David Rossi Quotes

Scars show us where we have been, they do not dictate where we are going.

Scars remind us where we've been. They don't have to dictate where we're going

Life is a hell of a thing to happen to someone

Life is a hell of a thing to happen to a person.

Trust me, kiddo. I've been here before.

Of course his name would be Dominic. It meant "gift from God." AKA a life-support system for an ego. Still, that didn't mean he wasn't fun to stare at. Dominic Rossi looked like a dream, the kind of dream no woman in her right mind would want to wake from. She had always been susceptible to male beauty, ever since the age of ten, when her mother had taken her to see Michelangelo's David in Florence. She recalled staring at that huge stone behemoth, all lithe muscles and gorgeous symmetry, indifferent about his nudity, his member inspiring a dozen questions her mother brushed aside.

That’s too bad.” Her breath was hot, her lips flicking his earlobe. “Well, we could always eat together later.” “What’s that?” he said, pointing at his ear, keeping his head down. She repeated herself as Rossi pushed past Wolf’s right shoulder, brushing right up against him, and out the front door. Wolf stood and watched Rossi leave. Rossi walked out in a fast march, took a left down the road, and went out of sight. Looking in the window reflection again, Wolf saw Cezar turn the corner back into the rear of the pub. Wolf pushed past the waitress and walked to the door. “Fucking American piece of sh—” the waitress’s voice was snuffed out by the door as it shut. “Goodbye, asshole.” The soccer fan with a lighter raised his beer to Wolf as he walked past.

At worst, the centralizing effort to remove, where possible, homonymy — and antinomy — of a Peninsula that had always been subdivided into local communities and tiny States, gave vent to an unrestrained toponymical revision, that binned millennial heritage in the name of celebratory intentions, patriotic Risorgimental evocations and moralistic efforts. The two-year period that follows Unification can be defined as a period characterized by "a sort of gutting of street names, which ... disfigured to a certain degree the topographic structure of build-up areas", redrawing streets and squares, choosing heroes and models and consciously ignoring others.

The need for certainty, homogeneity, rationalization and good road traffic organization, as well as the need to clearly identify the areas of an urban centre, took a back seat in respect to prevailing nationalization, driven by the need to reduce minorities and to make the State's cultural structure almost monistic. Toponymy became a cultural asset, inevitably losing its function as a "historical turnaround, or scientific furnishings that might be compared, in the order of physical events, to the different deposits studied by geologists".

And for their incredible scholarship and friendship, my thanks to: Andrea Ballestero, Lauren Berlant, Alex Blanchette, David Bond, John Borneman, Ella Butler, Summerson Carr, Molly Cunningham, Paul Edwards, Didier Fassin, Cassie Fennell, Elaine Gan, Stefanie Graeter, Hugh Gusterson, Orit Halprin, Isao Hashimoto, Gabrielle Hecht, Stefan Helmreich, John Jackson, Cory Kratz, Max Liboiron, Mark Maguire, Kai Mah, Kate Mariner, Andrew Mathews, Amy McLachlan, Greg Mello, Ned O’Gorman, Trevor Paglen, Juno Parrenas, Columba Peoples, Kareem Rabie, Laurence Ralph, Patrick Rivers, Michael Rossi, Nick Shapiro, Audra Simpson, Sverker Sorlin, Christian Tompkins, Anna Weichselbraun, Kaya Williams, and Jessica Winegar.

Alla fine di tutto questo caos c’erano gli esseri umani, con le loro paure e i loro desideri. Tanto diversi per provenienza, religione e razza, quanto uguali nell’animo. Bianchi e neri, su quella spiaggia rocciosa, si confondevano, stretti nel loro desiderio in un domani migliore.

Diciamo pure che non esiste arbitrio in ciò che capita. Nasci, vivi e muori. In mezzo ti capitano tutta una serie di decisioni, poche, e avvenimenti, tanti, che puoi solo limitarti a osservare. Tutte le altre azioni, consequenziali a questi fatti, sono scelte, se così si possono chiamare poiché anch’esse sono legate da vincoli sociali.

Prendila, e riempila di tutte le tue speranze. Questo è tutto quello che ti serve. Speranza e tenacia.