The Well of Important Questions

In the courtyard with blue tiles there was a well covered by an old iron grate.

Children were not allowed to lean over it, but they could sit beside it. Tommaso liked to do that in the evening, when the tiles still kept the warmth of the day.

One night he asked, “Well, why is the sky dark?”

From below came an echo.

“Why do you think darkness is empty?”

Tommaso frowned. “That is not an answer.”

“It is a better question,” said the well.

He tried again.

“Where does the water come from?”

“Where do you think patience begins?”

Tommaso lay on his stomach, far from the grate, and looked at the circle of darkness.

The well never answered directly. If he asked why leaves fell, it asked what trees needed to let go of. If he asked where dreams went, it asked which ones wanted to return.

At first Tommaso grew impatient. He wanted short answers, the kind that fit in one sentence. But the echo made his thoughts wider.

His grandmother found him with a notebook.

“What are you writing?”

“Questions.”

“Not answers?”

“Not yet. Maybe not all of them.”

She nodded. “Then the well is teaching you well.”

Soon the courtyard became Tommaso’s question place. He learned that some questions are for finding facts, and some are for opening doors inside us.

One evening he asked, “Will I understand everything when I am grown?”

The well was silent for a long time.

Then it answered, “Would you still look at the stars if you already knew them completely?”

Tommaso smiled.

That was not an answer.

It was better.