Brunello Cucinelli Believes Better Times Will Return, Like the Swallows
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CUCINELLI’S RAY OF HOPE: The times may be dark, but Brunello Cucinelli always sees some light. The Italian entrepreneur sent a letter on Thursday to those who attended the unveiling in September 2018 of the Hamlet of the Spirit, the village of Solomeo he restored. Thinking of happier moments, Cucinelli said the letter was “dictated” by his feelings at such a moment now — although he never mentioned the coronavirus by name.
“Who sends the swallows? Almost always, when I’m away on business during the first days of March, I call home and ask if the swallows have returned to Solomeo. I ask this question for two reasons: because I’ve loved them since I was a child, and because sometimes, I’ve heard, they stop coming back to some countries; maybe they don’t fit in there anymore, and I find this a little unsettling.” This is how Cucinelli begins his musings, adding that the swallows are so punctual that one could set one’s clock by them. And sure enough, on Wednesday, they appeared. Cucinelli views them as “one of the most beautiful gifts of Creation,” rejoicing at their arrival, “but in this slightly less easy year I sort of saw in them the symbol of rebirth.”
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Just like the swallows reappearing every year, Cucinelli believes better times will come. Comparing humankind to sailors, he believes that “a lighter boat is easier to steer; today, abiding by the rules of those who are responsible for our health, we have relieved ourselves of many petty habits that we perhaps believed to be indispensable to a happy life,” and that, instead, “after all we feel lighter.”
“In today’s suffering there is also the good of the moral reaction that will make us better, and perhaps tomorrow, when the memory slips away along with the suffering, we will come to the same conclusion as Aristotle, who once said that even calamities have a soul and can teach us a wise life.”
Hoping everyone will be able to “steer the wheel” on their vessel, he urged to comply to the measures taken by the government and scientists “with patient discipline.”
“I would like you to be aware but not apprehensive; I would like the certainty of a return to life as usual to be alive in you. There have been, in every part of the world, times and events much more painful than the present ones; yet they are now all over. The gray clouds always move away and let the free sky welcome the swallows; and you see, we do not know who sends them, but here they are, the swallows have already arrived.”
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