Lio Spinelli

Today is exactly two years since the crash that killed Sasha and nearly killed Lio. When I think back on everything that’s happened and everything we’ve been through it seems surreal somehow, like the events of a film you watched years ago and are struggling to remember. It seems impossible that so much could have happened and that the road we traveled could have led through more joy than tears.

This summer was intensely emotional in almost every respect. We began it by burying Sasha’s ashes in the garden of the beautiful old mill house she found in an unfashionable corner of the Italian Alps more than twenty years ago. Her parents Nigel and Penny bought the place back in a time when it was possible for normal human beings to do such things and all of us (David, Sasha, Nigel, Penny and I) have worked on restoring and improving it in the intervening years. We chose a spot with a view of Monte Pizzocco, a favourite of Sasha’s and a mountain Sasha and I had climbed some years ago. It was a beautifully intimate little ceremony with just family, flowers, music, children dancing, some shared memories, lots of silence and a single pine log beacon that burned through the night into the next day. Like me at her funeral service in Lewes a month after she died it was clear that Lio did not want the proceedings to end. At the instant we were ready to start Lio decided that he wanted to draw one last drawing to put in the ground with the ashes. He took a sheet of paper and started to pencil tiny hearts on it. He meticulously coloured in each one until he had filled the entire page. I can’t remember him ever sitting still for that long at any task and it seemed like it took him half an hour. The sun shone brightly, the mountains were clear, we brushed the earth out from under our fingernails, went for a walk in the hills, drank nice wine, embraced, laughed and remembered her well.

Some days later we went to Lio’s favourite castle, Castello di Zumelle. The managers there, Renato, Lucia and their son Nicola, had been our friends for years but since the accident they have become especially close. They knew Penny had been marking each month since Sasha died by making a large moon-shape collage of leaves and flowers and seeds and other natural material (Sasha had died on a blue moon). They invited her months ago to mount a show of her work at the castle which would open on the feast of St. Lorenzo, Zumelle’s patron saint. With only a little convincing and cajoling she agreed. It was extremely rewarding setting it up: the moons, Penny’s silk screens from decades ago, her paintings of Sasha and David, and photos of other environmental sculptures she had done quietly in the corner of a common near their house in London. Lio shuffled about bringing me wire and pliers and string until he got bored and scooted off to climb the tower with Nicola. On the day of the opening there was a mass in the castle at which a little local choir sang and Renato elegantly spoke about Sasha and Lio. Afterwards the show was formally opened and about a hundred or so people enjoyed a buffet with some very nice prosecco. Later that evening there was a harp concert out in the castle’s courtyard and from behind the open doors of the exhibition hall Penny’s large red portrait of Sasha had a perfect view of everything. Simply put, it was an exceptionally beautiful evening.

Over the past months of thinking about how to bury the ashes we had also been giving a lot of thought to a marker or a monument or a stone of some kind. We decided we wanted a bit of the Dolomites, a bit of that lovely pink-orange marble shot through with quartz that makes the sunsets in that part of the world so dazzling. Down below some of Sasha’s favourite mountain walks is a small valley called Zoldo dotted with sweet little villages that haven’t changed much over the centuries. In nearly each of these villages though there is a very modern marble fountain. These very abstract forms seem a bit out place given the slightly dilapidated surroundings but maybe that’s what Sasha liked about them. In any case, she was really fond of them so we decided to see if we could find out where the stone came from and maybe get some for our marker for Sasha. After several trips in the rain and snow last spring and winter, asking around in village bars and shops, we were finally directed to the quarry. I made some calls this summer and eventually got to speak to the surveyor in charge of selling the stone. We met him at the quarry one afternoon and explained to him what we were after. He was so moved by what we told him about our search for the perfect stone that he offered to give us two great big boulders for free (if we arranged to have them delivered). Lio was on fine form that afternoon, asking the surveyor about his family and even inviting him out to pizza with us later that evening. He smiled a broad smile, politely declined and left Lio to play among the rocks.

As Lio scampered through the boulders I couldn’t help but think the doctors back in New York would pleased with how well his leg is doing when we see them in a couple of weeks. Things seem to be going wonderfully well on that front—while Lio still has an obvious limp and deformity, and while he still complains of pain some of the time, he is completely unafraid to use his super leg and there are times when both he and I can completely forget it’s an issue. I sometimes get a bit nervous when I let his leg-exercise regime lapse on holidays, but it never takes him to long to regain his flexibility after our little breaks. His strength in his leg is simply amazing, and as he will tell you at the drop of hat he managed a two-hour hike up a mountain to a little church (although I admit I did tempt him along with the hope of finding a hidden castle and evading parties of marauding orcs). I’m grateful for his persistence and his perpetual willingness to try. I’m also grateful for my ability to encourage him and get the best out him. I made a little promise to myself that the next time I caught myself worrying that I wasn’t doing enough to find more or better treatments for him I would remember that hike in the mountains; I would remember particularly the moment in which Lio was so motivated to climb on in search of the castle that he cried when I told him we had to turn back because it was getting dark and I might be afraid of monsters.

After Lio and I had done our trek I took my own walk up into the mountains for couple of days. It was the first time I had been away from Lio for two full days since the accident; I went with a friend that I knew from Lewes. We walked above the clouds on some of the same mountains I had walked with Sasha. It was exhausting, glorious and transcendent, a sort of line under the very deep sense of loss I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to shake. When I returned Lio ran into my arms and I felt we were both a bit more relaxed for my time away. I was simply happy to have my boy back in my arms again, and while I know there is no end to the list of therapies that I might be trying, and no limit to the amount of time that Lio wants to spend with just me, we’ve both done a pretty marvelous job getting this far.

This summer was especially lovely in that the lack of medical restrictions and urgencies meant we could all concentrate on our own favourite little projects with Lio. My mother, who was with us around the burying of Sasha’s ashes, read to him everyday and organized wonderful little treasure hunts for him. Penny drew with him and Nigel did music exercises with him. And without other children around there was rarely the temptation to compare Lio to peers. This meant that I saw only his accomplishments—his moments of profound sympathy as we lay Sasha’s ashes to rest, his ability to follow quite complex instructions while we were building him a treehouse, his fertile imagination battling orcs with a wooden sword after watching the Lord of the Rings films on rainy afternoons, his startling ability to pick up music so quickly, and his delight at being able to pull himself further than he had the year before at his favourite adventure park (ropes and nets and pulley-slides strung between tree branches outside a town in France where we have friends). In all these moments I see only what he has, what he does and the joy he experiences. I wish I could bottle these up and save them for when I find myself wishing he could speak faster with his friends on the playground or sit for more than a minute without fidgeting while doing exercises or not deteriorate into wild silliness when things get a little stressful. We may have a ways yet to go, but he is only six.

While I miss Sasha everyday and while I would be lying if I said I never pined for my old life, the life Lio and I have managed to create in the wake of the accident is a remarkably beautiful and fulfilling one—better than I could have possibly imagined. I spend hours with Lio everyday coaching him through concentration and memory exercises, music, reading, numbers, Lego building, wrestling and just silly playing. All this is great for his continuing neurological recovery but it’s also good for me. In fact I’ve come to think that Sasha’s last and probably greatest gift to me is an awareness of how precious my time is with Lio, and the opportunity to make the most of it. But I’m also aware that not much of what we’ve been able to achieve over the past two years would have happened without all the love and support we continue to feel on a weekly basis from family and friends not just in Lewes but around the world. For every card, every email, every web page comment and every kind thought I remain continually grateful.

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 7th, 2008 at 2:38 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.