Ilde

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It was in September 2014 that I met for the first  Ilde, there, on the edge of the door of her building.

Despite the look and attitude of the "village lunatic" I was extremely impressed by the light of her eyes,

so impressed that I wanted to know better the story behind that look.

Ilde lived in  Pigneto, a roman neighborhood, since she moved from Calabria to marry Spartacus, the love

of her life, when she was twenty.

 

The trauma of her husband's early death led her to hide her grief behind the mask of madness, cutting ties with the outside world, being often mocked by the neighborhood and limiting her life living in her house, at the same time loved castle of memories of a distant and incomparable life and jail that imprisoned her in the past.

Immersing myself in the life of Ilde for 2 years, I witnessed the immobility of social services and the superficiality of the neighborhood, in a country as Italy where the rate of seniority is the highest in Europe and 538 thousand elderly people pour into poor conditions.

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I spent whole days appreciating her spirit, different from any other person I had ever met, coming into contact with a soul as feminine as neglected, strong and at the same time very fragile.