Still…life / Todavida

            Those walks back and forth along the corridors of the University which give him a feeling of freedom. His pace quickens until it acquires its own rhythm. His thoughts do likewise, they speed up until they become clear, freeing themselves from the superfluous details that surround them. Daniel can walk great distances and think many ideas. Solutions to study problems, proposals for new papers, new questions about the world, in short, digging around inside himself, in earnest. Not even…

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            Here I am, today, forty-four years old, in the building cafeteria, eating a sandwich so tasteless that I have to look down to remember what it is made of.             A surprise comes over the radio. A song carries me back to my adolescence. “Killing me softly”. Was it by Aretha Franklin? I never did know.             Me at eighteen. Going out to dance from time to time, with a group. Down in the lower town, around Olivos. The…

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To all those who have lived, are living and will live in this universe. Except one.             Where to begin? This is the story of an act of plagiarism. It might be better to tell it in chronological order, but according to the chronology of life rather than of time, since the two do not always coincide.             I had liked Kundera for some time and had finally managed to find a copy of The Unbearable Lightness of Being. “What…

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            I would say “I don’t think I’ll go to school today, mom” if it wasn’t that I have to go. But now it is work, not school. How nice when I was snug under the cover of my blankets and away off in the background you could hear breakfast being prepared. So warm and cosy and so different from the cold street, the drizzle, the cars splashing, the freezing schoolyard and such a long wait for the hot tea…

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Any similarity with coincidence is pure reality             The fact that characters sometimes become almost real is nothing new, but when has the reverse been the case?              Sandra had been asking me for some time to transform her into a fully‑rounded character. Or rather, to include her in one of my books, as long as it was under her real name. I didn’t like the idea very much to begin with since I don’t usually include such real people…

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                                                                                                                      Paris Dear Ana:             Please excuse the delay. There are some things you keep putting off and in the end they don’t work out.                        Many thanks for the gift. I know it was your idea. You told me to always keep it on my desk. It’s been nearly twenty years and the little frog is still there.             I remember the drama group. I used to be counting the days till Saturday. It was at two o’clock, remember?…

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            I knew him when I was four years old. He had an ice cream tricycle that he always parked by the door of the German Schule. I accompanied my father as he took my sister to her Grade one class. I don’t really remember what was I doing there. In fact, thinking about it a little longer, we probably were picking her up at the end of the day. Pirulo was always there, with a whistle hanging from his…

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            ‘An orgasm’. That’s what Daniel wrote in the book. Because of shyness, laziness, or some other more obscure reason, Daniel did not dwell upon it too much.             Thousands of people will read that book, that story, that page, those words. ‘An orgasm’. And in each mind‑body that orgasm will acquire very different characteristics and proportions. Experience, fantasy, desire, mood and other factors will influence the imagination of the readers. Their sex, time of the day, place of the…

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Only a handful of people in the theatre. Some of them knew each other, but only superficially it seemed. A slight nod of the head, a gesture of the hand, that was all. Twenty, twenty-five people in all. The film started ten minutes late. Perhaps they were waiting to see if more people arrived. The Ottawa Library Cinema Club showed films once a week. It was situated in an obscure neighbourhood to the south of the city, a relatively unfrequented…

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Like an awakening. Mariela closes her eyes, makes herself comfortable in her favourite armchair (the one she didn’t know was her favourite a few months ago) and lets herself go. A new game, perhaps much more than that, had started recently.   Not caring how or why, or even that she is, Mariela becomes immersed in herself. She has that nice, warm, full feeling, like taking a good shower. Ah, those little whims that enter the mind like errant moths….

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