What does it mean to be in the Peace Community as 'Paloma', an international volunteer with Operazione Colomba?
I put on the orange t-shirt and leave myself behind; I am no longer just me, I become a symbol.
It means being a witness. But only in a small way compared to these ancient trees, the birds that punctually sing hymns to creation, the stones polished by the river like the bones of giants—they have been observing human movements since time immemorial.
It means putting oneself at others' service.
It means having no time or space of your own, sacrificing them to sharing, to accompanying others, making them sacred.
It means embodying what it is to be an instrument.
It means a continuous, constant meditation on being in the present. Here and now. Accepting the sheer weight of it all, everything that is. The greatest beauty and the greatest horror. Wonder at creation, human elevation, the grace of Unity—and oppression, violence, pain, injustice.
Thus, it means being lucidly aware that in the quiet, anything could happen at any moment. It means experiencing, for a set period of time, the perennial state of alert that is normal life for the people we stand beside.
It means a meditation on staying in this void of a future, in the fragility of life.
It means being shot through with a rage that makes your stomach churn, that makes your conscience revolt in the face of injustice. It means learning to accept it, embrace it, and channel it into determination, into a clear-headed drive to build.
It means living with fear—usually more for the people we accompany than for oneself. The fear that continuous threats will once again turn into reality. Threats that do not affect our lives—"our" lives as people with a passport issued by a State higher up on the global ladder. They do not affect us due to an obscure law whose effects are clearly and constantly visible, yet its deep meaning remains incomprehensible, its core essence elusive: that one life is worth more than another.
It means using this inequality to subvert the order of things wherever possible.
It means living with being an uncomfortable presence, carrying the echo of history, of colonization, and of the hierarchical division of a world-system built on steps of worth. It means living with being idealized, objectified, revered, despised, and stared at with curiosity.
It means a massive exercise in humility, in keeping the ego in check.
Scaling down, repositioning oneself.
Stripping down, without a single foothold to cling to—no masks, no minor or major comforts, habits, pieces of paper, or material objects that prove or reassure you of your role and position in society. Without frills or labels. No room to lie to others, nor to yourself. Just being.
It means being frequently overcome by shivers of admiration.
It means being in a privileged position to know these people up close, to observe them in the intimacy of their daily lives. From a distance that allows you neither to mythologize them nor turn them into glossy cutouts. Amidst all their commitments, threats, and responsibilities, it means catching a glimpse of their kindness, attentiveness, care, tenderness, and the irony they masterfully deploy to defuse tension and welcome others; a glimpse of their ability to find inexhaustible energy to face all of this.
It means smelling in these lives what I can only imagine holiness to be.
Perceiving it woven into the fabric of tense muscles, calloused hands, and smiles that are sometimes "tired, but never defeated."
OPERAZIONE COLOMBA
