We lost the ability to lose. And we lost the ability to cope with a loser. A loser inhibits us; and irritates us. He’s a contre-jour photo, a contre-vie device, something that keeps us from breathing the fresh air of our ongoing projects, something that exudes the fetid smell of death and reminds us vaguely of our own unhygienic ways of following our goals. We’re taught to think positively. To be optimistic. To genuinely believe that things will go our way, and if they won’t, to genuinely destroy those that seem to stand in our way. Losing is not shameful, losing is dying. Losing is showing bad Google results and bad media, losing is having bad breath and bad credit history, losing is entering an abrupt process of social necrosis. We’re born with a fatal, annihilating sense of competition. That’s one of the reasons why we, the moderns, are in very bad terms with Alterity. If there’s a winner, there’s a loser. And if there’s a wish, there’s a Freud. And so one of his patients said to his wife: “If one of us is gonna die before the other, I’m gonna move to Paris”.
Joyeux Noël to all of you, beautiful losers!

PS:…and take some Roberta Flack in your iPod while wandering through Galeries Lafayette…

Being the puddle’s daughter and only feeling close to those things that tend to linger, no wonder I have a secret weakness for perpetual motion. And for those people having a sense of disorder.

In other words, I secretly love big cities. If you’ll ever hear me saying otherwise, you should know I will be lying. I love the way people walk on the streets and queue for cash or food, I love how they proceed to mutual ignoring, I love ladies’ defensive way of carrying their bags and oh those gentlemen in their crumpled suits talking on the phone and eating their mayonnaise sandwiches at the same time, and those bunches of teenagers hanging around during school time, those beggars eating icecream and popcorn, those hurried compulsive women walking into and getting out of every store within 3 minutes; mingling among this crowd see those fast ‘n slim pizza guys on their bikes looking like depressive Supermen, and see the mail men in their worn-out suits lingering around with their takeaway coffee, stiff doormen, thick policemen, husky newspaper boys, sleepy bodyguards, emphatic TV crews, chubby schoolgirls giggling sobbing pushing, LV-logoed infatuated middle-aged nymphs.
A big city reaches its ultimate limits each day during the rush hours and each time you think it’s irreversible. You think that car parks, clubs, subways, phone boxes and malls are going to burst into flames, tears, ketchup, gasoline and Christmas ornaments and everyone would have to run away and throw themselves into the sea.

Some things shouldn’t be taken too seriously; these things are: progress, people’s names, psychoanalysis, mascara on eyelashes, social democracy, gardening, women’s naivety, men’s pride, bras, blogs, success, and the iPod Touch. The whole rest of the things found in this world require your constant and acute attention, skepticism, love and hate.

PS: New Monday, new canvas: “Thinking of All Those Forbidden Cities”.
Click it.

PS2: The silliest song could leave a world of wised-up spoken words behind. A beautiful song could tell a mountain “go, throw yourself into the sea”, and it will be done. This is Leonard Cohen’s “Alexandra Leaving”.

Someone I know asked her guests: “so you’re 8, right?”. And she cooked 8 meatballs. They were brought at the table together with 8 slices of bread. A while later, she asked once again: “so I see you’re 8…”. And she baked 8 pieces of cake. Later on she looked at us and said: “8 people, that must mean 8 cups of coffee…If someone’s not willing to have it, tell me now while you can.”

So I see you’re two reading this text…

PS: Today, best in the iPod: Rosie Thomas and all her albums – lovely voice, steady message, classic harmonies, lots of heart. Today, best in my computer: Velvet Underground’s “All Tomorrow’s Parties” (demo version, album version and single version – worth having them all).

There are many crucial things that are completely ignored these days. Among others, I would mention the kiss. No, nothing’s wrong with your eyes, and yes, you’ve read it alright: the kiss. It’s ignored, it’s forgotten, it’s held unimportant, irrelevant and boring. It never stands for itself. It’s like a highway, it’s like route 66 leading to hell or to heaven (or to some peripheral park nobody heard of).