Where My Story Truly Begins
When people ask me where my life began, they usually expect a simple answer.
"I was born on June 5, 1948, in Loreto Aprutino, a small village in Italy's Abruzzo region."
That is true. But to me, my story does not begin there. I believe that a human life does not begin on the day of birth. It begins with those who came before. With their dreams. Their struggles. Their sacrifices. Their love. Long before I came into the world, my father, Antonio Rossi, had already made one of the most difficult decisions of his life.
Like thousands of other young Italians, he left his native region to work in the Belgian coal mines. He did not leave in search of adventure. He left to build a better future for his family. He left my mother, Guglielmina Di Pasquale, and her children in Loreto Aprutino, promising them that the separation would only be temporary. My mother stayed behind. In a modest house. With almost nothing.
But with a courage whose full measure I would only understand many years later. Life was hard. Water had to be fetched and carried home. Bread was precious. Every day demanded new sacrifices. And yet she continued to believe that one day my father's sacrifice would be rewarded.
But life spares no one. Even before I was born, our family was struck by a tragedy from which it would never fully recover. My little sister Lidiola lost her life in a tragic accident. I never had the chance to know her. And yet she has always been part of our family. We rarely spoke about her.
Perhaps because the pain was simply too great. But some absences remain as present as the people who are still beside us. Perhaps that is also why, later in life, I thought so often about memories. About family. And about those we lose without ever truly letting them go. On June 5, 1948, at half past one in the morning, I came into the world. My father was not there.
He was working hundreds of miles away, deep in the Belgian coal mines. I have often wondered what he felt when he learned that another son had been born. Joy? Pride? Or perhaps sadness as well, because he could not hold his family at the moment they needed him most. A few months later, my parents made another courageous decision. I, too, would leave for Belgium.
I was still only a baby when my mother began that long journey. A journey lasting several days. A journey filled with uncertainty. Along the way, we stopped in Milan, where we had to remain in quarantine for several days. Only afterward were we allowed to continue toward Belgium. On October 22, 1948, we finally arrived at what would become our new home: the De Lindeman mining community in Heusden-Zolder.
At that age, of course, I could not imagine that this country would become mine. That I would grow up there. That I would meet my wife there. That my children would be born there. That I would pursue my greatest dreams there. That I would experience my deepest pain there. And that, ultimately, it was there I would discover what truly matters in life. Today, when I look back, I understand that my story did not begin with my first breath.
It began with my parents' sacrifices. With my father's courage. With my mother's love. And with the memory of a little sister I never had the chance to know, but who will forever remain one of us. Perhaps that is also one of the reasons I wrote this book. Not to place my own life at the center of the story.
But to make sure that those who came before me are never forgotten. For in the end, we are all the continuation of stories that began long before us. And without those stories, mine would never have existed.
