“Diary” by Pier Paolo Pasolini
Friday, April 28th, 2006DIARY
Grown up? Never—never—! Like existence itself which never matures staying always green from splendid day to splendid day— I can only stay true to the stupendous monotony of the mystery. That’s why I’ve never abandoned myself To happiness, That’s why In the anxiety of my sins I’ve never been touched By real remorse. Equal, always equal, To the inexpressible At the very source Of what I am.
~trans. L. Ferlinghetti & F. Valente
In high school, I made a similar promise to myselfnever to grow up. All the kids around me were stressing about getting into the best colleges on route to the best careers. If thats what being an adult is about, count me out, I thought. I was into playing cards and basketball, making and looking at art, hanging out with my girlfriendnot test scores, and certainly not career paths. Maybe I was naive; maybe I was wise beyond my years; maybe I was a spoiled brat who didnt need to stress about a career. In any case, the moment I made that vow (I remember it vividly) was an important one for me. Ive never yet had reason to regret it. (I wonder if my high school buddies who went into insurance, or retail apartment development can say the same about their choices.) I was determined to always be mindful of the inexpressible/ at the very source/ of what I am as opposed to pinning my future to, as Pasolini puts it in another poem, the flimsy crust of our world/ over the naked universe. The detachment expressed in Diary, the steering a middle course between happiness and despair, is another idea with which I sympathize. Happiness is conditionaldependent on certain factors outside of our control (Buddhist theory). So paradoxically, even happiness causes suffering when we abandon ourselves to it. By which I mean forgetting its transient nature. If, in a moment of happiness, we recall that this too will pass, we wont despair when the conditions for that happiness disappear. Its good, I thinkas Pasolini suggeststo be similarly detached in our moments of guilt or grief. This too will pass… Thats just about the best thing I ever learned.