At the end of 1912 Don Guanella made a long tour of the United States of America to give life to some of his works. As an introduction, he brought an autographed letter from his friend Pius X. Returning to Italy in February 1913, he wanted to make one of his first visits to the Istituto Fanciulli Poveri in Gatteo di Romagna.
The young guests of the institute knew him very well from his previous visits and awaited him. When he appeared among them, smiling and happy, the boys at first clapped their hands happily, then began to look at each other and then, one after the other, began to laugh, so much so that the hilarity became a general and uncontrollable laughter. .
Don Guanella looked around without understanding the reason for all that happiness: sometimes he too laughed, sometimes he became serious and perplexed, unable to understand what had happened.
He looked at the director of the institute, Don Martino Cugnasca, a charitable grumpy, serious and not inclined to joke: that time he too laughed heartily.
Don Guanella calmed the laughter a little and asked Don Martino what had happened. He replied that:
"But don't you see, Don Luigi, that he goes around masked like Doctor Balanzone?"
Then Don Guanella understood: not at all worried about how he dressed, he had put on the clothes that he had to use in America as they were de rigueur for the ecclesiastics and having to speak in many communities. Seeing that the clothes were still new, he put them on thinking he could use them who knows how much. So he had presented himself in stiffelius: an archaic cut suit; on his head he wore a large bushel hat and on his feet shoes with buckles.
Thus he had obtained that deluge of laughter, due above all to the fact that he wore those clothes with perfect naturalness, without thinking of appearing at least extravagant or original. Don Guanella understood that his listeners were right to laugh and to laugh heartily, so he too laughed at himself. He finished his visit just as cheerfully, then, back home, he dusted off his old wardrobe, abandoning his American clothes.
{podcast id=12}