Empty Words

by MARIO LEVRERO

  March 21

  Fifth consecutive day of exercises. The good news is, they seem to have become a habit by now. Of course, they’re still a long way from calligraphical exercises carried out with concentration and diligence, but we mustn’t expect too much. (Today I read a tremendous bit of Rilke, along the lines of: “Reality is something distant, coming infinitely slowly to those who are patient.”) (Let us be patient, then, and wait for that distant thing to come.)

  (But few things conspire more against patience, and therefore against reality, than this constant buzzing that won’t let me sleep, think, or pay attention to anything else. And then there’s the interminably unsettled weather, heavy, humid, and with low air pressure. A storm’s been brewing for days now, but it won’t make up its mind to start, which sets the nerves on edge and makes it hard to get anything done. We’ve had the occasional patch of begrudging, monotonous drizzle over the past few days, but what we really need is a violent explosion of lightning, thunder, and wind, an elemental fury to release all the static electricity building up in the earth, people, and things.)

  But I’m getting increasingly carried away by my narrative urges and forgetting about my handwriting. Now I’m paying more attention to the writing, but my hand’s rushing nervously to form the letters without leaving my thoughts any time for reflection. The buzzing has gone, and the room where I’m working is reasonably cool. But Alicia is calling me.

  March 23

  Yesterday I skipped these exercises. Today I’ve decided to come back to them, in spite of the weather conditions, which are even worse than they were yesterday. At least right now there’s no noticeable buzzing—except in my own ears, where there’s a high-pitched humming sound I often hear inside my head when I’m not sleeping enough. Speaking of which, ever since the buzzing from the substation next door began, my sleep’s been terrible: I have trouble nodding off and wake up constantly throughout the night. This puts me in a bad mood and makes me irritable, demotivated, and unable to do even the simplest things. I’ve also had to make do with sleeping on the fly, as it were, seizing my chance whenever somewhere free of buzzing also happens to be free of people. This is all very bad for my health. My main comfort is reading, for the most part books I’ve already read more than once. Reading is a way of distancing myself a little from the buzzing and from my awareness of my own discomfort. I also need to distance myself from the bustle and mess of this house, which, in part because of my low morale, is no closer to being sorted out. The other people who live or work here haven’t done anything either. Yesterday I dreamed I lived day and night on a longdistance bus, which isn’t a bad image to describe my instability and the feelings of insecurity this situation is causing me. And now it’s almost Holy Week, or Tourism Week, and of course all the activity in the country has come to a halt. So the search for solutions to my problems has also been called off for the time being.

  March 25

  Today is a strange day in many ways. For example, the weather conditions are very mixed-up and volatile, as if summer were happening at the same time as autumn; it’s cold and hot, with changeable air pressure, all of which disturbs the body and leads to a vague feeling of unease. What’s more, today I woke up to the news that there’s been a murder in Colonia, in one of the pleasant spots we often visit. A murder in a detective novel is one thing, but it’s something else entirely in so-called real life. It’s not nice to think of living in a small, trusting, and very unprotected town with a murderer on the loose. Or more than one by now, since the victim was a woman and there are also suspicions of rape. Today is also strange because of the news that one of my books is probably going to be published in Belgium, and the even stranger news that they might pay a considerable advance for the rights.

  As for the weather, if it really has settled down into a fairly normal autumn at last, perhaps I’ll be able to get back to work, even before I make the changes I’ve planned around the house so I can keep all my things together in one place. Once the stifling heat goes away, I’ll feel physically and mentally stronger, able to overcome the problems and irritations of not having a space of my own.

  March 26

  The atmosphere today (meteorologically speaking) is very conducive to work. There’s a cool breeze—too cool at times—and yesterday’s mixture of seasons and temperatures has gone. The electricity board also seems to have solved (though not completely definitively) the problem of the buzzing, which has gotten rid of another paralyzing factor. The problem of finding a space of my own remains, but steps are being taken to create one for me. As for the buzzing, I must have been sensitized to it by now, because every so often I feel like I can hear it as loudly as before. All it takes is any other sound—the engine of a car, a motorcycle, or even the fridge—making a similar impression on my ear for that impression to become prolonged and amplified and then frighten me by turning into that same permanent buzzing. It’s clear the buzzing hasn’t completely disappeared and that the walls of the house are transmitting it continuously. I don’t know if this level of sound has been here all along and I’m only noticing it now, when I listen closely in certain strategic locations, because I’ve been sensitized to it, or if the real problem hasn’t fully been solved. Time will tell, I suppose, since when a stimulus goes away the sensitivity to that stimulus gradually decreases until it reaches the normal threshold of perception.

  In today’s exercises, I’ve taken care to make my handwriting legible, but I’m still a long way from the patience and concentration necessary to achieve the results I’m aiming for.

  March 27

  The buzzing is back, at full blast. I find the whole thing very strange. It’s the second time this has happened: the workmen come and do some repairs, and the repairs last for a total of precisely twenty-four hours. The only thing I can think of to compare it with is the problem of the noise from the fridge. Sometimes a loose panel starts vibrating with the movement of the motor, and the sound builds until what’s usually a soft purring becomes quite intolerable. Then I go and slide some cardboard into a suitable position between the loose panel and the body of the fridge to stop the rattling. But after a few days, or a few hours, the vibrations dislodge the cardboard and it ends up in a place where it has absolutely no impact on the noise, and the whole thing starts again. I think something similar must happen with the machines in the substation; the workmen come along with some quick fix, not so different from mine with the fridge, then the vibrations themselves render it null and void. We need a permanent solution. With the fridge, putting a few screws in would probably do it. As for those machines, I don’t know what the solution would be, but we need to keep demanding one. No one can live under these conditions.

  April 1

  Juan Ignacio is now at soccer practice, Alicia is at work, and the maid is at home (or wherever she is—she’s not here, anyway); the Holy Week guests have now left; it’s now 7:30 p.m., the walls are exuding no buzzing noise whatsoever, and I even managed to doze off for a few minutes; I’ve now been for a walk on the beach with Alicia and felt how my body is deteriorating; I’ve had breakfast and lunch and a snack and cleaned my teeth three times; it’s now no longer too hot, in fact it’s pleasantly cool; the dog isn’t barking and there’s nobody at the door; the working day is now over, or almost over, for many people. And so I can now sit at my desk and, after so many days of total inertia, begin these exercises again.

  I’ll start paying attention to my handwriting now; I knew it was bad from the outset, but I was in a hurry to get down what I was feeling. From here on in I can start to expect a bit more of myself and begin thinking about the shapes of the letters. I don’t think I’ll ever manage to write legibly and quickly at the same time; // I’ve just been interrupted, first by the doorbell and then by the phone//. Not too long from now, I hope to have sorted out a place to work. Then I’ll be able to get down to these exercises, and everything else, in earnest.

  April 3

  I’m searching for and discovering
strategies that might help me survive this strange state of marginalization within my own home. Yesterday I managed a good siesta, making the most of a pause in the buzzing, and at night I found a mysterious spot in the bedroom where the vibratory waves canceled each other out, creating a hollow of silence, or relative silence, where I could sleep. I suspect the battle against the noise won’t be over as quickly as it seemed, though; the electricity board claims they’re going to solve the problem once and for all “today or tomorrow” by removing the faulty machine, but they’ve said that before without anything changing. Maybe we’ll end up in court. We’ll see. Another factor contributing to my marginalization, the maid, is less of a problem now that she’s been replaced by a new maid whose presence doesn’t radiate aggression and who, conversely, seems interested in cooperation. Still, a house with servants is a “house taken over,” or at least a house with ever-changing occupied zones. If in the unaggressive presence of the current maid we could do a few basic things (more water in the tank, doors that close properly, etc.), my marginalization would be easier to bear. There would still be the presence of Ignacio, with his intrusive curiosity about everything I do. In his case, the educative efforts will need to be intensive and immediate. There’s also the problem of Alicia and her unpredictable hours, but I don’t think that problem has a solution. My marginalization will always ultimately be sustained by her, even if everything else can be happily resolved. Nevertheless, there’s hope that I might be able to start work again, in a future that doesn’t seem too distant or impossible to reach.

  April 7

  WARNING: This handwriting exercise contains scenes the reader may find distressing.

  It’s about Pongo the dog, whom I’ve said on several occasions we need to get rid of. My reasons for this aren’t emotional; they’re based entirely on logic and reason, and today something happened to add fuel to my arguments. I’d been out in the back garden with Pongo for a while, playing with the ping-pong ball (which he completely destroyed), and we’d even had one of our usual sessions of cuddles and affectionate words. Then Pongo the dog went over to a spot very close to his lair among the hortensias, and when I followed him I saw to my horror that he’d gotten ahold of a small piece of rotten meat. He’d probably buried it a few days before. Some time ago, I’d found a big piece of meat in the garden covered in soil, but it wasn’t rotten, perhaps because it was almost entirely coated in a layer of fat, and after I’d dug it up Pongo hadn’t shown the slightest interest in it. But standing over him now, I saw he’d put this new piece of meat down in a clear patch of ground and was pretending to be lying casually on his back, the way he often does, only this time aiming to have the piece of meat more or less underneath his neck. I made a sound he recognizes as disapproving and he stopped what he was doing; when I looked more closely, I spotted two or three little white conical maggots on the ground (shaped like truncated cones, and similar to the ones I once found in the cap of an empty bottle of floor wax, though much bigger and fatter). Then I saw, disgusted, that the piece of meat Pongo had dug up was covered in the very same maggots.

  (second sheet)

  Pongo the dog was on the alert, guarding the piece of meat. He growled when I tried to pick it up with the shovel and poker from the outdoor stove and even grabbed it in his teeth to take it away somewhere safe. I gave him a severe telling-off, at which point he let go and stood a few feet away, letting me do what I wanted but not taking his eyes off me. I carried the hunk of meat to the stove along with the fat-covered piece I’d found before, doused them both with methylated spirits, and set them alight, feeding the flames with some newspaper and twigs, and later with a couple of logs. Flies of all sizes were soon lured over by the smell of the roasting meat, fat, and maggots, and they even flew inside the stove and darted around looking for the source (though without getting as close to the flames as I would have liked).

  It wasn’t easy to keep the fire hot enough for the meat to carbonize. I had to add more methylated spirits a couple of times, but eventually the process seemed complete. The flies disappeared, though the sickening stench—which is also the sickening stench of Pongo himself when he smells bad—clung to my nostrils for a long time afterwards, even during a foray into the outside world in search of some coffee.

  All the while, I kept asking myself what could have possessed Pongo to do something so disgusting; whether its purpose was medicinal (to make his fur healthier, kill parasites, etc.) or merely cosmetic, that is, as a kind of perfume to attract members of the opposite sex with dubious olfactory preferences. I’ve also noticed there’s a similar smell in the vicinity of the hortensias permanently now. I think Pongo is creating a kind of private graveyard in the back garden, burying pieces of meat all over the place. WE NEED TO GET RID OF HIM IMMEDIATELY.

  April 9

  It looks like we’re reaching the final stages of this nightmare, and within a few days I’ll be able to begin going back, little by little, to my “normal” life (I use quotation marks because I know full well that my life has never been normal, thank God). I don’t want to be too optimistic, but the latest news about the buzzing seems promising. The problem could be completely gone by tomorrow. (And at this very moment, as if someone’s watching what I’m writing so they can make fun of me—so they can hit me where it really hurts—the buzzing has started up at full volume.) (I’m trying to keep calm, but my left ear’s still aching from the awful vibrations yesterday and this morning.) I’d be better off finishing these exercises with no further pretensions of neatness and swiftly escaping into a less affected part of the house.

  All the work (or the most important parts of it, at least) that needs doing to turn the garage into a space I can use is either arranged or in progress, and dates have been agreed upon for the completion of each stage. Allowing for any potential setbacks or delays in the workmen’s activities, I should—I hope—be installed in there no later than the middle of next week. Meanwhile, I have some pressing work to do (going through the edits of Fauna for the Belgian publisher) which can’t be delayed, so I’ll attempt to make a start right now——in spite of everything.

  August 24

  Another attempt—this is like the myth of Sisyphus—to get back into habits that are good for my health, such as doing my handwriting exercises. Today I also went for a walk around the port. It used to be my usual route, but recently I gave up going for regular walks, along with everything else. The main idea at the moment, generally speaking, is to force myself a little (as much as I can) to keep doing good things, so they turn into habits and replace my other habits. Here’s a brief list of the habits I’m trying to replace: (1) excessive smoking, (2) valium, (3) watching too many films on video, (4) playing with electronic machines, (5) excessive reading, especially at strange hours of the day or night.

  To mask, moderate, or banish these habits, I propose: (1) returning to these exercises, (2) going for walks again, (3) persevering with the challenge of making myself relax or meditate for a few minutes each day, (4) going to the gym on a daily basis again, (5) spending more time in my garage-office, with or without music, working or not, (6) returning to my games of ping-pong with Juan Ignacio.

  My handwriting’s looking pretty awful. I should probably add to my resolutions: (7) trying to do these exercises calmly and with full dedication (even though I notice that at this moment my hand is completely out of control).

  As expected, Alicia has come to interrupt me before the agreed-upon time, which means I can’t finish this page in peace. I’ll need to make a particular effort to eliminate unnecessary interruptions from now on. I’ve had some success so far, by turning off the telephone ringer in the bedroom and the garage. But I have to instill a sense of respect for my privacy, personal space, and need for concentration in the other members of this household.

  August 27

  The aim today is to manage my anxiety and make my handwriting large and clear. So I’m going slowly, trying not to give in to the current of thoughts I can feel
bursting to express something, not because I don’t think I should be expressing anything, but because I don’t want the current to carry me away (for example, when I wrote the word “current” just then, my writing sped up anxiously, and as a result the r’s didn’t come out right. Current. Current). (The thing is, when you write one r, you think that ought to be enough, and then you rush the next one because a second r seems like a luxury with no purpose other than slowing you down and interrupting the rhythm of the writing.) But in general I’m quite pleased with how today’s exercises are going. My handwriting had become so scrambled and microscopic that deep down I was beginning to despair of ever turning it back into a legible script; specifically, the legible script I’d managed after weeks and months of more or less daily exercises. But I’m delighted to see that the exercises I did the day before yesterday were enough to help me identify the bad habits in my writing, allowing today’s progress to take shape within me unconsciously in the time that’s passed since then. I dare anyone to tell me that what I’m writing now isn’t perfectly legible, even if it’s a long way from anything that might be called “calligraphy.” I’m not aiming for calligraphy, though; I’d be content with handwriting that I, and other people, could easily read, without it needing to reach any level of beauty or perfection. The French refrain puts it well: “Le meilleur c’est l’ennemi du bon,” as M. V. instilled in me. But there are plenty of strokes I still need to improve, and I should also work on writing more quickly without sacrificing quality.

  August 28

  I’m determined to keep these exercises as exercises and nothing more, rather than seeing them as a useful way of expressing things I’m feeling, thinking, or experiencing. The priority is the handwriting, I know; I need to learn to form the letters before moving on to any other stages. Because the hand forming the letters needs to become confident first and foremost, and then loose and fast-moving, and this confidence comes from a feeling of certainty; that is, you can’t start hesitating because you’re worried about what the handwriting looks like. It, the handwriting, like the way of joining one letter to the next, should follow a single, preestablished pattern and not be made up as you go along. For example, I know I have trouble with the r because of habits I’ve developed over years of writing it the wrong way, without all the features that make it easy to identify immediately. My r’s are identified more by their position in the word (and look at that badly written r in the word “word”).