On Monday, the Círculo Ecuestre invited me to moderate a talk by Àlex Roca (33), and there we spent an hour, about sixty people contemplating the character.
It is possible that you know who Àlex Roca is, because the man, long and skinny like a flamingo, is already a legend in our society. You may know who he is, but just in case, I’m going to remind you.
As a baby, when he was six months old, herpes had broken out on Àlex Roca’s little body. It could have appeared on his lip, it would have been nothing, but it had appeared in his brain, and the effect was devastating. It caused cerebral palsy, blockage on the left side of the body and a 76% disability.
Here is when a superhero is silhouetted.
With such a dysfunction, any of us would have stayed in bed, crippled for life. However, Àlex Roca decided to do the opposite, this is how the world changes: he went out to pedal and run and tell his story, and thus, sharing his experience, is how he met Mari Carme Maza, the social educator who, sitting in the first lined up, notebook in hand, she watched the speaker who one day, five years later, would be her husband.
(They have been married for two years now).
Having said that, I began to contemplate Mari Carme. It is inevitable, since she always appears with her husband: she accompanies him 24/7 and gives voice to his very exclusive sign language (and it is very exclusive, literally, since Àlex Roca cannot even use both hands to express himself: his left one is paralyzed). .
Àlex Roca speaks with his right hand and his gaze, and Mari Carme’s voice immerses us in the world of the character. Between them they share a range of confidences. They tell us that when they argue – and they do, just like all perfect couples do – Mari Carme closes her eyes so as not to see how her husband yells at her. And they run half marathons together. And that sometimes they go to the movies or go to a party, and when one wants one thing and the other wants the other, then one goes with his friends and the other goes with her friends. And with the voice of Mari Carme, Àlex Roca tells us that he is no longer that self-conscious child who sank his left foot in the sand on the beach so that no one would see it, but that he wears bright colors and tells the world: “Here I am, look at me.”
And between the two of us they ask us what we can buy with one euro.
And they propose to us:
–Buy a mirror and look in it and see how good you are. Say to each other: ‘How beautiful you are.’
And a kind joker in the room says:
–There’s a reason Alex’s last name is Roca.
And to myself, I think: “Well, Mari Carme’s last name is Maza.”
(And with the mace he sculpts the rock; if I don’t write it down, I’ll burst).
