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December 10, 2005

Winter Sun

One of my greatest winter time pleasures is to sit in a bench in a sunny spot in a park, a new book in my hand. The promise of a quiet time, all to myself, the anticipating of the opening of the front cover and reading the first lines. You can easily judge a book by its opening lines. Some of them stick to your memory even though you can't remember anything else. They are the author's chance of making a good, lasting first impression.

Now that I am physically separated from my books, it seems I appreciate every new acquisition even more. It's like starting all over again, the excitement of building a new private library. It started out as an interesting - yet painful - exercise: having to leave your books behind and considering you can bring a dozen or so with you, which ones would you choose? My grandfather's dictionary; the Quartet, the Sheltering Sky; Gordon; Shakespeare; Palomar; Ficciones; some Kundera; some philosophy books. I get jealous of my books. P has been lending some to his new housemaid's daughter. Apparently she likes to read, they're poor and she got very excited when she entered the study, covered by books from wall to wall. I have mixed feelings about this borrowing.

I hadn't been to the Gulbenkian gardens for a while. I felt like a lizard desperately looking for a nice, smooth rock where to rest and warm up. But the winter sun was playing a trick on me. Hanging low in the sky, it completely shattered the picture I had imagined of a splendorous sunny garden. Only two months ago, I sat in the open air amphitheater, savouring a Gonçalo M. Tavares. Instead, I had to find my way through the maze of paths to find a decent spot. I didn't feel like sitting on the grass and all the benches were covered in the shade. My only option was to sit on the concrete pedestal of a modern statue which turned out to be quite comfortable. Is it just me or concrete is much warmer than stone?

I open the book, it looked promising:

"I was looking for a quiet place to die."

A woman comes and sits on the same pedestal on my left. I was thinking that the garden was big enough for her to find another place but I quickly returned to my reading. She starts smoking. I don't smoke. I don't like that people smoke next to me, especially on a public park and when the wind isn't blowing. In a such a situation and depending on my mood I either ask politely for the person to have her smoke somewhere else or I move away. It felt warm, I didn't want to move. I didn't say anything either. I remembered being told that sometimes what we call superstition is just sense of aesthetics or balance about how the world should work. First, I had to fight to find a sunny spot and now this. Maybe my reading just didn't fit the aesthetics of the situation. She finally finished her cigarette while I delved on my thoughts. Got back to the book.

"Like him, I had majored in English at College, with secret ambitions to go on studying literature or perhaps take a stab in journalism, but I hadn't had the courage to pursue either one. Life got in the way - two years in the army, work, marriage, family responsibilities, the need to earn more and more money, all the muck that bogs us when we don't have the balls to stand up to ourselves."

A man with a crooked back that had been walking back and forth on the pathway just in front of me suddenly stops. He too is enjoying the warmth of the winter sun. I could appreciate this scene if it wasn't for the fact that he was casting a long shadow, all over my feet and legs. I moved slightly to the right. He automatically throws his weight on his right leg, thus making me feel like I'm on a cartoon, a two dimensional Claudia running away from a shadow. He finally picks up where he had stopped that back and forth autistic stroll. My boots are getting warmer again.

"It's about nonexistent worlds, my nephew said, a study of the inner refuge, a map of the place a man goes to when life in the real world is no longer possible."

The woman sitting next to me turns out to be Spanish. Her family, who apparently had been visiting the museums while she waited outside, comes to join her. Now I've got 5 Spanish people next to me, speaking loudly, commenting on the hideous statue they saw and what they should do next. It's always hard for me to concentrate when someone next to me is speaking in a foreign language. I usually don't overhear other people's conversations but my brain can't stop from trying to decipher the weird, unfamiliar sounds that are coming in my direction. It seems that the next stop will be the Spanish department store El Corte Inglés. How imaginative. The equivalent of an American going to the Hard Rock Café when abroad.

"Tom put them off with his doubts and soul-searchings, his obscure disquisitions on the nature of reality, his hesitant manner."

I suddenly feel observed. What is this primitive skill humans still have, this alertness that doesn't leave us to rest, like preys waiting to be hunted? I look behind me and between the iron legs of that grotesque statue figure, I see a man with a camera taking a photo. Of the statue? A photo of me? It doesn't matter, by this point I am convinced there is a universal plot against my reading. The man puts his camera down and I see a familiar smile. Ricardo L. is smiling at me. A "gotcha" look on his face. "Too bad you saw me, I was going quietly away and then I'd send the photo by email". At least this was a nice interruption. R&A are very friendly, interesting people. After a short chat about hiking, rainy weather, crappy Portuguese translations of American authors from the 80's and ginger cookies they leave me to my book.

"Thousands of items were crammed onto the shelves down there - everything from out of print dictionaries to forgotten bestsellers to leather-bound sets of Shakespeare - and Tom had always felt at home in that kind of paper mausoleum, flipping through piles of discarded books and breathing in the old dusty smells."

Despite the occasional kid running by, the garden seems to have quieted down. Which is completely understandable, considering the sun has now dropped behind the museum building. I'm getting cold. I'm going home.

Posted by claudia