FLASH
Shkruar nga Auron Tare
The village was completely abandoned, but nature, which does not care about the departure of man, continued its life. Through the alleys where grass had covered the cobblestones, water still flowed from the springs. It seemed as if the place breathed without people, like a body that had lost its memory, but not its soul...
Sometime towards the end of last fall, I decided to venture into one of the most unknown areas of the south. A mountainous area, with forests and small villages nestled on the slopes of the mountains, it was a place that the fate of the lack of roads had somehow saved from the drive of modern Albanians to cut down forests or take gravel from streams.
After walking for over twenty kilometers through untouched nature, where autumn had begun to splatter the trees with a yellow like aged copper, I came upon the first village. Of what had once been eighty houses, only one chimney was left today, smoking. The Ottoman bridge was still standing, although it had been pierced in two or three places by treasure hunters.
I crossed the bridge and headed for the house that had people. Only an elderly couple lived in it. The large gardens were full of vegetables. The trees were full of fruit. The nuts were still unripe. They lived with cows, which they kept in a semi-wild state, as well as a few other livestock.
The village was completely abandoned, but nature, which does not care about the departure of man, continued its life. Through the alleys where grass had covered the cobblestones, water still flowed from the springs. It seemed as if the place breathed without people, like a body that had lost its memory, but not its soul.
As we were drinking coffee on the sofa of the stone house, which must once have been quite noisy, dusk was falling on the village. Suddenly, the alleys were illuminated. The wooden pillars still had lamps and it seemed as if a hidden hand was waiting for darkness to fall to say that the world had not yet abandoned the village. In fact, its nest among the mountains and the world's oblivion had ironically meant that no one had come to steal the power wires that once connected the village to the electrical system.
The owners of the house, after telling me about the solitary life in this forgotten village, brought me a cup full of honey. They had their hives in the garden of their neighbors, who seemed to have not come to see their house for decades.
"Where are the neighbors?" I asked.
"Ah, they are no longer there," they replied.
The owner has been dead for a long time, and the children have scattered. They have never returned.
I was staring at the falling dusk, lost in thought.
The owner of the house was a courier, and the host was a chatterbox.
"Courier?" I asked, surprised.
Postman. But we, around here, still call him "courier", since the war.
Ah… I get it. The village postman.
No, no. The courier for the entire area, he explained to me. For forty years he walked to the center of town, where he would wait for the press. He carried a large leather bag on his back. He would fill it with newspapers, magazines, and various telegrams, then return to distribute them to the surrounding villages.
“Forty years… ” he said, lost in thought, looking out at the abandoned house, as if to emphasize how quickly time had passed. “Forty years on foot. Winter and summer. Rain, snow, heat. He went to town every day. He would fill his leather bag with thick straps, throw it over his shoulder, and carry a whip in his hand, because there was danger from wild animals. He would distribute the press to the centers of culture, but also telegrams. Everyone could hardly wait for him, because he brought the news of the world to these villages of ours .”
“When the system collapsed, he continued to go to the center of town every day. He waited for the printing presses to come… but nothing. Things turned upside down and no one remembered him anymore. He continued to go for a few months, then it seems he realized that everything had changed. They had forgotten him. He locked himself in the house. He would come around the garden, talk to us every morning… and what .”
"And then?" I asked him curiously. "When did you leave the village?"
The old man looked at me in surprise.
What do you say? Where did he go? A few months later they found him dead on the porch, as if he was still waiting for the newspapers to arrive.
Lini një Përgjigje