Fragrance (novel) [43]

Pr. Dr. Dorin Octavian Picioruș

Fragrance

(novel)

*

But, to put the new sink on the wall, I bought what I need for fixing, plus a faucet and a drain valve, but I forgot to buy a flexible siphon. The old one is good too, I could use that one, but I’m going to go back to the blonde lady, the one nearby, who helps me with her shop at all kinds of repairs, to buy something like that. That the valve has to be hand in hand with the siphon so that everything drains well. But my muscles hurt, I have muscle fever, mixed with a cold, plus a sinulan before I sleep, anti-headache. And I had just fallen asleep for almost an hour, when I received the first alert ro! A fire far from us, but we were being told to make way for the emergency crews, while I was in bed, wanting to sleep, to rest. And they sent another alert, shortly after! That when you don’t need them, they send them to you, but only when you need them, they never come. I was in Predeal and I received a bear alert. He had also come out for food, a bear, like all bears, on sunday, being hungry…And we were heading to Church, in pleasant weather, and we saw an overturned dumpster. And we told ourselves that it was the bear’s footprint, that it must be him, but we didn’t worry at all. That the bear had come out for food, just as we, the christians, went to Church to be seated at the Lord’s Table and to commune with Him Himself. Hunger makes you visible. Ghostual hunger is in proportion to zeal for God. You come, you zeal, you strive, you rejoice, because you are always getting closer to the God of glory. But when you are characterized by stagnation, although you are torn apart inside and need your peace, you do not look above, but are riveted with your eyes on your passions. And because you don’t yet need His mercy and forgiveness, you don’t do the normal thing, that of repentance and asking God for help, but you believe that you are strong, that you can move mountains further and further, in untold torment. But this proves that you are immature, that your lack of experience makes you suffer for nothing.

The onion was…the onion, we thought we knew it, because we had never looked at it up close, in a serious way. But when he put a tiny part of it on the lamella and we saw how much life there was in the onion, suddenly the onion became a universe, an unsuspectedly alive world. We took the eye out of the microscope and couldn’t see inside anymore. But when I entered the onion, I saw various forms of life in it, I saw that it was alive and not static, and the subatomic world began to amaze me, to keep me awake. Because it promised me an expanded knowledge of it. When I went online, I entered the minds of the world. Wherever I went, I had something to see, something to read, something to hear, because each one offered something. I left my world everywhere, in other people’s cities and countries, but also in their lives. And you read as much as you received. And if you want to stick to a man, to his online creation, you can do it without stressing him: by being a good receiver of everything he presents. To follow, online, means to get to know a man daily. And, without just and maybe, many of his needs are yours too, and you will find his adventures to be a friend. Because, in a certain way, you live them too, you bump into them, they have already penetrated you.

Those close to you are silent, they don’t talk seriously about themselves, or, if they say something, it seems insignificant to you, but those far away, whom you don’t know, whom you didn’t know existed, amaze you with what they say and do. And that’s why the online world completely ensnares you, makes you curious, makes you like the constant wandering, because it offers you a space that seems endless, although it has its limits. Children are enchanted by the online offer, by its abundance, by its diversity, and that is why you must immerse them in reality, in a direct experience, in order to take them out of the online. And if you make them feel life within themselves, to see the difference between watching and dialogue, then you draw your children, your grandchildren towards you, because we live in families, we live with people and not in the middle of computers. They, the devices, are the instruments of communication and not the communication itself, they are the microscope that makes us talk about the things within ourselves. But we are the life from the onion! We are the ones who can talk about what we have within us and which the eye cannot see, but only we can talk about them.

If you give up the microscope, the depth vision, you don’t see greatness anywhere. Those who confuse faces with people’s works believe that looking at someone’s face exempts you from reading their work. But understanding my work leads you to understanding my face, which can tell you a lot about me, if you start to love me, because you start to understand me. And I, in turn, entering into a relationship with you, start to love you more and more as I understand you, as you give me clear reasons for loving. And love is born from sincerity, from loyalty to personal beliefs, from your daily work to be yourself.