Sometimes, surprises come when you least expect them. Nothing happens and yet, everything does. As I write this, I think of the song from La Traviatta, Questa donna conoscete? It is 1 AM and nothing moves outside. I decide to play La Traviata softly on my PC.
Un di, felice, eterea.
Have there been days like this? Perhaps, perhaps not. Today is an important day for so many reasons. Where is warm rain when you most need it?
Libiamo ne' lieti calici.
Cigarette smoke. Nervous energy. A group of three women behind me glide past their drink superfacially. I come alive inside a gin and tonic. Gin and tonic and coffee. Coffee drained itself with cigarette smoke. Like a dream. I must have been there for two hours, perhaps more, perhaps less. Might have sat there all night too. So much sadness, death and fear. I see these two red marks on the palm. Must have accidentally held the fist so tight? But why?
I feel happy, right at this moment. Enough. I am not ever interested in perpetual happiness. To quote George Bernard Shaw, "A lifetime of happiness! No man alive could bear it: it would be hell on earth." I am looking for spare change. And unexpectedly, I find it. Days I am happy, I want to remember them.
(I feel like I am inside a Thomas Mann novel)
It is so much easier to write about others and other things. I don't hesitate and sit here blankly staring at the keyboard when I think of writing about others. I feel unlettered, uncouth trying to describe my feelings and emotions. Smiles frighten me because I know they are fleeting. I know there is a warm sun on the other side of these clouds and I just sit here waiting for glimses of the sunlight behind them. But today I am thankful for the warmth. I am happy for the arrival of an unseasonal spring. I remember J. D. Salinger writing about being a paranoid-reverse, people plotting to make him happy. I think I am addicted to sadness. I thrive on sadness yet today I am smiling, I feel happy. Just this moment, for no particular reason, looks great to me.
Peace is such a transient thing. Sometimes it is just enough to be happy for a second or a minute. That is enough to recharge you for a year of detachment. But you have to allow yourself to be happy without thinking of the next day or the day after. Or the end of this life. It is today that matters, and more precisely right at this minute.
(I see no lights outside my window. All apartments in Petit Saconnex have gone to sleep. The sky is cloudless and open. Moonless.)
Why am I so uncomfortable with happiness?
"'Tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies not plenty"
(Anyway, none of this writing makes any sense to you reader. I think i know how to write more clearly but I dont think I want to. What is the fun in being clear, it is overrated:-))
Sempre libera!
May be tomorrow, the moon will descend at my feet on a puddle.
Lunge da lei per me non v'ha diletto.
I turn the opera off and go to sleep.
FIN.
