This morning I had to get downtown.On my way, I was reading the play Don Álvaro o la furze del sino (by Ángel de Saaverdra, Third Duke of Rivas). This is an odd and potentially pompous sentence to write. Here is to the classes that push you to read the most random ass shit that still, somehow, gets your mind to open.
It's amazing how quickly time passes when one is immersed in reading theater. Some people find it difficult to read and conceptualize, and I get that to an extent. The stage directions and lighting instructions are fun to try and imagine. It is never the same as being in the same room with the props and costumes and actors projecting their recited lines but a few feet from you.
Make no mistake: Reading a play written in the Spanish of 1835, set in that time, is not the most...well...suffice it to say that it is not a quick read, nor is it easy to get the references to culture of that time and place.
All the same: I enjoyed reading it. There are some beautiful lines, and some characters that are, all things considered, relatable.
I found myself wishing that the era of the dual for honor still existed.
That may be my problem: Perhaps I believe it still does.
(pause)
When I stepped off of the bus, downtown, I took four quick steps, then stopped abruptly. I realized I was hearing this song by Erik Satie, the one I have been listening to obsessively for the past few weeks, being piped out into the street from an unseen source.
What an oddly beautiful coincidence.
Instead of hurrying, I just stood to listen.
To let this song from 1893 wrap around me while I stood in the cold, on the sidewalk, downtown, while 2016 and its downtown occupants and trench coats rushed past me.
There is something to be said about the intermingling and influence of centuries.
It is always present, but, today, it felt a bit more magically and tangibly present.
Be well; be loved,
k.
(photo via altcomics tumblr)
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