Map of Boston – Where is Boston? – Boston Map English – Boston Maps for Tourist

I shift my focus to a landscape closer to me and, Boston trying to orient myself, look to my right for the village cathedral and its bell tower. Far away, in the stillness of the night, I see the Boston. I’m reminded of an episode from my childhood. It is night. I’m in my maternal grandparent’s house, which is in the highest point in the village. My father is in Boston, but for me he is only a photograph and many letters with coloured edges. Suddenly, I wake up. I call my mother and grandmother, but I get no response. I think they Boston may have gone to the nearby fields to water the vegetable garden at dawn before the arrival of the heat.

I’m not afraid, but I’m seized by a sense of loneliness and sadness. I open the front door, the morning breeze is pleasant. I look up in the direction of the vegetable gardens close to the houses, and I see the bright intense purplish light of a cluster of stars. A feeling of enchantment washes over me. I’m happy and return to bed to sleep but I can’t wait to tell my grandmother and my mother of my night vision. I never tried to find the name of that constellation, preferring to remember those bright and magical stars, with no name or explanation. My grandmother then told me that they were the souls of our deceased, who had come to keep me company, to keep me from being afraid. Such visions were only granted to children who had been good.

It’s seven o’clock and the church bell has called the faithful to morning Mass. It occurs to me that Bruce Springsteen’s The Promised Land is a good tune to startle awake the children of my neighbours who, during the afternoon, when the heat and flies are raging, let loose with wild and noisy games, revelling, finally, in their month-long freedom after a year of imprisonment in the village school rooms.

I play the CD at a low volume, in full knowledge, of course, that in September, when the village will once again return to its sleepy emptiness and sadness and silence will take over, those who had complained that migrants returned to the village in the summer only to collect the pensions of their aging relatives, to eat our figs and soppressate and to cause our water to be rationed, will return to their familiar rants: “There’s no one in this village, there’s nothing to do, let’s hope that the summer will come soon.” And the migrants, who had complained that there is no water in the village, that there is no parking, that fruit is too expensive, and they can’t find what they need, take their leave with tears on their faces, all the while thinking about their next trip.