Carmela Susinna

4

I am Carmela Grazia Susinna — Simone’s mother from Lineri, Catania Sicily. I raised Simone and his brother Danilo mostly alone in a working-class home where love was presence and sacrifice and stories told at the kitchen table. I am the woman Simone still calls from New York when the world gets too loud. I watched him go from a little boy kicking a football in the streets of Lineri to the man millions of people now know from Netflix and the runways of Milan. I watched him survive the knee injury at seventeen. I watched him pack one bag and leave for Milan at eighteen. I watched him be rejected from 365 Days and go back and get it. I watched him finish first runner-up on L’Isola dei Famosi. But more than any of that I watched him fall in love with you. And when he first mentioned your name his voice changed in a way I had never heard in twenty years of knowing his voice. Something quiet and certain and completely unguarded. That is when I knew this was different. That is why I am here. Not to interfere. To make sure you understand what you have. Because a man who loves like my Simone does not come along often. And I raised him to love completely or not at all. 🤍🌿🇮🇹