This is what happened to Malvina in the summer of 2024, when her animals—her reason for living—became the target of sudden violence, leaving her breathless and without certainty.
A special family
Malvina is 34 years old and lives in Liguria, in the mountain village where she was born and raised, and where I recently visited her. We discover we have a shared past: she worked in Rome for seven years before deciding to return up here, with every intention of staying. Living in the Ligurian hinterland requires resourcefulness and a healthy dose of stubbornness , qualities she apparently has in abundance. Upon her return, she and her partner Valerio take over the management of the village sports center, which has a space where they organize lunches and receptions. The business is successful, which is already a huge success, but Malvina's dream is something else: to start a special family.
The terraces surrounding the house, typical of these once meticulously tended mountains, lend themselves well to realizing her vision and soon transform into a small ranch. A tiny ranch. A miniature ranch—we might say—where ponies and tiny Tibetan goats graze. An image of peace that fits with the reality Malvina has in mind. What she runs is not a business aimed at producing meat or cheese. Her animals provide another type of product , equally precious and nutritious today: relationships and well-being.
Malvina develops a warm, visceral bond with them, and she engages in educational and volunteer activities: an educational farm for the little ones, introduction to grazing, short treks, and visits to local healthcare facilities, where her four-legged friends bring comfort to the sick and elderly. She introduces me to an elderly donkey, who has been by her side for nearly thirty years, and tells me that the one before me is the first representative of her species to be admitted to a hospital in Italy . I ask her how difficult it was to convince the bureaucracy and the doctors, but she, petting the donkey, replies that the real challenge was convincing that stubborn donkey to get in the elevator.
Alone against all
As Malvina recounts her story, a thick layer of clouds seems to rise from the treetops around us, obscuring the sun like a kind of omen. Against the backdrop of these rugged and wild mountains, it's not hard for me to imagine where the story will end.
The house stands right on the edge of town, on a slope that was once entirely cultivated. But today, with the abandonment and cessation of almost all agricultural activities, we find ourselves immersed in a changing landscape . Natural vegetation has taken over, erasing human geometries in just a few years, and the ancient terraces have become forest. A vigorous and impatient undergrowth presses forcefully against the houses and fences of the small ranch. And with it, its inhabitants press and push their way through.
One evening in July, four goats fail to return from pasture . Malvina is taken by surprise, and so is the rest of the community. When she recounts what happened, many don't believe her: "Wolves don't come this far, so close to the houses." But the wolves do come, they do come. And then they return, night after night, drawn by the cheap merchandise on display.
These are sleepless nights for everyone , during which Valerio and Malvina's dogs—pets who spend the dark hours indoors—bark incessantly. The neighbors protest, threatening legal action. It's the height of the tourist season, the sports center and restaurant attract dozens of people a day, the second homes are full of vacationers, and Malvina doesn't know which way to run. Until one night, when louder-than-usual barking awakens her, and on the monitor connected to a surveillance camera, she sees a scene that turns her blood cold: two wolves are inside the enclosure , and the one they're clutching in their jaws is none other than one of her goats.
She and Valerio rush outside, among the terrified animals. They spot the injured goat on the ground, but as they approach, they see something moving in the shadows: a wolf is still there, crouched a few meters away. Feeling discovered, the predator clumsily lunges against the fence and disappears into the woods.
The goat is in a bad way, but it survives. The fear, however, doesn't go away: it lingers there, day and night, along with the fearful looks of the animals, the incessant barking of the dogs, the protests of the neighbors, and the feeling of having to resist, alone against all, an invasion one doesn't have the strength to contain.
Confusion and despair take over, reason falters, and while grief carves a void, blind rage fills it. And from anger, like fire, can spring light or destruction—the strength to change or to burn everything.
Sliding doors
Hi, I'm Tommaso D'Errico and this is Rendez-vous , a newsletter produced by Io non ho paura del lupo and dedicated to the connections—often invisible and sometimes explosive—between humans and wild animals.
"Explosive" is the best word to describe the encounter between Malvina and the wolf. A meeting that truly threatens to explode, with unpredictable and potentially damaging consequences for everyone.
Malvina and Valerio's reaction is clouded by pain, disbelief, exhaustion, and a sense of helplessness. And the urge to defend themselves opens the way to disturbing scenarios . "Those nights, we were prepared to do anything," Malvina says, looking me in the eye. "I'll be honest: if we'd had a gun, I would have used it without thinking twice."
Thankfully, we don't live in Texas (at least not yet), and Malvina doesn't have a weapon. Circumstances force her to reflect, and her anger gradually transforms into energy, channeled into a desire to protect. It's her love for her animals that drives her to seek realistic solutions and to consult with those who know more than she does. Seeing them defenseless and exposed to danger forces her to question herself. The wolf isn't to blame, Malvina knows that. So perhaps she's done something wrong.
The next step is a difficult decision: give up, or try? Malvina chooses the most difficult path, but also the only one that allows her to pursue her life plans: finding a way to live with wolves.
Silent Heroes
A year later, the way we coexist is the measured movements and sly eyes of Rocco, a Sila Shepherd who has been demanding petting ever since I arrived. He does so with grace and dignity, but it's certainly not the accommodating attitude you'd expect from a guard dog. Seeing him like this, in his Big Friendly Giant guise, it's hard to imagine him capable of facing down a pack of wolves. Instead, it's precisely his poise and good manners that make the difference, along with the indispensable help of an electric fence, which Rocco often bypasses to mark wider boundaries and keep intruders at bay.
Its effectiveness is not based on brute force, but on the ability to read the situation and the extraordinary ability to speak the language of wolves, to communicate with them to impose his authority.
There's a beautiful image among the surveillance camera footage: Rocco scratching the ground, marking a boundary invisible to our eyes with his scent, and a few hours later, an adult wolf sticking its nose into the grass, at that precise spot, and leaping back as if stung by an asp.
Today, Malvina looks at Rocco with adoring eyes, calling him her hero. Even though, at first, she had many doubts. After the predations, she consulted a friend who is a breeder and the technicians at DifesAttiva, an association that promotes the use of preventative measures to protect livestock, and they all gave her the same advice: you need a guard dog. Except that between words and action there's a difference, and in this case more than one: where can I find a suitable dog, already an adult and capable? And won't his arrival risk making the situation worse? And how will the neighborhood take it? Will you tell them that another creature capable of barking is on the way?
Then, as often happens in life, a solution materializes almost out of nowhere , from those strange and unpredictable twists and turns in which human affairs become entangled, unraveling amidst hostility, misunderstandings, and sudden outbursts of solidarity. Among the dozens of messages Malvina receives on social media, alternating between words of comfort and malice, she is struck by one from a Tuscan farmer, who, touched by her story, offers her what he believes is the solution to her problems.
The rest is history. Rocco arrives and sets everyone straight, restoring peace to Malvina, her animals, and even her neighbors. It seems like a miracle from heaven, but it isn't: it took common sense, determination, knowledge, and a good dose of courage to build this reality.
My best enemy
Malvina certainly isn't lacking in courage. I've seen her use it several times in this story: in deciding to invest up here to care for her land and her home; in the rare act of self-criticism in a moment of anger and pain ; in choosing to use her head and move forward, wolves or no wolves. And then once again, in agreeing to expose herself to tell her story.
Today, the blind rage has passed: Malvina lives with wolves and respects their right to exist. She doesn't go so far as to thank them, but she credits them with opening the doors to a new world for her: that of guard dogs, which has given her a newfound balance and has fascinated her to the point of wanting to make it a profession. Yet—and this is the first thing she says when she addresses the subject— for her, the wolf remains what it is: an enemy.
A few days ago, when we published his video interview on the Io non ho paura del lupo channels , not everyone understood his point. And while on the one hand, vaguely intimidating messages arrived from breeders unwilling to accept the idea of coexistence, on the other, among wildlife lovers, outrage spread over the use of the word "enemy."
Understandably, "enemy" is a dangerous word, one that risks erecting psychological and moral barriers between us and them , whoever they may be, legitimizing a logic of non-acceptance and annihilation. It's a word that politicians increasingly use as a propaganda tool, to channel fears and frustrations and find scapegoats to persecute.
But Malvina's isn't propaganda. She isn't talking about a symbolic enemy, invented to shift blame or build consensus, but a real one, one she must deal with every day. She has chosen to do so without demonizing it, but rather by acting responsibly, adopting the right preventative measures and learning to minimize risks, striking a balance between defense and respect.
After all, true coexistence, the kind played out on the field, is anything but rhetorical: it's a daily exercise in realism. And if we look at things realistically, like it or not, for pet owners the wolf sometimes represents just that: an enemy —in the most literal sense of the word. A flesh-and-blood adversary who tests you, forces you to change, to invent solutions. And, if you're smart enough, to recognize your limits.
Conflicts and evolution
The value of Malvina's story lies precisely here: in her recognition of those limitations and, with them, the right to life of the man she considers an enemy. To the point of deciding to try to live with him, without denying the existence of a conflict, but transforming it into an opportunity for growth.
This is exactly what happens in nature, where competition does not result in a desire to exterminate the other, but becomes a powerful driver of evolution and identity creation. Different and antagonistic species, like predators and prey, influence each other in an "arms race" that pushes them to perfect themselves and define themselves in relation to one another: the cheetah is fast because the gazelle, with its agility, has forced it to become so ; at the same time, the gazelle has developed a prodigious sprint to survive the threat of the cheetah.
And the improvement isn't just genetic, but also cultural. Wolves learn to coordinate their hunting skills in packs when facing large prey, and these, in turn, refine collective strategies to face danger with the group's heightened senses.
We humans, too, have been shaped by this same process: our rivals, those who once wanted to eat us or compete for our resources, have made us what we are today. And even today, every challenge life imposes on us represents an evolutionary threshold , an opportunity to sharpen our intelligence and our ability to coexist. Or at least, it should.
Challenges and future
Coexistence, in short, is a great opportunity for individual and collective growth, which comes precisely from accepting conflicts and how we choose to address them. This doesn't mean living in peace with everyone, but understanding that differences, tensions, and friction are inevitable parts of life, and that we choose whether to transform them into hatred or constructive energy, rediscovering the evolutionary potential of relationships with others.
I believe this is the most important lesson we can draw from this story: that coexisting with those around us—be they animals, colleagues, friends, or enemies—doesn't mean giving in or becoming good, but learning to navigate conflict with clarity and intelligence . And that we must do it for our own good, even before that of others.
If we're up to it, we can win many battles like Rocco does: without even fighting them , but simply by communicating and learning to negotiate spaces. Perhaps we could come to terms with wolves, foxes, wild boars, the neighbor's barking dogs and the shepherd's dogs that scare us. And maybe even with our neighbors themselves, or with those born across the border and those with ideas and lifestyles we can't understand.
One thing is certain: in an age where intolerance is rampant, and where we have tools capable of annihilating every animal species - including our own - learning to manage daily conflicts and negotiate spaces could be the greatest challenge the future holds for us.
But we'll talk about this, and the urgency of rewriting our way of relating to the living world, in future episodes.
In the meantime, speaking of spaces, I remind you that Rendez-vous was born with the idea of being an open and shared place, so if you have experienced encounters or stories that deserve to be shared, I invite you to write to me at rendez-vous@iononhopauradellupo.it.
We'll meet again here in a few days. At our usual rendezvous.