Fragrance (novel) [13]
Pr. Dr. Dorin Octavian Picioruș
Fragrance
(novel)
*
For the people of the Church, however, I am bearable when I deal with theology, when I write things about the past, but not about the present. Because they believe that I, the Priest, cannot be both a writer, I cannot also be a man of the present, that I should not have opinions about the present and that, only those who have no opinions, but only circumstantial interests, should deal with the present. I am asked for moral flexibility, I am asked to deny my life options or, at least, to remain profoundly silent about them. My only option, silence, can be filled with prayer. But since for some prayer does not produce holiness, but only wastes time, they do not realize that my silence is the most dangerous life option. Because what you can do in a life of silence is heard across millennia.
We, children, believed that the donkey told the exact time when it was braying. When he gives his trill. The hen, it is true, looked into the branches, turning her head to one side, but her gesture seemed studied. It was a kind of young lady’s look in the mirror, to see if her breasts had grown any more, although it is inappropriate to talk about such things at such an age. Copying the gestures of vulgar women, more and more children are posing from behind, not understanding what a butt represents for mature women. They imitate gestures, hum the song of the day, try to walk with their breasts forward like a Barbie doll, naturalness seems outdated to them, tarring their face means ruining it, so that former divas end up as stretched, aged tattoos, which some people still invite, nostalgically, to shows. And when you want to access the pages of the past, you are amazed by the insatiable models they have aligned themselves with and which you believe are completely dead. But no, it’s not like that! Our world recycles cultural, philosophical, political corpses.
The travesty of the moment has a lot of the past, but you have to know the historical background. You have to know the history that you did not live, but that has wreaked havoc elsewhere. For, from the past, like a worm that climbs into the apple of the present, come ideas that seemed dead, but which we put back into circulation. Through our ignorance we make them habits. Because you have to know what to avoid, so that you don’t repeat them. But if we don’t read our history anymore, how can we know the things that killed millions of people in the past, like that, on unset table?! We, the presenteeists, sit and dream of being eternal. Eternal for a moment. And we die like flies in the generation that would have wanted us to be a quintessence of history.
Bubulina makes you cabbage rolls until the light falls. Because she’s a practitioner of the moment, not a dreamer. When the police arrive, they find excess meat on the grill, given to the maximum, which is why we keep the boom-boom cadence, in which we do not hear ourselves citizen with pedestrian. More interjections with echo mean a good manea[1]. A collective sweat is a memorable concert. They take off their bras because they are worshipers of Hell. Rhythm has taken the place of lyrics. Because we no longer need to know how to speak, but we need to know how to eat, no matter what eating means. I have the latest kind of, newly released, not because I’m confused by technology, but because I don’t understand it. I press the button, I drive away, it stays in the field, I call for a tow truck, because the car is miles away from my brain. I don’t care who did it or how, but I trust that it’s the best. It’s a finished mass of irons, with which I become visible, just like a star in the sky that no one knows.
– Girl, Tudorițo, girl! Do you know what love is?! Because when love comes, it’s like your mind opens up and you understand what you were made for on earth. You weren’t made to be selfish, but altruistic. You were made to forget yourself and love her. And if you love her, then you too become peaceful, you leave your incomprehensible, lonely airs and have a hard, iron heart. Because love strengthens you, makes you overcome temptations of all kinds, makes you feel at home. And home is not a song, it is your heart. It is the place where you feel that you have everything and you really do.
The green bus reaches its destination, but it has intense pleasures. One of the pleasures is turning off the air conditioning between Comarnic and Sinaia, but also on the way back. Until you tell him to his face. And the second is to be late for 50 minutes, let’s say an hour or so, as long as a person can endure. Only after we vociferated did we get light and air. And we were in the only place where people could talk with the light on, because everyone, so as not to get in trouble with the drivers, was reading on their phones in the dark. So that the opticians can make money too. The silences of the gang are cowardices. The cowardice eats money from somewhere, given under the arm, that’s why it keeps quiet. He pretends not to know, because he does. And the one who knows and keeps quiet, does it, does it in a gang, and he scrunches up his nose at the verticality. Because being vertical doesn’t seem to be rat-like, and that’s how it is!
[1] To be seen: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manele.