness and optimism.

Awareness: We all know that the pandemic has changed our lives in the last two years and that it has not yet passed, but we also understand (save for a minority of irresponsible people who reject the vaccine) what we need to do to protect ourselves and others. Awareness: We all know that the pandemic has changed our lives in the last two years and that it has not yet passed, but we also understand (save for a minority of irresponsible people who reject the vaccine) what we need to do to protect ourselves and others.

And then optimism, that disposition of mind that helps us to see the glass as half full instead of half empty and which, above all, allows us to face the future without negative preconceptions. At this moment we do not need Cassandre to announce the worst calamities. We need to believe in ourselves, to commit ourselves to doing the best we are used to, both at work and in the family, and we need not to be afraid.

To tell the truth, I didn’t want to write about the cursed Covid even on the first day of the year but, having just returned to Spain for a few days, I realized that in Italy we cannot help but discuss it. Because all the media, newspapers, televisions, the world of politics, entertainment programs do nothing else. In other countries such as Spain, on the other hand, where the contagion situation is more or less identical to ours, people who conscientiously wear a mask on their face are not constantly bombarded with a myriad of anxious information. They have the news, they are informed but … the impression is that they are also able to live even with all the necessary and sacrosanct restrictions.

This is the wish I feel like making today: let’s try to live, to enjoy what we have, to inevitably learn a different lifestyle but without considering it a condemnation, if anything an “opportunity”. Let’s try not to be afraid of others because the only chance we have of defeating the virus is to succeed together.

With awareness and optimism.

As the great Lucio Dalla said, “the year that is coming will pass in a year. I’m getting ready, this is the news ”.

And you?