Benjamin Kunkel

“Currently the party line I give myself, and do in part believe, is that what’s the happiest is just to be alive and sensitive when it comes to feeling the world, and if what your senses, honed beyond usefulness, end up registering is so much suffering out there that you become light-headed with it at times – well, those senses can still be used for extracting pleasures from fruits, nuts, beverages of all kinds, words on a page, a loved mammal in your arms, music (including sad kinds), and anyway this is only the tip of a list anyone could assemble. I know my list is basic but maybe to utter banalities is a type of solidarity in these lonelifying times?”

“As you grow up, and you’ll find this, you keep getting involved with larger and larger illusions that take longer and longer to fall away. The great hope is eventually to find a delusion that will outlast your life.”

“There is no worse preparation for adulthood than having been a child.”

“What solitary people my family were! It amazed me that two of its members had ever gotten together to produce the others. But then solitary people pretending not to be – that must be how families start up, and how the race of the lonely has grown so numerous.”

“It was like when I’d taken a trip to some foreign land and everyone asked about it when I got back: my accounts would grow similar, focusing on this impression, that cool place, a certain funny anecdote, until there was just the one account which then substituted for my memory. Remembering this tendency, I felt an honest fear. It was the familiar fear, made honest through sudden intensity, that once all the sensation had evaporated from my life the residue would be a cliché. I’d die, St. Peter would be like, “So how was it?” and I’d say, “Great place. I liked the food. I was sick for part of it. But all the people were really nice.” And that would be it.”

“You Up?' What a great question! Just to be asked was to know the answer.”

“Mais tu crois que c'est quoi, une famille ! Sinon des gens dont on ne se remet pas ?”

“Mais quelle famille solitaire avais-je donc ! J'étais même ébahi que deux de ses membres avaient pu s'assembler pour engendrer les deux suivants. Seulement, des solitaires qui feignent de ne pas l'être... voilà sans doute comment les familles se construisent, et comment la race des gens seuls est devenue si nombreuse.”

“Un peu comme lorsque je rentre d'un voyage quelque part et que tout le monde me demande comment c'était : peu à peu mes différentes réponses n'en font plus qu'une, mes impressions se resserrent sur elles-mêmes, ouais, c'est cool, là-bas, et tiens, une anecdote marrante... puis ce discours unique se substitue à la réalité du souvenir.Du coup, j'ai franchement eu peur. J'ai ressenti cette crainte familière, soudainement intense et sincère, qu'une fois toute sensation échappée de ma vie, il ne reste plus de celle-ci qu'un cliché. Et le jour de ma mort, saint Pierre me demanderait :- C'était comment ?- Vraiment super, en bas. J'aimais bien la bouffe. m'enfin, avec la tourista... Bon, les gens sont tous très sympas quand même.Et ça serait tout. (...)Et j'ai décidé de raconter quelque chose de nouveau sur mon séjour à chaque personne qui voudrait que je lui en parle, sans me répéter une seule fois.”