Domingo

Mientras me zambullía en un exilio de las palabras sin fecha de regreso y jure que leería todos los días, a toda hora, para tratar de rescatar alguna tradición milenaria de compartir la soledad con algún buen libro, encontré un excusa para no hacer nada.

Aquello, un síntoma de una flojera estructural que tiene su origen en la religión y que se esfuma ante la necesidad, era materializado en un desapego a todo aquello que significara trabajar. Después de todos los patricios romanos declaraban el trabajo un penitencia de los dioses, un castigo (no por lo pecados cometidos, a diferencia de los cristianos) algo que solo podía evitar el libre pensamiento y la fluidez de la oratoria. Los esclavos romanos solo tenían un derecho: el del trabajo.

La flojera trepa por todas las paredes de mi casa. Habita entre los libros. Encanta el aire con una pesadez solo parecida a las tardes de domingo.

Ostia en Invierno

Ostia en Invierno es un gran bazaar de ofertas en zapatos y ropas. Cada esquina tiene personas haciendo la tradicional passieata. Unos toman café, otros grappa. Olores de calamari y scampi persiguen cada paso que doy. La rutina consiste en vivir bien, en elevar el gusto a todos los sentidos. Ostia en Invierno no es vivero de turistas, sino un calidoscopio de sabores de puerto italiano. Juraría que vi a Sofía Loren tres veces.

Paris en invierno

Paris recibe el frío como un viejo amigo. Cada esquina se torno gélido a la vista y el frío arropa todos los postes de luz. Los turistas galopan por las avenidas y las iglesias en busca de la majestuosidad de una ciudad que se exhibe bien en cualquier época del año. Paris es Moda y Paris es gastronomía, Paris es fantasía, Paris es Noche. En invierno la noche abraza la luna mas de cerca y el viento se deliza como un fantasma por todas las calles grises.

Herta Muller - Extract of the Noble Lecture

"Can we say that it is precisely the smallest objects—be they trumpets, accordions, or handkerchiefs—which connect the most disparate things in life? That the objects are in orbit and that their deviations reveal a pattern of repetition—a vicious circle, or what we call in German a devil's circle. We can believe this, but not say it. Still, what can't be said can be written. Because writing is a silent act, a labor from the head to the hand. The mouth is skipped over. I talked a great deal during the dictatorship, mostly because I decided not to blow the trumpet. Usually my talking led to excruciating consequences. But the writing began in silence, there on the stairs, where I had to come to terms with more than could be said. What was happening could no longer be expressed in speech. At most the external accompaniments, but not the totality of the events themselves. That I could only spell out in my head, voicelessly, within the vicious circle of the words during the act of writing. I reacted to the deathly fear with a thirst for life. A hunger for words. Nothing but the whirl of words could grasp my condition. It spelled out what the mouth could not pronounce. I chased after the events, caught up in the words and their devilish circling, until something emerged I had never known before. Parallel to the reality, the pantomime of words stepped into action, without respect for any real dimensions, shrinking what was most important and stretching the minor matters. As it rushes madly ahead, this vicious circle of words imposes a kind of cursed logic on what has been lived. Their pantomime is ruthless and restive, always craving more but instantly jaded. The subject of dictatorship is necessarily present, because nothing can ever again be a matter of course once we have been robbed of nearly all ability to take anything for granted. The subject is there implicitly, but the words are what take possession of me. They coax the subject anywhere they want. Nothing makes sense anymore and everything is true."