Beauty Is A Basic Necessity

It’s as essential as water, food, warm clothing, and medicine.

I take the train to go to work.

When I arrive at the station, I walk along some of the grayest and gloomiest streets in Bologna, where there are tall, ugly buildings, few trees, and walls covered in graffiti.

In the early morning, along with me, there are many other workers getting off the train. They have faces that are almost always serious, sad, worried, bored as they make their way to their workplaces.

In the middle of one of these streets, Via Amendola, lives a homeless person, a woman of about fifty, like me.

I’m more of a homebody. I like being at home in my quiet and comfortable refuge.

So I’ve always been struck by the homeless, and I can only imagine how incredibly tough their lives must be. I’m sure it’s even tougher for a woman. Fortunately, in Bologna, there are arcades that provide them with shelter from the rain and sun.

Her “home” is a mattress with a sheet that she tidies up every morning, a cardboard box containing a pack of tissues and a few mandarins, a large bag with some clothes. Just the essentials to survive.

Yesterday morning, passing by her “home,” I noticed that near her mattress, there was a plastic bottle with a white rose inside.

Beauty is a basic necessity.

I’m Andrea from Bologna, Italy. I write about life, beauty, empathy, and lessons learned. To see my stories pop up on your feed, I’d love for you to follow me (Andrea Feccomandi). And, to have stories sent directly to you, subscribe to The Warm Lasagna, my weekly newsletter.