“Meeting Elio, I tried, deep within myself, to remember his deeds and his work, beyond the illness that so often reduces every patient to a number, so that I might recall how important the respect he had shown me was: first as a person, then as a physician. Not because I deserved it or because it was professionally required, but because it is the right way to begin any relationship.
From an anthropological perspective, dignity resides in the intersubjectivity of every human being. This is what a dear professor of mine used to say in medical school: human dignity is never bound to utility, but always to relationship, to the feeling that such a relationship secretes. Respect lives within the relationship. Within a respectful relationship, we learn to live the dignity of everyday life.
Elio and Gabriele, in my view, were existentialists—two men condemned to be free to believe that the future does not exist, yet that everything can be lived with dignity and purpose, if grounded in respect for and appreciation of others, in the right ways and at the right times.
When I switch off the Acers in the clinic at night, a silence remains that tastes of time—full and present. It carries the scent of a maple tree and its resin. It carries the spes of Elio and Gabriele. The time that precedes every authentic encounter is a silence that is both seed and soil—capable of immense care and patience. In that moment, within that extinguished and open space of time, the physician becomes a seasoned humanist, asking neither gratitude nor deference, but only pure respect.
When respect fails, the relationship gives way. Spes collapses. The honestum—the honor inherent in every gesture—falls into the oblivion of data and sterile matter. Medicine, which speaks of doctors and patients, ultimately loses its sacredness and its honor. And it leaves behind fears and indelible unhappiness.”