'A sciammeria

'A sciammeria is the tailcoat, the suit for big occasions. Sixty-four is the number of elegance and — the Smorfia is always a little mocking — of appearances too: you put on your good suit for a ceremony, but it’s still just a suit, and underneath is the same person as yesterday. In dreams, sixty-four shows up when a situation calls for proper form. A job interview, an important invitation, a moment when you have to keep your composure. And it also comes when form is all there is: someone who makes a wonderful impression and nothing more, or the feeling of wearing a costume in a life that doesn’t look like you. The images that lead here are the tailcoat and the donkey. The donkey is everyday toil — the kind no good suit erases, because after the ceremony you go back to work. Together they say the same thing from two sides: appearance and what lies beneath it. If sixty-four came up in your dream, there was a form to keep up. The question that remains is the usual one, and we’re not the ones asking it: under that suit, who was there?