Do you know when you feel lost for a while , but suddenly a light turn on in your heart and mind because you've found some sort of truth, inexplicable intuition, revelation? Yes, I know this kind of thoughts could appear rambling, but my mind sometimes (no, I'm joking: always!) works in this strange way. Anyway, when this feeling of loss comes, I seeks a shelter into arts and immediately my soul calms down. But not always the relief become a revelation of something, an answer to what I am wondering about. When it happens, I have to keep searching. What am I searching? I don't know. Maybe an emotion. Maybe a way of living. Maybe a home. Maybe just myself.

Last October I was in a library, strolling among the shelves, when I noticed that a second-hand book was watching me intensely. I watched him back. He wore a white and red cover, yellowed by time, with a stamp of a '50s car (a Cadillac, I think) at the centre. We decided to know each other, so I put myself into tiptoe and I extended my arm to reach him, because he stood in the higher shelve. In that moment we were really closed, I could smell his nice perfume. On the top of his cover, there was a sign saying «On the road by Jack Kerouac». I didn't have the time of reading it, that suddenly I heard a voice: «Hi!» he said gently «I'm Sal Paradiso. It's nice to meet you». I've already heard this name and read the sign on his cover. I knew that his story should be curious and emotional. For a lot of years, I've been telling myself that one day I would like to meet him to listen to his story, his life, his adventures, but I kept saying that It wasn't the right time. But in that moment, there in front of him, with my heart jumping and my breath suspended, I realized that the time was finally arrived.

He started to tell me about the adventures with his friend Dean through the United States, when they'd been driving Coast to Coast for a long time, without any money in their pockets or useful travel items in their bags. They brought with themselves only their need of living freedom. They had no destination, they were just a vagabonds (or bums, as he later revealed) around the America, searching for their truth, their way of living, against time's dictatorship. I could't stop listening to his stories as he couldn't stop telling them. So we decided to choose each other and spend some times together. As I continued listening, I discovered a world and a way of thinking that a part of me (or maybe totally me) recognises. I found what I'm searching, I found an answer, or maybe just someone like me: confused and needed to feel everything.

When Sal finished to tell me his travel story, I felt empty. I needed more. So, he changed his dress to a blue and red cover with a sigh saying The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac. He also decided to chage his name from Sal Paradiso to Ray Smith. So, he started a new story, connected with the first one he had told me.

I'm listening to it right now. And I'm so grateful to him for his enthusiasm, desire, feelings and, above all, for his kindness and sincerity. For his generosity in sharing his 'Vision' with me.

This is just a little part of my journey into Beat Generation's world!

So... to be continued!