It all started with a hot air balloon. A huge, iridescent balloon – it routinely hung in the courtyard of a house in Cheshire, as some banal seasonal decoration for Halloween or Christmas.
I drove closer to the balloon and saw that there were people in its basket, and the balloon itself was tied to a pole. The people in the basket were silent and motionless, like statues. The morning sun flooded the area. The balloon hovered slowly above the ground, eclipsing the autumn splendor of the American province.
… I suddenly remembered a dream I had long ago about a big dark planet and stars that hung so low above the ground that you could touch them with your hands if you climbed onto the roof of the house. I remembered my exuberant joy in a dream from seeing all this. And the triumph: “I kept telling you about it, but you didn’t believe it! Are you convinced now? There!” As if something that everyone had been waiting for a long time has finally come true. Quite contrary to scientific forecasts and public opinion. But what, what exactly has come true?
… And here’s this balloon. A dream that has come true. And the same flow of feelings – boundless joy and triumph. However, there was also a new feeling. I would call it a feeling of defeat and voluntary surrender to a phenomenon that surpasses you in every way and is ineffably beautiful. A phenomenon that unexpectedly plucks you out of everyday life and swiftly lifts into the cloudy distance.
… A few more episodes about “defeat” came to mind.
One of them happened at a concert of symphonic music. I can’t say that it was my first visit to a concert hall. And it’s hard to say what was special that evening. I remember how I sank deep into my chair in anticipation of a pleasant pastime. The first chords sounded… The music flowed softly, completely filling the space, leaving no room for the listener to step away. It was captivating and… conquering. It was talking about something big, great, powerful, but at the same time surprisingly soft. About childhood, about love, about trust… It appealed to the very depths of a human soul.
And I instantly felt ashamed of all my sins, big and small. Suddenly, it became quite obvious that they could no longer be pulverized and scattered to the winds. They happened in the past but still exist. As if there is a record of you somewhere in space – of every minute and second of your life. And this record can be continued as long as you live, but it is no longer possible to erase it.
…I was crying and couldn’t stop. I was crying about who I could have been but wasn’t. I was crying because I realized that a lot of things were irreparable. I felt the despair and the pain of the person on his deathbed. My old self writhed like frog skin in the fire, shrinking into ashes. And in the ashes, there glistened droplets of a new entity alive as quicksilver, which could gather into a single drop and be reborn in a new form.
2009
Photo: Taryn Elliott.
Painting: Akira Kusaka.
