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This book represents the posthumous finishing of a project begun by my father since his youth and which unfortunately had remained incomplete. After almost eight years since his death, last May I found it in fortunate circumstances, a few pages consumed by time and containing  notes, novels, poetry, articles and the first rough copy of this collection. It was all jealously conserved in the back of his desk, already ready for publication. Looking through these yellowed sheets of paper, wrinkled by continuous use, I realized there were several pieces already published in his first work “Le stagioni della nostalgia”, published in 1989 by the Florentine editor Lalli. You can imagine my emotion at this discovery, the avidity with which I explored this mine of information and that gave me the possibility of remembering the cold winter evenings passed in my father’s office as he translated all the emotions that now I had found in some of these pages, while I, not yet an adolescent, wandered around these same pages which, once upon a time, I did not consider important. They were my father’s papers, perhaps technical ones for work, perhaps notes, certainly nothing that could have interested me, in the ingenuous  happiness of those past times. Now these scattered papers were transformed in a volume that showed the wish to bring this project to a finish, over the course of about forty years of work, but above all it represented a small, yet great, gift for who was  gone, but who in reality had been daily present for the choices of every day. In a day like today that is very special, I wish to publish this volume  with the wish that it will also  evoke the same sensations and emotions in you.

Bruno Blanco

20 novembre 2010

Usually a son does not write the preface to a book by a parent, but I wish to underline a few aspects of the work and personality of Salvo Blanco that perhaps only a son can well express. Competent authorities have affirmed that Salvo Blanco was distinguished among his colleagues and men for his way of doing and  confronting different obstacles of life and in the various sectors in which he worked. A man of extreme correctness, he was able to obtain positive results also in the worst conditions for work. He constituted, in the long years of his direction in Acireale, a scholastic  seat noted throughout the region for the preparation  with which the students received  their diploma. All his life was dedicated to education of the younger generations and the reaching of the best results for the institution which he led. In the area of his profession as agronomic he was one of the best professionals in the field during the last part of the century. But the best qualities of educator and teacher Salvo Blanco showed in the heart of his family, giving his children an education and moral integrity  that today allow them to  stand out from those who, unfortunately are the actual social  parameters. And what about the rapport of father with children…he was not simply a father, but a friend, a person in which we could confide, always available to give  advice to help us with little daily problems. We called him Christopher Columbus for the many voyages we  made together which he organized and led. We visited together beautiful and fascinating places, confronted many problems and unforgettable adventures that  forged us as kids, as men and future parents. Thanks for what you did for us, for being out lighthouse and  will continue to be for our lives.

Dino Blanco