Che ci vuoi fare. What can you do.

He woke up early, but not for fishing anymore. He had recently retired and was now expecting only a barely satisfactory pension, along with a lot of free time. He had a plan, though—not to be idle or age too quickly.

He opened the caffettiera and filled the bottom with cold water, stopping just below the valve. He added plenty of coffee, screwed the pot together, and placed it on the stove. Soon the coffee began bubbling, pale and foamy. It was still cold outside, mid-winter on the island, the same sea he had known so well after working on it for decades.

He wanted to travel before he got too old, to as many Latin American countries as possible. He often dreamed about this, along with studying Latin American history. An online university was offering such a bachelor’s degree—fully online, with no need to travel or relocate.

He would make a party out of his remaining days on this planet. A party of knowledge, and perhaps travel to places he had only seen in photos so far. He sipped his coffee slowly and felt proud that he had taken care of himself after his wife died twenty-four years ago. He had no plans to remarry. No children to look after either—just cats and dogs on his property.

He opened his recently purchased laptop. He had owned an old Pentium before, but for online studying he decided to upgrade a little. He read the news first; it made him a bit sad, but as always, he had a plan not to remain sad for the rest of the day. He logged into the university website and added information to his student profile. He already had an email from his tutor, which made the whole thing feel more real. He was unusually happy that morning, despite the winter sea, the gray view from the windows, and the always-saddening news.

He had spent most of his life at sea. Not the kind of life that produced stories worth telling, but one built on repetition: leaving before dawn, hauling nets, repairing what broke, returning when the body said it was enough. Retirement arrived without announcement. The boat remained tied at the dock, its paint dull, its name still legible. He did not sell it. He did not need to explain why.

Aside from retiring, he had recently been hospitalized with a COVID infection. He used to visit his favorite cafés on the island and still had a few old friends. He suspected he had caught the virus from one of them—Mauricio, a bartender at the island’s biggest hotel near the most beautiful sandy beach. Still, he held no bitterness toward Mauricio, despite being hospitalized in a special chamber when the virus reached his lungs. He was grateful he had quit smoking many years earlier. The sea breeze and the smell of fresh coffee were enough. He had not touched a cigarette since.

He felt like a survivor, especially knowing that at least three of his childhood friends had died from COVID that year. The experience reminded him of death and how short life really was, not something granted forever. He should travel and study—that was all he wanted for the remainder of his time on this planet.

During his hospitalization, he was given a tablet to watch YouTube. A nurse felt sorry that he had little family visiting him, so she gave him her old, scruffy tablet. He had never owned a tablet before. Others used theirs to speak with their families, or even to say their final goodbyes. He used it to check on his university application and to learn more about COVID.

Although he had finished only high school, he had always been known for wanting to become a journalist or a historian, if only he had had the chance and the money to attend university. Until now, he had had neither. Now was the time. Battling the infection inside the hospital room, he found courage in the kindness of the people around him—the nurse, the doctors, and even the distraction of the tablet.

He searched for Spanish-language films online. Illness narrowed his world, then widened it unexpectedly. Brazil appeared more than once—not as spectacle, but as background: plantations, unevenly expanding cities, labor movements, dictatorship, transition. History explained what cinema implied. The connection was practical: bodies, work, land, power. Recovery made him attentive to structure. He read when he could, stopped when tired, and returned later.

When he finally returned home, he set out to make his lifelong dreams a reality. First, studying; second, learning how to write an academic research paper or essay. It was all new to him. He had thought online university meant only studying theory, with no practical work, but soon his tutor demanded a short research paper on Mexico’s troubled history. That became his life: reading extensively and writing papers.

He received poor reviews at first, but he passed every module successfully during the first quarter. He was not unhappy about the bad grades; he would try to improve his writing. His tutor was thirty-four years younger than him, which made him feel young again. Most of the other students were in their forties or fifties, with a few younger ones. He was one of the oldest students in the department.

He laughed when he remembered that before working at the fisheries, every morning had started with strong coffee, and now it began the same way—with coffee and study. He joked that one of the best friends of his life was the caffettiera. Then there were the men living nearby, most of them old or older. “Our island grows old in winter, so lively with young people in summer,” he remarked silently.

He was, in a way, a “winter person.” As a fisheries worker, he used to wear thick gloves while sorting icy, newly caught fish into boxes. The cold never bothered him. He never complained. He simply bought better gloves, or wore two pairs at once for extra protection from water and frost.

A life spent at sea and in fisheries had not prepared him for university-level studies, but his young tutor gave him a book on how to write academic papers. He had to start from nothing, from zero. Still, he felt it was fine. Che ci vuoi fare.