June 2010

Smile, Sylvie!

Smile, Sylvie!

"Why not?" I am James.
"Standing there in front of everyone, well ... not that ..."
"Listen. Who would you believe it? If you do not bother me, then, that interests you? It does not cost you anything, you can take it like a game ..."
This is the embryo of the story. I reviewed several times this conversation in my head. It 'was the decisive moment where I thought and said "ok, I'm fine", and from then on everything is automatic, all follow-up. In every story there is always a fork, take the rest as the saying goes, you can also go back, you can leave, but the game would end prematurely and leave the bitter aftertaste of the unlived experiences, regrets.
short, it is a Saturday morning in late April, we are drinking a bitter sitting at a table in a bar near the walls. James shows me this article "Il Tirreno", "Tomorrow morning the descriptions of Miss Italy in the Red Cottage."
The next night I'm there, I approach the table inscriptions.
"Name"
"Sylvie Angels
" Italian? "
"Yes"
"Age?"
"Twenty"
"Educational"
"Liceo Artistico
" Ok. In half an hour you show up in flesh-colored swimsuit and sandals with a heel. There - puts his arm forward and continues to write without looking - on stage. "
"Where can I change?"
"in the bathroom."
"It 's all dirty on the ground, there's another ..."
"No."
After a quarter of an hour we are in the process. James I suspend in the air as clothing, so it does not get wet with urine and dirty water. Sigh. Snort.
"Come on, Sylvie, quiet. A game, remember? "
" Yes "
out of the bathroom in costume, boys look at me. One beckons to another. James holds me close and I support his leather jacket on his shoulders. I approach the stage, a bouncer invites me to go behind the little curtain, no nods to James. Through the curtain and find myself among a dozen girls. We look without saying anything. A couple I know the view - Lucca is not so great -, one works and another does all'Esselunga sciampista from "Morena hair fashion" do them a nod. I raise my hand without saying anything.
comes a tall and burly with a full beard and beige, it reminds me of Eater figure of a book of Pinocchio I was a child. "Hello girls" look around "are splendid. I mean really."
"Thanks," replied a smiling blond girl and smoothed his hair with both hands. The look of the type
gets serious while giving a look at a sheet. "Well. One by one, when I utter your name, go ahead up to here with his eyes forward, then go back and you have to bow back here smiling. Let me see. " That sort of giant obese run the whole procedure, including the final smile. Me to laugh, I can help myself, because nobody talks. A girl pulls out - from where, I wonder - a tiny notepad and pencil and take notes.
"When you're here, Stand up, three quarters of the public - you must show your goods, no? - With the right leg below and the right hand resting on the side, still smiling. Always. Questions? "
The guy lights a cigarette." Try a few minutes. "
The stage is alive with walkers from the plastic smile that you touch, you avoid, collide. The sound of heels on stage is covered by the techno music that are dancing on track. I walk back and forth. And I smile. How Eater want. A few minutes later the race began. And walk away. Back and forth. My brain is on stand-by. And I smile. Always.
"Miss Red Cottage. Winner of the evening .. èèèèèèè Sylvieeeeeee "
Eater pushes me with his hand resting on my butt" Go Sylvie, it's your time. "I turned around abruptly and glares at him. Let's make my entrance on stage, while behind me a feeling that I miss no screaming" ugly whore. "
I see James in the audience beaming, a man I put the band" Miss Red Cottage, "everyone screams, a couple of kids make me obscene gestures.
After half an hour I find myself at a table with James and eaters.
"You'll have twenty - say twenty, under penalty of exclusion - nights like this - far from Lucca, however, the rule is that, eeeh - in various clubs of Tuscany, and if you will place the top three in at least five evenings, you'll the regional stage with other important places in five nights, you know? "
I nodded.
" Okay, "James said quickly.
" I give you the cell phone number, call me Tuesday, I'll know the next evening. My name is Richard, call me Ricky. Oh, I beg you: Do not make fun of the number, right? "
job as an assistant in a dental chair, on Monday morning, the doctor looks at me as if he had seen an alien:" Well done Sylvia, I read in the paper ... "
" Thanks. "
" Glad? "
" Mmm ... Yes "
" Something wrong? "
" No, sir. "
" Well, this will take us a while ' advertising, sa ... "
" Ah ... "
Patients also do not speak the other all day. And if they do not do them, we think the doctor. I see their eyes - at least I think - trying to guess beyond the shirts I wear. Yet they are the same person as last Friday.
Molazzana, Pitigliano, Equi Terme, and other such places that I've barely heard of are my destinations. Hours by car - for Driving luck James - and then the evening, those looks. infinite weariness. Mangiafuoco occasionally attend, says "good" and leaves. A first, then three rooms in which they are not liked, a second place.
We are return from Larderello. Without a level crossing.
James lights up a cigarette. Aspires. "I do not know, maybe you could do some lessons on behavior. Sometimes you move a bit 'wood, like a puppet ..., here."
"It was a game?"
"Yeah, sure ... but if you went ahead, in fact."
"We're ruining all weekend, including Friday night. We are not talking about anything else. Our lives have stopped, I now propose the lessons of behavior?"
"But I do not ..."
"Forget it, okay? It seems to me already so exaggerated."
"I said this for your own good ..."
"I do not piss around, James. Falla's over."
"Whatever ..."
"Behold, I like that. What you to stop."
The whistle of the oncoming train, the light of the locomotive that cuts through the darkness of the countryside, the freight cars that seems to never end. Even an hour's drive to return to Lucca. I sleep.
Two days later I'm at my house, where I'm staring at a plain mozzarella and two tomatoes.
"Mama."
"What is it, Sylvie?"
"Why do not you do more than the first?"
"No, that is ... I thought the fact that you ..."
"I what?"
"Yes, well ... you have to stay on a diet."
"But I asked you to?"
"No, but as I thought ..."
"Listen. Tonight at dinner I would eat pasta. All right?"
"Okay, okay ... It 's that I like history, and I'm glad you ... you know, Sylvie, I was thinking when we gave you the name. "
" Yeah. Every time I have to say as you write. It 'a ball. Silvia could not go right? "
" Yes, I know it's complicated, but I ... Did not I ever tell you? much admired by young Sylvie, Sylvie Vartan. And now you're dancing in the Miss Italy contest I'm glad, it is still the world of entertainment, no? "
" Mom, do not even know who he is Sylvie Vartan. "
" He has done many shows on TV , for example - is not that you look like, eh - what with ... "
" I do not give a damn about Sylvie Vartan, cabbage! And this story of Miss Italy I took it as a game and I want to remain so. "
" A game. Yes, but ... you need clothes Armani and Dolce and Gabbana, costumes, shoes. An expensive game. And I'm happy for you ... "
" Mom. I've got the shoes and two piece swimsuits, but the clothes they have bought me alone with her salary. I have not given anything more to eat, it's true, but it's already a few months, right? "
" If you need, Sylvie ... "
" I need air. All who care about me. "
" Sylvie. I'm your mother, if I care, I do it for your own good, no? "
" I'm not so sure of these evenings, in this story, Mom. "
" What do you mean? "
"Okay, forget it. Tonight I want to eat pasta. With pesto."
The twenty nights have passed, I'm tired. We are in the office of Ricky, me and James.
"Well, Sylvie. Three first places, one second, two third places. Congratulations. But you see, the numbers we have them. One and eighty, then a beautiful body, long hair, those blacks ..."
"What should I do?" I cut short, looking at the ficus, so lush as to fake his shoulders.
"Montecatini, Viareggio, Chianciano, Follonica, Florence. In one of these nights you have to take at least one band: miss Tuscany, Miss Smile, Miss cinema, Miss Elegance, Sasch girl, Miss Triumph swimwear, girl gambissime, Miss Rocchetta beauty , Miss Wella, girl image. A band available, ten places available for Tuscany. On these evenings you guys will be the attraction, no disco. The track is for you and the jury table and we will be the best presenters in the region, even Carlo Conti. You have to show sympathy and smile. Smile, Sylvie. Smile. "
in Montecatini make us feel the pace and the interview. Yeah, as if there were not enough the interview, there is a shift that is deficient of appreciation to you and then asks you which your job, you would like to do, your hobbies, your measurements ... and you there as a brain-damaged to smile and answer crap. We agree it all before. I have no desire to laugh. When I pass the jury - making a turn on myself - I see there with pads, without any shame to lay eyes where it seems to them, their faces serious. One says something to a nearby chair, and that responds with a nod, then writes something. Emerges I remember when I was a child: a Sunday my grandfather - was a farmer - he took me to the fair to see bovine calves, cows, there was some bull. There were so many colors, different races, and I was excited, I did not know where to lay his eyes. My grandfather was happy with my reaction was that it was interested in buying a dairy cow, and when you saw someone who could do the job his own, he took out his notebook and began to write. It became serious, looked at the cow in great detail, and wrote. All cows had the label with a number, like us. And the jury at the table smiling, applauding, but when writing becomes serious, just like my grandfather.
"But where had it in my head tonight? Least smile, right? What were you thinking?" James I am in the car.
"In my grandfather."
"Sylvie, is not the case of taking the piss.'s Not really the case, you know."
"James, if it does not mean that turned me smiling balls. And anyway I do not think they had not won for lack of a smile."
'Do as you think, Sylvie ... "
"Sure."
"... but what the hell do we go around the clubs menga two months now? "
" You've never been so pissed off ... What lies beneath? It is no longer a game? No? Have the courage to say, at least. Excites you have the girl in the contest Miss Italy? I'm an accessory to show off to your friends? "
" Sylvie, stop. Missing four nights, yet. We try to stay calm. "
the third night I take the band Miss Wella for hair and scalp. I have to congratulate me with my hairdresser.
" Brava, Sylvie. Now the going gets tough "Eaten me into his office, I turn to James and he looks down" to spend a week in Riolo Terme - 20 to 26 August for pre-final. Two hundred competitors from all over Italy, and the first hundred will be moved directly in Salsomaggiore. The other home. Bring a nice wardrobe, Sylvie. "
missing two days, the time to spend three thousand euro in shops, beautician and hairdresser - James gives them to me, I'm dry - and are already leaving.
Dad and Mom are the only twenty-six, if I'm still in the race, my father does not give him the pizza and leave, mom would not have problems, nine months a year working in a shoe factory - all the workers laid off in the summer - but is afraid to travel alone. We are on the front door, James is setting a trolley suitcase, a door-dresses and vanity case in the car.
"Hello Sylvie. I'll call you every night. Make good, eh. "
" Hello Mom. "
" Hello baby "Does My Daddy" 'you are a' to confuse 'with that stuff, you know, and go home. "
" Hello dad. "The hug and burst into tears, I'm five minutes to cry all the time. He is on the tips - is a few inches lower - to caress her back. I am calm. Monto car. James part. I turn and I see them still there, that become smaller and smaller until it disappears.
In Florence we find ourselves in the station yard, I recognize the other nine girls, greeting. A Mercedes minibus waiting for us.
"Sylvie, I'll miss you. I ... I would come, but if they move to the final I have not ... I'll leave the twenty-six evening with your family. This story is getting bigger. Although I am happy for you, at the same time I'm sorry, and I hope that between us ... "
" Do not worry. And thanks for all you are doing. We are now at stake, no? "
Salgo. I turned around. Now it's up to James disappear. I start to look at the view from the window. A guy is in Bermuda with its head in a fountain near the Fortezza da Basso, a girl sitting on backpack fanned his face with a map. I feel shivers on my back, I settle back on the plush cotton.
After two hours we arrived in Riolo Terme, take us to a grand hotel with swimming pool. The lobby is impressive, the kind that make you worry about the bill.
"Room 101, miss. First floor. The elevator is there, behind the flags."
are in a room with Lucy, a girl Fucecchio. Beautiful girl, I'm thinking. But here are all beautiful girls.
After a dinner of plain mozzarella and tomatoes, they make us sit in the congress hall.
"Good evening, my name is Caesar Bellizzi. I welcome you all. You are two hundred, coming from all regions of Italy. Represented Italy, the new Italy, a charming and seductive. Today 's image is a fundamental aspect of life, in your case, image is everything. People do not give a damn about what the fuck you think - excuse my frankness, but I want to emphasize, I also say to my clients, I have an international agency of supermodels - people want to see you, and wants to see you all. He wants to be reassured by your imagination. You are a point of arrival, the cosmetic surgeons for their work, show your photos as reference models. So curating this picture, including how to relate to others. These days you can not move freely, I can not afford that disgraced - er, sorry - the event with the adolescent bullshit. You are not in toyland, no, here you have to work hard. And do not feel sacrificed for this: thousands of girls would be for you. You will be monitored throughout the day - even for what you eat - do not you Mammine see your and your sweethearts. Use your phone to talk to them, is basically the same. There is also a swimming pool to relax during breaks, even to give you the incli tanning, but do not overdo it, please. So. You'll have to learn to move with ease on that damn platform, you say four crap by heart - but nothing brilliant, huh - and you smile, people already has its problems, should not take charge of your menate, smile and nothing else.
Tomorrow morning we start at seven. You have two days, then begin the pre-final.
Good night. "
I go to bed. I turn and I turn around. In the darkness of the room I can not remember the arrangement of furniture, my house would not have happened, I could not get to the bathroom without turning on the light, without the risk of waking Lucia. In the dark I can not remember my body: I \u200b\u200bfeel my feet, legs, stomach, breasts, face. I do not remember my face, I lost my picture. I'm not anymore. My body is falling apart and afraid give up, finally. I fall asleep.
"Hello girls, I hope you slept well. Today we are facing a very tough day. You will study the gait, stance, what you should do on stage - there is also the Rai - The interview with the presenter. Now I'll share into four groups - you have already given your number, right? - and will study all of these things with me and my three employees. "
What goes on like this all day. We stand for eleven hours. We walk back and forth and establish the idiotic phrases to say at the moment.
"What is that face, Sylvie? A toothy smile, shit!"
smile.
The next night the dream of being in a glass case is completely naked. A child asks me a photo. It 's a polaroid, I see my figure coming out of the car, the child takes it and sticks in an album that gives her a lady. I crouched in a corner and try to cover myself with my arms, but I notice that the bottom is made of glass, there are people watching me from below. The flash bombard me from all corners of the prism. I wake up with shortness of breath and drenched in his pajamas perspiration.
"Today you will experience the entry and exit from the stage, with the staff of hairdressers and make-up test your look. Come on, let's go girls. Few talk, tomorrow we enter the scene."
the evening at dinner after a day there to scream propinano vegetable soup, then fillet of cod or alternatively the usual mozzarella.
the evening sleep.
"Good evening, good afternoon, good evening, ladies and gentlemen from Marco Predolin! With the picturesque setting of Riolo Terme behind me, I am pleased to present these beautiful girls of the pre-final selection of Miss Italy. Here they are coming! Make them a big round of applause "The noise is deafening, I am the number 96, take a minute to enter a at a time, we sit in four rows on a staircase. "Look at the explosion of youth and beauty, fantastic platoon! A round of applause!" I'm impaled on the second row with the frozen smile. I feel the breath and the artificial rigidity of the girls who are close to me. "I would not be in the shoes of the jury, people. For four consecutive nights will have to remove twenty-five of these splendours. What a pity! But so goes the world. Only half of this army of beauty - I will pass the word, eh - will move to Salsomaggiore. Good luck to all participants! Take a round of applause! " I feel the mixture of sweat and perfume that lingers on the whole group.
We have included in the hotel lobby. They call us one by one. They spend two hours.
"Now is the turn of the contestant number ninety-six. Miss Wella Tuscany Sylvieeee Angels! A big round of applause!"
Way, smile, do the whole platform, spins and keep walkin '. I pull up next to Predolin.
"Hello, Sylvie - Sylvie Vartan like, eh - that glory night!"
"Thank you" the voice comes out a little 'shaky from the speakers.
"Where are you from?"
"Lucca."
"Oh, what a beautiful city! The walls are magnificent! And that square oval ... what's his name?"
"Square of"
"Ah, yes ... I remember. We've been around a long time advertising for a magazine that I can not name, speaking of songs. Bella. What are you, Sylvie, in life? "
" I work as an assistant in a dental office. "
" Ay, ay! The last time I went by ... no, better not talk about it, and then I removed it. Ah, but the bill, I remember that ah Ah ah ah !..."
Part applause. I laugh at fake taste.
"... But the rest - jokes aside - give a smile to a person is important, and you work for it. You
ambitions in the entertainment field, Sylvie? "
" Well, not exactly. I would like ... I want to paint, in short, yes, to be a painter. "
" But how nice! Brava, Sylvie. Well, the jury has done its job. Let's see. 88 points out of a hundred. Well, Sylvie, you can go. A round of applause for Sylviie Angels! "I'll be back with a smile on his face. I hurt my cheeks.
" And now is the turn of the contestant number ninety-seven ... "
" What the hell did you come to mind, Sylvie? The painter? "Does My Bellizzi lobby" now we have to change it for the press ... "
" Sorry, I came this way. I'm sorry ... "
shakes his head and walks away.
go through, and the next step even in the evenings, including the evening of the twenty-six. There is no time to do nothing but think about the selection, hair, aesthetics, makeup, ironing clothes, taking pictures. I do not want to admit it to myself, but I feel flattered to be in the top percent. At midnight on twenty-six give me two hours to a day off to celebrate with me and James. We stop at an ice cream shop. I'm happy, but not very generous with words. I take a cup of chocolate.
"I missed you, Sylvie."
"You too, James."
"Brava Sylvie.'re Proud of you 'Mom."
"O good to me' baby 'me, Father," but if I went home happy anyway. Same. "
I feel. It 's like a confirmation. My father would have been happier if I had been deleted. I think the fact that he has agreed to call Sylvie. But where was that day?
The next morning we prepare your luggage with clothes hangers, trolleys, vanity case. I have brought clothes and other changes at home to Salsomaggiore. Left in two buses. Lucia also has qualified, we are close to the place. We hope very much, but we're good together.
"Now we stop at the next service station," says the guide to the microphone, "you have to take an elegant dress down on your luggage and then we change the road. It's still an hour." Part
a general groan. "But why do not we have said before, Riolo?" in many yell. And who does not scream - like me - I think. The coach sits back down and tone up those thighs of mirrored sunglasses.
The bus starts again after we found their clothes. Move the curtains on all windows. He began taking off, the driver and the passenger occasionally peering mirrors that fifty asses and tits that look in vain for a bit 'dignity. Some of us laugh while they settle on a bra, some crying, many - like me - look at the floor of the bus and try to do as fast as they can. A
Salsomaggiore we can expect a row of red sports car: a hundred Ferrari with drivers honking scarrozzano us far and wide to Salsomaggiore.
In the hotel there is the usual rigamarole Bellizzi image - use the same words - and adds: "Today is the twenty-seventh, September 2 - six days - there will be the first event. You have to learn ballet. And learn a ballet with a hundred people means working hard. Good night. "
There are many things to learn: the movement of arms rather complicated, a hint of tip-tap with your feet in sync with the music, a jingle-like Broadway, the entrance in groups of ten.
Twelve hours of work, and still groping.
After dinner style weight-watcher, you try the dance until midnight.
We go to bed.
"Hey"

"..." "Hey, Sylvie. "
" Who is it? "
" Lucia. "
" What time is it? "
" One. Sorry if I woke up, but ... you can come with me? "
" But you're saying, Lucy? "
" Grant. Please. I want you see a thing. Come. "
" I do not understand, anyway .. "I get up and I wear a suit.
" Come. "Ahead of me in the hallway of the hotel. We are on the ground floor. Down the hall a door opens, we enter a room not very large. There is a wooden cabinet, a huge fridge, a table, a juicer, a microwave and a row of plates.
"Here's the stuff for breakfast."
We get to eat as the madman: tubs of Nutella, jam, ham, prosciutto di Parma (here is a few steps), orange juice. We can not talk, we had too much noise, but look at us and laugh softly, there are tears in my eyes, for the first time in ten days I smile to someone's taste. It 's beautiful. Let's take a bag of empty containers, the dirty napkins, cardboard juice over. Throw the bag into the trash a bathroom in the hallway and we go back to bed.
I spend days with dance rehearsal, the arrival on the scene, press interviews, interviews with two psychologists, pictures. Four hours sleep a night. Until September 2, we can not see anyone.
"Good evening, good evening! We talk to Fabrizio Frizzi Salsomaggiore Terme to present the final stage of the Miss Italy contest, I greet the viewers, the beautiful people attending - you'll see in a moment - and the whole jury. Greet the president of the jury who has freed himself from all its commitments to be here, Maaaike Bongiorno! A round of applause for Mike, allegriaaaaa ah, ah, ah! "Applause.
" And here they come. A big round of applause! "Applause.
" On stage, come on! "We
ballet. We dance, we dance. Tonight it will eliminate winds, the fact is that the jury came in the afternoon and has already decided. I'm not among girls eliminated. The girls have had to remove the trials with Fabrizio Frizzi and tells them that comes close to elimination. They show surprise and displeasure, had to postpone this displeasure in the evening, preferably with room and tear on her face tightening .
The next morning it's up to me. Out. Deleted. I feel the big scene with Frizzi, repeat it verbatim to the evening. I do not tear, but is fine.
"Well, it was nice, no?" I am James and onto the ramp of the A1. E 'morning. I have been sleeping my behind.
I do not answer, I observe the endless plains. A field of sunflowers in particular.
arrive in Lucca.
"I'm tired, James. Monday to resume work. Starmene a couple of days I would like to be idle without seeing anyone. Do you mind?"
"... No, Sylvie. I want to see you, but ... well rested, Sylvie.'ll Call you, come on."

"There's no hurry, James. We feel. "We'll, I know. And I think with relief.
I go to bed early. I wake up. E 'dawn. My home is in the middle of a hill in the countryside, four miles from Lucca. I open a cupboard, take an old bag and go out. I make a path, coming up the hill. The sliding sun illuminates the petals of a sunflower field that is under me. Every time the wind stirs the value heads, creating waves of dark yellow, coming up to me. I caress. I bend down to pick a dandelion in the grass. As a child I was told that if I spread all their seeds in a single breath, a wish is realized. Blows, all the seeds vanish. Disappeared in an instant.
There is silence.
set up his easel, I open the stool, I begin to draw the sketch.
smile.
And thank you.

Breathing The Air

Sunday, June 27, 2010

How Long Does It Take To Get Head Lice

Monday, June 14, 2010

60th Birthday Speech For A Brother

Sunday, June 6, 2010

Telstra M450 Answer Phone Manual

Saturday, June 5, 2010

Mario Saliari Online Watch

Wednesday, June 2, 2010

Cervix 2 Cm Long And Soft 2 Cm Dilated