I Admit I Feel A Bit Deceived

I've been reading Marcel Proust, I've been thinking that he's probably one of the most quoted writers and one of the less read, I've been locked in my house for almost three weeks, I've been paranoid and I've been watching fake news on social networks, I've been reading Science comments' on COVID-19, I've been thinking about how will my wife and I buy food for us and for the cats if we don't have a damn car and if the supermarket is pretty far from home, I've been seriously worried about get in touch with real unknown people in the streets, I've been paranoid about the idea of get infected, I've been thinking people are so dirty and unaware of the real situation. 

Here, in Lerma, people have been celebrating parties.
The churches are full of people and noisy as usual.  

I've been taking French lessons, I've been thinking about Philippe, I've been thinking about Paulette, I've been thinking about my old French professors, I've been thinking why did I behave like a moron when I should have focused on my French classes, I've been thinking that I met them more than fifteen years ago, I've been thinking about Maurice, I've been thinking in the times he was my French professor, I've been thinking he liked Boris Vian,  I've been thinking I was so futile, I've been thinking why I fell so blindly in love.  

Once Maurice imparted a class under the influence –maybe he took a Valium 'cause he thought his life sucked– and he made us watch a Stanley Kubrick film in French. I wonder what happened to my French professors, where they are now, what they have done and how they are going. 

I've been thinking about you and your friends in Europe, I've been thinking that you might hate me 'cause I haven't been supportive in the experiments you've been performing in Mexico City, I've been thinking there is something about you that makes me sick, I've been thinking why I feel pity about you, I've been thinking that it is just a sad projection of myself, I've been thinking about your cats, I've been thinking about your lonely life, I've been thinking in the times that you've complained about your life on the cellphone, I've been thinking if we could befriended. 

What if we just could be honest for one single time? What if you just admit that you like women? What if you just admit that you believe that I am a moron?

I've been thinking about yesterday, I've been thinking about my last meeting via ZOOM with my colleagues, I've been thinking about the impression my colleagues might have about me right now, I've been feeling ill and miserable, I've been considering to act like a smug guy to make it clear that I've written every single damn paper in which I appear as first author, I've been thinking that I am unable to write my own stuff, I've been realizing that I can't write as much as I want, I've been thinking why do I need to be alone to write, I've been thinking why in the hell I can't finish this damn paper in which I've been working for months.    

I've been thinking in those times when I could hear Bandoliers and get drunk and get high and just fall asleep, when I had the worst nightmares of my life, when I was a stupid postgraduate student and tried so hard in my dreams to be less stupid than I was in real life.   

I've been thinking why I can't give a fuck about silly people.

Bandoliers

Whisper Secrets For Me

We spoke on the phone, two days ago. 

Though I pretended to pointed out that it was exclusively an academic call, honestly I just wanted to hear your voice. 

I wanted to tell you that I care about you, but I didn't. 
I am not sure if you would find it awkward. I understand that you don't care about it. I understand that you don't want to know a single thing about the world. 

You told me that you were carrying out a procedure for your daughter to obtain your husband's pension, and that it was so damn difficult. I didn't know what to say. I just remembered when I first met your husband and when I first saw your daughter. It was scary and I stopped thinking about it. I just can't imagine how painful is it to be you. 

I couldn't survive if I were in your situation. I wouldn't be able to handle such a situation. It would kill me, if my wife was dead. 

I would have liked to tell you that I really care about you, but, as usual, I felt somehow rejected, and, as the conversation progressed, I became nervous and I started to think which words I wanted to say to you and I became the very same idiot guy I have always been when I try to speak with you. 

It's a sickening personality complex. I suppose my interest in us to be friends makes me act like that. It reminds me of a friend I used to have when I was eighteen years old. It was a weird relationship. She was older than me and she really behaved like an older person. Her personality attracted me so wildly. I met her in one of my first classes at the university. I started to idealize her and I spoke to her after school.

She was so nice and we talked about The Beatles and about literature. She obviously had read many more authors than me. She had an interesting and funny conversation. 
She was pretty smart and she was a professional dancer. She had health issues. She was anemic and depressive. Her dad died when she was a girl. Her life was such a mistery for me.

We started to talk on the telephone. We talked and talked by entire nights. We had fun. We had a weird relationship. Eventually, we became more than friends, or so we tried. It started on the phone. On the previous days –we used to spoke twice per week–, I told her that I liked her so much, that she was so perfect and that I wanted to see her. At the time, she had another friend. He was older than us and, apparently, he was a professional dancer, too. He was a mature man. I was just a teenager. 

She was thinking about us for an entire weekend and then she called me and she told me that she also wanted to have a sentimental relationship with me. I was so damn happy. I guess I hadn't been as happy as I was then, before. Lily was all I ever wanted and I just couldn't believe that she was “more than a friend”. 

The relationship was a disaster. Each time I saw her, it was a stressful situation for me. I was so nervous, I wanted so bad to not make mistakes that I just became a stupid guy. 
It was so repetitive that she generally got mad and angst and dissapointed and exhausted. Once she even told me that she preferred to talk on the telephone rather than to see me.

I was so naive and silly. 

Then she moved to another city and I started to write letters to her.
I wrote her endlessly –I wonder what kind of nonsense things did I write her, and I suppose I would be ashamed of them– and she wrote me back. 

The last time I saw her, she thought she was pregnant and I was brokenhearted. She was in love with an Argentine artist and I was dealing with the fact that my ex-girlfriend –the longer relationship I had back then– just had married. 

(And, right now, as I remember those days and as I write this post, I feel I'm some sort of Marcel Proust copycat, writing a letter for you.) 

I still remember when we first met. 

I saw you in a small dinning room. I still remember the way you smiled. 
You seemed so shy and clever. I wanted to know you, but I was so shy to tell you. 

Each time I think about it, I wonder why didn't we meet long before. 
It would have been awesome. I am sure that, right now, everything would be different for both of us.   

Though we worked together for four years, only on the last days we shared an office –almost two years ago–, we started to have normal conversations. I really enjoyed. You seemed a human, after all. Maybe you thought I seemed a human after all, too. I sensed that you also enjoyed our brief conversations. We started to talk about nonsense issues. We started to act as normal people. Then I moved to another city. (Ironic, isn't it?) 

I wonder if someday we could just talk on the telephone as normal people.

Whisper Secrets For Me