A Quick Word... From Alessandro Baricco

Who's he? Well he's an Italian author, and if the following passage is anything to go by, probably a pretty bloody good one at that. I must admit this piece was stolen from Jonathan Carroll's Blog, which is a fine and splendid place full of wonderful things to read, this being just one of them. I do recommend you check it out.

Blogging has been slow of late, needing to compensate for that which is happening very fast, namely the end of a job (or two), the end of living in a house (or two), and moving from one city to another, beginning a new and exciting chapter (or two) of my life. Also I'm turning 20 next week. All this will be thoroughly documented of course, but for now there is much to do and much wanting to be done, so I ask that you patiently wait, while I leave you in the hands of someone much more talented than I. Over to you Mr. Baricco:

"He puts down the pen, folds the sheet of paper, and slips it inside an envelope. He stands up, takes from his trunk a mahogany box, lifts the lid, lets the letter fall inside, open and unaddressed. In the box are hundreds of identical envelopes, open and unaddressed. He thinks that somewhere in the world he will meet a woman who has always been his woman. Every now and again he regrets that destiny has been so stubbornly determined to make him wait with such indelicate tenacity, but with time he has learned to consider the matter with great serenity. Almost every day, for years now, he has taken pen in hand to write to her. He has no names or addresses to put on the envelopes: but he has a life to recount. And to whom, if not to her? He thinks that when they meet it will be wonderful to place the mahogany box full of letters on her lap and say to her, 'I was waiting for you.'

"She will open the box and slowly, when she so desires, read the letters one by one. As she works her way back up the interminable thread of blue ink she will gather up the years-- the days, the moments-- that that man, before he ever met her, had already given to her. Or perhaps more simply, she will overturn the box and astonished at that comical snowstorm of letters, she will smile, saying to that man, 'You are mad.' And she will love him forever."

-Alessandro Baricco