Il Trottolaio

There are cities that, seen by a distracted visitor, seem similar to other ones. But you do not have to get yourself deceived. Like certain ancient writing desks which keep secrets inside a concealed drawer, also the cities can reveal precious things to who knows to search. Livorno keeps in its small Venezia a delicate lace of channels, light bridges and shadowed alleys. Here, you can meet an out of the ordinary person. Not for the look or because comes from far places. It is what he does which gets him special. Romano makes toys that take us back in an ancient world, in the world of the memory and the fairy tale. Romano makes spinning tops. His city house is surrounded by many others that modernity has wanted anonymous and equal to each other. Not his one. In the ancient myths and fairy tales, men and animals can speak the same language, so is still for Romano. Pio... Come on! Come on... Come on then! Here. Two chickens and one rabbit are the tutelary deities of his house and his cabinet-making workshop. Go away, you get out, come on. Come on, come here. Come on. Come that now we work, come on. Stay a little bit here. Try not to eat everything, ok? Serrazzano, a small village at half way from Livorno and Grosseto, is the birth-place of Romano. To understand his job and how much wiseness and ability are hidden in what he makes, you have to follow him where he has his roots, and where he gets inspiration for his creations. You need to enter his world, to listen to the old stones of the village, to let the past generations memories drive you. Only in this way you can understand the hidden charm, the secret, the lost symbolism of the spinning top. Crossed the village, Romano reaches the farmhouse that was of his father. Anna Maria is with him, a friend that often helps him, particularly since several years ago when a piece of wood escaped away from the lathe hit him in the head. After four days of a coma, he woke up unable to speak. He looked like he was forever doomed at the silence, but his strong character and his big determination allowed him to recover in part his speech. The ancient house was a friend of him, too. The objects, preserved with loving care, are themselves memory. They call back memories and emotions, become speech, are able to evoke it when it is lost. Since the accident, which it seemed have deprived him of something, Romano has been able to acquire a new deep sensitivity. That silent language that in the childhood of the world related men to things, men to animals, is not lost in him. Romano, do we open the windows to change the air? Yes! I go upstairs to tidy up the room. And I am going to the lathe, bye. Equilibrium and harmony is what it offers itself to the gaze from the window of the farmhouse. Woods and cultivated lands, meadows, olive tree grows and vineyards shape the perfect drawings create in the centuries by men wiser than the contemporary ones. Equilibrium and harmony is what is based the spinning top maker’s art on. The motion conservation, the perception of the time as rotation, as natural cycle that repeats itself, are the other essential elements. So, before starting to work, Romano and Anna Maria with him have to preserve the harmony of the environment. In order that the fig tree has fruits, you have to set it free from the suckers. The lawn must be mown and the dry grass harvested, so that it is not bait for the fire or, growing beyond measure, it becomes bush. And the bush in turn must be thinned out, to prevent it from becoming an inextricable tangle of shrubs. The land, cared for over time that repeats itself from year to year, can therefore remain fruitful. And when, with the rapid advance of the years, the strength of the arms is no longer sufficient, the machines come to the aid. Not even the use of an ancient mechanical means, however, reduce the charm of this magical rural landscape. Everything has its time, as in an ancient ritual that is repeated immutably. Now is time to light the fire and heat the oven with the wood that the forest has donated. While the smoke brings to the sky the announcement of the food that will be prepared, Anna Maria moves towards the apple trees that grow wild at a short distance. To the farm, Romano’s father gave the name “the Lotus”, because he was fascinated by this flower which, though living in muddy ponds, is always immaculate, like one who manages to remain pure among the difficulties of life. A fairytale name for a fairytale place. Here everything seems to belong to the world of fairy tales. Like the apples, so small that they seem victim of a spell that has reduced them to the size of the smallest creatures in the woods. Romano, do we put also these in the oven? Yes, put those into as well. Look what wonderful. They should be good. Look. Ok. Perfect. Just these simple and apparently modest fruits are the ones that the heat of the oven awaits. Together with the small apples, so tiny to appear unsuitable to be cooked, Romano prepares other ones, the “rotelle” apples, sour if consumed raw, but sweet and fragrant once cooked. Removed the embers, sure from experience that the temperature is right, Romano bakes the apples. Passed the time, cooked in the simplest way, the fruits are ready to reveal all their sugary flavor. The “rotelle” apples, due to the petiole removed, have poured out their pulp and now they appear almost as if they are made of marzipan. The smaller ones have kept their vivid color, the same as the fire and the embers that have them baked. Romano’s farm is located in the metalliferous hills, rich in geothermal energy sources that have been used for over a century to produce electricity. The territory is also rich in bubbling mud puddles and geysers, whose hiss fills the air. If you let yourself be guided by the imagination, at the twilight you can see here the mysterious creatures of fairy tales. Here. Time has come for Romano to dedicate himself to his work, to his passion. Over the years he has made spinning tops using the most diverse woods, even the ones coming from far away. Each wood has its own characteristics, its peculiarities: compactness and weight, density, veining and color. But it is above all the wood that the forest offers spontaneously, without the need to cut down trees or cut off the living branches, which Romano seeks. Nature must be understood and respected. There is no need to cause unnecessary wounds. It is a holm oak very old. I believe this... is eighty years, ninety years. I know it's small but it's hard, you know, very hard. No! At the expert eyes of Romano the sawdust produced in the cut is revealing. Too tiny, too impalpable. A sign that humidity, mold and xylophagous insects have notched and weakened wood. He has to keep searching. I would say... I cut this... and that as well. This is perfect. Wood is found. For many years the forest nourished it and made it solid. Now other time is needed, the one for the drying, at least one year. Always living matter, the wood keeps changing with time, the fiber becomes stronger, the texture and color change. During his long life, Romano has practiced many different trades. But the one of wood has always been his true passion since, years and years ago, he was fascinated by a carver who made small masterpieces from olive wood. But before that, as a child, when children's games were simple and joyful, he had had his first spinning top. To build it for him was a craftsman of the village. I wanted to buy something like this. While he was working on it, I was I was set up outside, not inside ... He says, stay out there and wait. I'm here when he worked with the lathe, and then he gave it to me, he gave it to me for free, without paying… Before it even exists, the spinning top starts its rotation. Wood is preparing to be reborn in its new life. The magic begins. I like the whole world of all wood, I like it very much, I also like necklaces, now I have started making wooden bracelets, not all the same, even made of olive trees and other things. The most important things that I did, were made of holm oak or ornello. Ornello wood rotates super perfect. Even the holm oak is perfect but you must remove, remove, remove to find the heart of the wood and then it turns super perfect. The spinning top was already there, hidden in that anonymous piece of wood. Romano did not create it, he made it evident, he revealed it to our eyes. In his ones, which can see the essence, it was there since ever, waiting to be brought to light since the seed of the tree sprouted. Meanwhile, Anna Maria dedicates herself to her passion, painting. Even for her, wood, nature and its fruits are an irreplaceable source of images and colors. Romano is a very special person. Almost all of them consider him a genius in his field, also because the spinning top’s makers in Italy have remained very few by now. His particularity is constancy, the passion he puts into his work. Until one o'clock AM he is always in the laboratory and always invents new things. He knows how to work all types of wood and has exceptional creativity. He is an all-round artist, at all levels. They give him great compliments, here, he is gratified by the compliments that all these people give him. Because, even if we are in a technological age, I still see that people love wood, love wood products and they pass on also to their children this passion for ancient things, for lost things. This is a beautiful friendship that continues over time and which I hope will continue for much longer. If a friend in need is a friend indeed, Anna Maria has been and is a true friend. Along with Romano's children, she has been close to him at the moment of his greatest difficulty, she understood and supported him. If Romano is a wizard, Anna Maria was for him a fairy godmother. The spinning top has taken its final shape. Only a final finishing is necessary. I am glad it is not to talk, but I am happy where I work, yes, When I am also alone, I stay still and then I feel with the thinking the moment I work I am doing well well and I must settle perfectly. Time has come to try the spinning top, to throw it, as children throughout the world have done for centuries. I want to see if it turns well. The miracle of perfect balance is repeated. The sun has almost completed its apparent turn in the sky. Perhaps also this is the ancient charm of the spinning top. Circular movement, balance... it is the dance of every man who finds stability in the movement. It is a sign that tomorrow, and next year, and so forever, time returns. At the end of the day it is time of rest, of domestic heat. Romano dedicates himself to cooking, another of his many talents. I gladly do it, because this is very good! Here. This is... heather, this, a piece of heather, which it is particularly tough. What do we do, do we put it there? Where? This, the other... the other burner. No, you cannot do it now. Does not it fit there? You have to do it there. More or less when ... did you see the time? Romano, what time did you put it? At 8:25 it is ready. The polenta is almost ready, just a last touch is missing, a pinch of condiment. His way of preparing it is very personal. Romano gave some of its creativity even to that tasty dish by going against the tide... he replaced the usual continuous rotation with a slow pace. A last stir with that wood of heather that does not break, which does not get altered, which perhaps transfers some of its secret virtues to food. Not for nothing, in ancient times to the heather was attributed the ability to free the house from bad spirits and near it, in the moors, lived the fairies… Dinner is served. Market days are pleased for Romano, the right complement to his work that takes place in the concentration of the laboratory. At his stall he meets men and women of all ages and everyone is fascinated by his wonderful spinning tops. The perfection, the prodigious balance, the ability to amaze is common to all of them, from the simplest to the most unusual. I know it, you know, I speak a little bad, to understand, etcetera... But I tell everyone what wood is. When they listen to me and speak in this way, they were still and happy to understand, not this way, away at once, they stayed for several minutes that i talk these things. Even if he speaks a little badly, his creations talk for him, and sometimes they sing. Another cycle finishes. Romano has returned to Livorno, to its canals, to light bridges to the hidden places of the city, to the most frequented. Who does not know who he is, what his talent is, does not notice him. It seems one of many. We know instead what wisdom is hidden in his hands, in his mind, in his words. Only who knows to listen can understand the magic of the man who utters them.