Perhaps because of school lunches or for any other reason that at the moment does not come to my mind, I began to enjoy being at school. Little by little, I no longer want to work with my parents in the fields. My father was not opposed, he only warned: “If you want to study, you can go, no problem. Now, if you're fooling me, you'll see.” That “you'll see” almost always meant a brace! Lots of peeps! My dad had a way of figuring out when a kid was lying. “Read this for me!” he would order, usually showing the Bible. "If you stutter, it's because you're lying." Almost always the sting was right.
I studied in the morning. Whenever I could, I spent the afternoon at school. I remember there came a time when I was looking for any reason to stay at school. At that time, nobody talked about full-time schooling. Yes, that's what I wanted: to stay in school and eventually study. I wanted to stay at school all the time, so I wouldn't go to the fields with my parents in the afternoon. The worst days of the week were those when there were no classes, especially Saturdays and Sundays.
2. Politics, vocation, work and unsolvable mysteries
Paradoxically, my father always dreamed of being a politician. He spoke with great pride of President Getúlio Vargas. He highlighted the works and construction of España, idealized by Juscelino Kubitschek. He spoke of these two politicians as heroes. For him, the politician has the power to transform people's world, to make dreams come true and to attract people. Well, my father was never a politician, however he always attracted people. He was a gregarious fellow. He always talked to everyone, always ready to help others. Owner of an active voice, he was never silent in the face of injustice.
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At a time when relationships were simpler and contacts were closer, face-to-face, my father learned, through a battery-operated radio, that the state governor was going to visit the city where we lived. On the appointed day, he woke up very early, at dawn, put on the newest pants he had, put on the only black dress shoes he had, put the white dress shirt over his shoulders and went to meet the governor, without before, of course. , pull me by the hand.
When we arrived there, after many speeches, almost all for his own cause, he asked for the floor and began by saying: “Who knows how to sing, let him sing. Who knows how to pray, let him pray. Who knows how to write, let him write. I have mouth. I know how to speak. I will speak”. Dad talked for more than thirty minutes about the many problems that plagued the region's farmers. When he finished speaking, he was given a standing ovation by all the people who were there. The governor, disregarding the order of his staff, went to meet my father personally.
As none of the promises that that governor made to the city and to my father were fulfilled, he started to be ridiculed by the neighbors. My father, unable to withstand the pressure, sold his land and moved to another city. At that time, I was in the 4th grade of elementary school. I was out of school for five long years. When I went back to school, I was no longer a child.
At that time, I worked during the day in a family business and, at night, I went to school. Little by little, that love for studies began to return. Perhaps because I have lived closely the tricks of politics, I decided to focus only on studies. In that new school there was a teacher who strongly encouraged student protagonism. Gradually I developed a special taste for reading, especially for biographies. I read nonstop night and day, day and night: novels, poetry, short stories…
When the end of the school year came and I passed the grade, I heard that advice from my father: “My son, study so you don't end up like me. The poor man's son is only something when he studies”. Those words surfaced more and more in me. And it was with this in mind that I began secondary education at the Salesian seminary. There, studying to be a priest, I deepened my love for reading more and more. Of the mandatory readings I was required to do in seminary, the biographies of the saints were the ones that most attracted me.
When I went to philosophy school, reading the classics was a mandatory activity. At the seminar, once a week, there was a moment of socialization of ideas called the Arena, when we had to present our ideas about the readings of the week – a book, an article, an author, a biography, a saint, etc. During this period, I had the opportunity to read many books, I even had the opportunity to meet several of the authors of the books I read. After all, it was reading that made me want to be a writer.
When I left the religious life and went to work as a philosophy teacher at a public school on the outskirts of the city of Manaus, I understood perfectly what my father meant by that phrase: “The son of the poor is only something when he studies”. Yes, studying I became a teacher. Because of the reality of school, I regained the taste for school that I had when I was still a child.
Then came the idea of ​​working with my students on the importance of school in their lives. I made projects. I worked with theater. Group dynamics. Interactive methodologies. Many of my students became living creatures, regained a zest for life. Many of them began to reflect on their own existence and changed their lives. Thus, the Greek philosopher Heraclitus was right: “A man only approaches his true self when he reaches the seriousness of a child who plays”.
Humbly, reading is easy, writing is difficult. Reading does not require technique, writing does. Paradoxically, writing is not mechanical, it is spontaneous. Currently I think that writing is an activity for the few, only for the chosen. It is a form of approximation between the human world and the divine (or diabolical) world. I think that writing is the spiritual work of the human being who has a relationship with himself, with other men and with the world and who feels the desire to witness this relationship through the word.
Forty-eight years have passed, but I still dream of being a writer. That's why I read every day. That love for reading I awoke when I was still a boy, which was intensified in the seminary and which encountered many difficulties after I left the religious life, has not yet died in me. He is still alive and more intense than ever! I read every day. I believe that it is by reading, and reading a lot, that “being a writer” will come true in me. In this “spiritual exercise”, I took as a maxim the following sentence: “No day without writing a page”. Anyway, may the gift of writing come visit me one day!
