At Home : Letters from Italy at the Time of Coronavirus. Story Twelve : Milano

The locomotive of Italy is Milan, a city that Romans love to compare unfavorably to their capital for its inferior weather and much higher pollution levels but that they envy for its wealth, sophistication, cultural life and the ability to get things done.  

Milan’s region, Lombardy, has born the worst of the national virus burden with a death rate that far overpowers every other region.  Over 1100 of Italy’s 13,772 deaths were Milanese. 

Stefano is Milanese, and one of the oldest childhood friends of dear friends of mine. He is intensely likable, lively, international, multi lingual and deeply socially engaged.  

From Milan he wrote to me about his experience during the first 54 days of lockdown : 

“I find it difficult to summarize everything that has happened in these two incredible months.  You know that we are all closed inside the house. This could be a good opportunity for me to rest, relax, and chat with friends. Instead I am overtaken by this western and above all Milanese efficiency craze, so I do even more than before, and go to bed completely exhausted at midnight.

My job, which was already largely teleworking, has become 100% teleworking. This was a fairly easy transition, and the projects we had in progress are moving along. What has greatly very slowed down is the sales part: customers respond with difficulty, they struggle to make commitments for the future, budgets are uncertain and often cut back. I envision further problems as times go on.

I really miss outdoor activities, mountain walks and weekends at the lake, but these are “happy problems” and not serious one. I compensate with physical activity in the house and the neighborhood, every day a bit of Pilates, walking stairs and walking around the block.  My social life is conducted on Zoom with both close and and less close friends.  

I took this opportunity to make contact with friends I had not heard from for decades, and this was a very pleasant and easy, thanks to the fact that everyone is at home so it is not difficult to find a timetable that works for everyone.

I have a few friends who have fallen ill, and some who have also died.  That is terribly sad but I suppose not that different from the “normal” periods. The most painful aspect of these last months is that my mother-in-law in Frankfurt passed away, and we weren’t able to say goodbye before or after. The funeral is currently set for June but we don’t know if we can go. This is one of the saddest things about this lockdown right now.

My health and that of my family, including my mother, is good, so this is of no concern, and food and medicines at the moment are readily accessible. I have two daughters abroad (Switzerland and USA), we hear from them often, they too are fine. I also have long video calls with my mother and now we have found a way to “share” a screen and watch things at the same time, comment on them, be together virtually.

I know that after pandemics, famines come. This is a real concern not for now but for the future.  I also know that after the pandemics and famines comes a recovery which is very vigorous. 

I am not worried about my children, I think they will have more opportunities after COVID than before. I’m not even worried about myself. I think I have had a beautiful life, I have no regrets or self reproach. I took advantage of this interim to make a will, so if I were to die I wouldn’t be worried. I read a lot, I just finished Camus’ “The Plague”.  I avoid the daily news, because this can easily absorb you all day, and I focus more on philosophical and socio-political subjects and thinking about the future.  I also have long conversations and exchanges of emails with friends who have special insights into these topics or just like them.  I am very passionate about them myself. 

I hope when we when we restart things we will do so in a different way, with more attention to the environment, with more kindness, less aggression, more calm. I hope that we will take notice of the hateful and/or unnecessary jobs; the waste and the numerous forms of injustice. I hope that we will understand that after all we can live well, even better, without them. 

Some say that the worldwide reduction of pollution during this period has reduced the number of environment-caused deaths by more than the number of victims of the virus. I find this hard to believe, also because  pollution-related deaths are the result of slow and long exposure.  I do think that the lock-down has had some unintended positive collateral effects such as the reduction of road accidents. I hope that the realization of how things “can be” will lead us to understand that we can rebalance our lives and see vast improvement. We will be poorer, but this will encourage us to waste less, not a bad thing. As a society we need to work on reducing inequalities.  Here too in these two months I have seen actions of great generosity, and productive, focused conversation about what more there is to be done.  Not enough is being said about the mafia. Worldwide mafias will benefit greatly from the pandemic.   We need to be very much on guard.

I am trying to keep to my usual daily schedule. I am up at seven; breakfast; gymnastics; shower; email and work video conferences; lunch at home with the family; afternoon a little work and some reading; Zooms with friends, dinner at home and then a movie streamed from Chili or Beltrade (our neighborhood cinemas.) 

On Saturday 7 March, we were at the lake having dinner with friends, and learned that the Lombardy region was going into lockdown. So after dinner we closed up the house and went back to Milan. Since then we have not gone out except for one weekly supermarket trip that my son usually does for us, and one or two small daily purchases that we make to support neighborhood businesses (bread, cheese, vegetables).  After the small daily purchases, our patterns is to take few quick runs around the block to keep our fitness levels reasonable. We have the phone number of our trusted greengrocer and once a week arrange to have delivered a crate of fruit and vegetables. Our weekly street market has been suspended.

In front of our house there is a street with trees, a dog run and a playground. I see very few people on the street, the dog area is very popular, the playground is closed and off limits. At first there was a police car patrolling the neighborhood and dispersing groups, but now we rarely see it. 

What I miss are being out of doors, our house at the lake, dinners with friends, seeing my mother.  

I think that many small businesses will not be able to reopen, and this will be a problem. But the Italians are ingenious and I think they will invent alternate occupations. I already have seen many who have moved their businesses online, are working on home deliveries of their products and have found other ways to adapt to the circumstances.  

Milan has always been the locomotive of Italy. Once again it will fight back. Milan will have the deepest recession in all of Italy, and also the most vigorous recovery”.