Cplow Esther,
“When I became Anna Karenina?” (a character, who together with Madame Bovary, has always deeply annoyed me, ed)
This is the question that has been ringing in my head for some time now.
I’ve been 40 for a while now, just me, who grew up as one intelligent mother with a Teutonic approach to educationwho dismissed my adolescent whims with a lapidary “make it less long” I have consequently become an adult with a notable tendency towardsself intransigence and to a severe and pragmatic approach to existencealso thanks to some heavy blows and great pain which certainly did not contribute to a graceful vision of life.
You will therefore understand my dismay in finding myself struggling in a situation for some time now desire for lightness, of some playful and unexpected shuffling of cards that deludes me that life can still offer some flashes of exhilaration and is no longer definitively and ineluctably channeled into an (undoubtedly “comfortable”) loop of an inevitably tarnished marriage, a job that is sometimes still interesting but mostly repetitive, tiring and often disheartening let’s face it, and some occasional moments of leisure cut out among the many daily hassles and anxieties.
Certainly, the solid awareness that things could be worse never fades (we know it, we’ve seen it, we’ve been through it, we have an indelible memory of it) and so the sense of guilt of “what do I have to complain about in the end” adds to the discomfort? ?”.
And in the meantime the days and weeks pass and you continue to wait for who knows what we don’t know, fully perceiving the meaning of the famous expression “The hope that kills”
As your faithful reader (and follower in these social times) I don’t have a real question for you but rather the need for some of your lapidary pearls of Neapolitan wisdom to be able to get over it.
I await confidently!
G.
Ester Viola’s response
Dear G.,
What is there to get through? I read twice, what do you have to defend yourself from with three aphorisms? From life?
“You will therefore understand my dismay in finding myself for some time now struggling with a desire for lightness, for some playful and unexpected shuffling of cards that deludes me that life can still offer some flashes of exhilaration and is no longer definitively and ineluctably channeled in an (undoubtedly “comfortable”) loop of an inevitably tarnished marriage, a job that is sometimes still interesting but mostly repetitive, tiring and often disheartening let’s face it, and some occasional moments of leisure cut out among the many daily hassles and anxieties.”
What do you mean here? We need to be direct, at least between us. Does this dark subordinate mean that you’re seeing someone after twenty years of a marriage that has legitimately broken down? And what will it ever be.
Yours is a “nothing happens” of the best kind. Highly prized problem-free boredom. The greatest ambition of the adult.
What package of Sfogliatelle can I send you from Naples? What do you want? Here for you instead of the old Flaianos for every occasion (from the Diary of errors, Adelphi), with universal questions arrogantly written by me.
How come I can’t get rid of stupidity, the same one I had when I was twenty?
We never got out of adolescence
and who knows how we will manage when we grow up.
So is this thing true that being bad is difficult but unfortunately it pays off? Why does this happen?
Indulgence for people who behave badly. He who arouses neither sympathy nor compassion is the average man, honest and without great inclinations towards evil. The man who works to pull
forward, who starts a family and supports it. The average man is unpleasant. (I’m unpleasant. You can tolerate me). To become likable you have to behave like a rogue, to be loved you have to be supported. It is the erotic misunderstanding that continues. Pity towards sex replaces feelings. The wicked person gives those sexual guarantees that the good person does not give. Actions against morality and society are symptoms of sexual vigor and ease in those who carry them out. Temperament! Those who behave righteously admit their “ordinary” sexual activity and are not interested. (Women’s aspiration is to be whores).
To tell the truth, I’m a mythomaniac. Even when I feel sorry for myself and say “impostor syndrome!” or “it’s a shame this low self-esteem” I think to myself that I am better than others.
As we move forward we realize that we have fallen into the trap. Vanity made us think we were different.
Where did I throw all that intelligence?
Intelligence is not enough if there is no pressure.
Did I miss the best opportunities?
We are disappointed at every age of life, because we could do (indeed we are offered) what we would have liked in an earlier age. Today we reject what would have flattered us yesterday. In short, everything comes late.
Nothing ever happens?
I never feel bored. Every moment has something that attracts me. Nothing is to be thrown away.
We’re not too special even to ask ourselves questions, that’s G. Flaiano’s remedy is to forgive ourselves for wasted time, to consider that the disaster of misunderstandings is a general rather than a particular matter.
So how to face life?
Bonjour bitches!
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