Master Errico squeezes it, turns it around, sniffs at it. “It’s thick,” he says, then he spits on top and rubs the saliva in with his thumb. I’m shocked by his familiarity. The boomerang is ancient, it’s foreign, it’s a weapon. How dare he do this? He shows me the spot where he rubbed, it’s turning violet, he puts his mouth over it. “It’s full of tannen. It’s acacia.” I tell him how I got it. It’s not good to work with. It’s too hard. You could break a planer on it. You couldn’t even carve a crutch out of it. It’s not good for the stove. It must be good for something, but he doesn’t know what. He gives it back to me and gets an electric shock as he lays it in my hand. He jumps in surprise: is it electric? I didn’t feel anything, I lie, because I’m used to the tingling of the boomerang. Master Errico makes a dark face like he does when he doesn’t understand why something went wrong. Then he comes out with his motto: “Iamme, vuttammo ‘e mmane”; let’s go, get a move on it.
