Dear Piero

Dear Piero, and so on a mid-August weekend you left. But it's not true.

The last time we spoke you told me candidly: "I'm happy". Despite the ailments, the illness and the years that passed, his eyes shone at you, while he said he was the luckiest man in the world. Happy because, you said quoting an old proverb, do the job you love and you won't work for life.

Now you're gone, but we know that's not true. You are always here with us Piero, inside the thoughts of all those people who, looking at you, saw the passion that animated you, the pure pleasure of explaining things and surprising everyone with the simplest but also the most difficult thing: the world around us. Talking to us about that thing called "science" and which you actually showed for what it really is: life.

Other than Harry Potter, you were the real wizard, because when you spoke we all felt like scientists. Then someone did the scientist, thanks to you, but we all remained scientists, because that magic you did has never gone out: having awakened the child inside us, that curious child who always wonders why . Here is the true meaning of your answer, "I'm happy".

And that's why, Piero, in reality you never left, we know it, and from up there you still smile: at all those children inside us.