My name is Bart
My name is Bart, Bart Friman, like my grandfather, whose complete name was indeed Bartholomew Freeman, true British and RAF Chief Technician, who served in the Second World War but in the end decided to settle down in Italy, when the US forces entered the country, to marry my grandmother, Michela, or Michaela, depending on the person I am telling the story, who despite bombings was pregnant with my father.
The local pronunciation and dialectal accent, during postwar reconstruction, slightly altered the spelling of my family name making it as it is now but, apparently, my grandad was happy enough to not care about it. When, as a child, I asked him why he didn’t care, he answered quoting Shakespeare - oh, he liked the Bard so much - by saying “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet”.
Eventually, my being Britalian, or Itanglish if you prefer - both of them sound funny, don’t they? - seemed to destine me, in a nearly karmic way, for studying at first, for working then, to swing like a pendulum between Rome and London, where, in the end, I decided to settle. I am quite sure my grandad still laughs about it wherever he is now.
In any case, just call me Bart and we’ll be friends.
To make a living, I work as a child psychologist and a consulting forensic psychologist. To some of my more eminent colleagues, I am actually childish and criminal instead of a psychologist.
In my defence, I have to admit while making my job I actually try operating a little above the lines, if you know what I mean.
My son, Michael - in memory of my loving grandma - who is currently twelve, while talking once about the importance of rules, told me, looking like who knows a thing or two, that the sorting hat would send me to Slytherin - about his mother he was sure she would be sent to Ravenclaw, instead.
The point, in my honest opinion, is, in my job, if you want to achieve a truth your patient can recognise as of their own in order to disclose it and share it with you, you cannot always act according to the official rules. Some of the family and personal stories I meet are so twisted and untouchable to not leave you any other chance. And often, when I meet them for the first time I cannot even suspect how much sorrowful they will reveal.
