Chapter XIX: The Institutional Transition
From Commission Officer to Independent Consultant, 2002-2005
Policy changes at the European Medicines Agency, where I was seconded with my Unit from the European Commission, required our return to the main headquarters in Brussels. The IT-statistical support was transferred to a new unit within the Agency itself. My Unit was partly absorbed into the new structure and partly returned to Brussels to be relocated to other services. I was offered the favorable opportunity of early retirement based in London - conditions that were particularly attractive, and I accepted the offer.
Establishing Residence in Wales
Meanwhile, Joan and I had already purchased an apartment in Cardiff, Joan's hometown, and I already had formal residence ready. This Welsh connection provided both practical advantages and emotional anchor points - Joan's return to her roots after decades of life in Italy, and for me, a new environment that was neither Italian nor fully European institutional, but something different where I could begin to define myself outside the bureaucratic identity that had shaped my working life.
Thus began the first phase of my final journey. I thought I could work as a consultant in the sector where I had operated, and initially, institutional connections still allowed some relationships, but this lasted only briefly. The loss of institutional belonging isolates you rapidly. I entered a regressive phase and returned to my old philosophical studies that I had begun during my doctorate in Milan.
Return to Philosophical Roots
I picked up where I had left off, but could not find the concentration for serious academic engagement. The philosophical questions that had fascinated me in my youth - the same questions I had explored with Alessandra during our reading of Schopenhauer and Plato - seemed both familiar and distant. My mind, trained for decades in practical problem-solving and institutional navigation, struggled to adapt to the more contemplative and abstract demands of philosophical inquiry.
I dedicated myself to my daughters, who were already at university in the UK - Livia at St Andrews in Scotland and Giulia at Nottingham. I tried to devote myself to them, partly to make up for my countless absences in the past. During this phase, I also found a small repositioning at the University of Insubria in Varese as head of European research for the university.
Chapter XX: The Entrepreneurial Experiment
Building and Dismantling a Consulting Firm, 2005-2010
With a couple of capable young professionals, I founded a small consulting company focused on European affairs and research. We managed to function for 2-3 years, but then the volume of business did not allow us to continue with the chosen formula. I worked with two young men: Andrea, an economist from Bocconi, and Luca, a historian from the State University of Milan. In different ways, both were very capable and intelligent, and I was able to pass on part of my knowledge and experience.
Andrea and Luca: Mentorship and Legacy
Looking back, I believe the experience was useful to both of them - afterward, they both made professional progress. Andrea was practical and analytical, bringing fresh economic perspectives to European policy analysis. Luca had a historian's long view and communication skills that complemented my technical expertise. Working with them reminded me of the pleasure of intellectual collaboration that I had first experienced with Alessandra decades earlier, and later in various research partnerships.
It was an interesting experience nonetheless, even though it did not produce entrepreneurial success. When we closed the company, Andrea left the partnership to pursue a career as an accountant. Luca remained with me for the second phase of my consulting activity, which lasted until 2015 when Joan retired and I gradually abandoned the activity. Luca eventually became a manager in the luxury hotel sector, first in Milan and then in Rome.
The Reality of Post-Institutional Consulting
The consulting world proved more challenging than I had anticipated. Without the authority and access that came with my Commission position, building a client base required different skills than those I had developed during my institutional career. The technical expertise remained valuable, but the networks and relationships that made that expertise accessible to clients required constant cultivation in ways that institutional life had never demanded.
The entrepreneurial experiment taught me important lessons about the difference between institutional influence and independent authority. Within the Commission, my expertise had been valued because it served institutional needs and was backed by institutional authority. As an independent consultant, that same expertise had to prove its value in a competitive marketplace where personal relationships and marketing skills mattered as much as technical competence.
Chapter XXI: Reconciliation and Reflection
Family Focus and Gradual Withdrawal, 2010-2015
The period from 2010 to 2015 marked a gradual transition from active consulting to a more family-focused life. Joan's approaching retirement provided a natural endpoint for my own professional activities, and I found myself increasingly drawn to the quieter satisfactions of domestic life and personal reflection.
Reconnecting with Livia and Giulia
My relationship with my daughters deepened during these years as I had more time and emotional availability to offer them genuine attention. The guilt I carried about my professional absences during their childhood could not be completely resolved, but I could at least demonstrate through present attention that they mattered more than any career achievement. Watching them develop their own independent lives and careers gave me a satisfaction that professional success had never provided.
During this period, I also had more time to reflect on the broader patterns of my life - the influence of Pietro's systematic thinking, the long shadow cast by family dysfunction, the tension between intellectual achievement and emotional availability that had characterized my adult relationships. The distance from active professional engagement allowed for a kind of analytical perspective on my own life that had been impossible during the years of intense career focus.
The gradual withdrawal from consulting work was not traumatic but rather a natural recognition that the phase of active professional engagement was ending. The expertise I had developed remained valuable to me personally, but the drive to apply it commercially had diminished. The satisfaction of passing knowledge to younger colleagues like Andrea and Luca had been real, but I no longer felt compelled to seek out new opportunities for such relationships.
The Wisdom of Gradual Endings
Unlike the abrupt transitions that had characterized earlier phases of my life - leaving Ferrara for Ispra, divorce from Caroline, retirement from the Commission - this transition was gentle and evolutionary. Joan's career timeline provided a natural framework for my own withdrawal, and the financial security we had achieved allowed for choices based on preference rather than necessity. For perhaps the first time in my adult life, I could make decisions based purely on what felt right rather than what external circumstances demanded.
By 2015, when Joan retired and I fully ceased consulting activities, I had completed the final professional transition of my life. The boy from Ferrara who had escaped family dysfunction through education, who had found purpose in European integration, who had contributed to pharmaceutical regulation, and who had attempted entrepreneurship in retirement, had finally arrived at a place of simple domestic satisfaction that required no external validation or achievement.
Looking back across the entire journey from 1941 to 2015, I can see the persistent influence of Pietro's teachings about systematic thinking, the lasting impact of early family trauma, and the gradual development of emotional wisdom that came only through decades of experience. The mathematical modeling skills that began with Federico's library, the emotional resilience forged through family crisis, and the systematic approach to complex problems that Pietro had taught me - all of these elements found their final expression not in professional achievement but in the careful construction of a satisfying personal life.
Thus concludes this personal journey through the complexities of twentieth-century Europe and the challenges of building a meaningful life across multiple transitions and transformations...