Free in her choices, strong in love: in memory of Sara

We receive messages in the Lunàdigas email inbox that often cheer us up because they establish and strengthen the networks that we are building together with everyone.

Sometimes we receive messages that move us deeply, messages like the one from Aurelio, whom we thank and embrace, along with ‘our’ Sara.

 

My name is Aurelio.

I’ve been incredibly lucky: not only to have Sara as my wife, but even before that, to have had her as my life partner. We had been together since 2012 and got married in 2016, but we’ve always remained, in the truest sense of the word, partners: in everyday life, in our choices, in caring for one another, in times of pain and in our freedom.

I met Sara in 2011. I was almost fifty, she was thirty. Then she was the one who chose me. I asked her if she was really sure, as it didn’t seem like the right time to have a child at my age.

Sara replied that she chose me for two reasons. The first was that she didn’t want to bring a child into the world because – her words – this world doesn’t deserve another child. The second reason belongs to her own choice, so there’s no need to write it down.

The night of our first kiss, on March 5, 2012, marked the beginning of our life together.  From that moment on, we became partners in each and every sense of the word.

Sara was a nurse and a union organizer with the CGIL. She dedicated a huge part of her short life to public health—not out of personal ambition, but because she deeply believed in the value of what is public, fair, necessary, and humane.

She had started medical school but, after two years, chose to become a nurse.  Not for lack of opportunities, but because of a deliberate choice: she wanted to be by patients’ sides, close to people, immersed in real, everyday suffering. She spoke English and French; she was intelligent, cultured, and capable; but, beyond all that, she was much, much more.  She was one of those people in whom professional expertise goes hand in hand with humanity, becoming care, presence, and attention toward others.

With Sara, however, none of this was ever a display of how capable she was.  It was substance. Her intelligence did not create distance from others, but closeness. Her education did not lead to a sense of superiority, but to an ability to better understand others. Her strength did not turn into harshness, but into responsibility. Unfortunately, on June 14, 2023, she was diagnosed with adenoid cystic carcinoma of the salivary glands, with extremely rare molecular characteristics. We were told it was an extremely rare condition.  An abysmal stroke of bad luck, almost impossible to accept.

Sara embarked on her final journey on April 30, 2025, at the age of 42, in her forty-third year of life. In March 2025, a little over a month before she passed away, Sara wrote me several letters from the hospital in which she reflected on our story. She reminded me that she had been the one to choose me because, as she said, deep down it is women who choose, and she called me “her life partner” several times.

Even then, in the midst of the illness that was consuming her, she continued to think about how to support and protect me. Those words encapsulated everything about Sara: free in her choices, strong in love, and capable of caring for others until the very end.

I miss her and will continue to miss her.

One of the most precious things Sara left me is Zucca, whom we adopted in 2024 when she was six months old. Today, she is not just a cute dog, but a living reminder of Sara by my side, a creature to cherish, love and protect.

Every morning, when I take her to the dog centre before going to work, I see her running happily towards her friends.  I watch her and smile, because in her joy I sense something of Sara.

Somehow in this way, with her joy, Zucca continues to keep me connected to life, as if Sara, when she left, had given me a task of love: to look after Zucca and never abandon her.

Through the Lunàdigas documentary, I’ve come to understand Sara even better. During the years we lived together, I used to tell her that if one day she changed her mind and wanted a child, I would respect her choice and give up our life together.

I told her this because I loved her so much that I wanted her happiness above all else. Her happiness, not mine. She would reply: ‘Don’t worry, I know. But I’ve chosen you. And I’m old enough to have realized who I am and what I want.’

That was Sara.

Her political activity was much the same: her involvement was experienced above all as a practical commitment to others.  For Sara, working in public healthcare meant putting her ideal into practice: guaranteeing everyone the right to accessible, high-quality care.

A remarkable woman, even in her fragility. Remarkable in her freedom, her integrity, her care for others, and the clarity with which she knew how to navigate the world. A woman who never lived a half-life, even though life granted her far too little time.

I have written this because Lunàdigas’ work has moved me deeply.  It made me feel, once again, just how genuine Sara was and how much her choices, her intelligence and her freedom deserve to be remembered not as a loss, but as something that lives on.  I would like to share some photos of Sara, because they capture her in the light of her face, in the radiant beauty of her eyes, in her work – which was her calling – and in her soul.

Sara did not bring a child into the world, but she created so much. In every person who was lucky enough to know her, she left a part of herself, a different kind of presence: the courage in the strength with which she defended rights, the desire for freedom in her smile, and the care in her devotion to others. And this is also why I am entrusting her story to Lunàdigas: so that what Sara inspired in those who met her may continue to live on in the people who will come to know her through these words.

Aurelio “ieiu” Bertolino

Without knowing

I love you
like leaves in the breeze
as if you were holding my hand
but I have emptiness in my breath
I have a hole in my soul

I see you
walk through the trees in the woods
stopping to watch the ocean from the cliff
absorbed in your fragile silences
or looking at me with your magical smile

I hear you
in your words of enchantment
in my heartbeat
when you dance in my thoughts
or reminding me of life

I think of you
in the passage of time
dancing squeezing me hard
laughing away from sadness
or listening to the rain falling

I’m talking to you
for having you close still
mirroring myself in your photo
walking along the border
trying to shield the dream