Over time you’ll just have to be a little less
If I only make it on time
Oh my, time is really flying, you shouldn’t stay too late
I’ve never had so little time, it’s unfortunately
Maybe when you have more time then
I’ll have more time later!
* * *
Every day, sometimes even cheerfully, Malina and I muse on what horrible things might yet still happen tonight in Vienna. Because once you’ve let yourself get carried away reading the newspaper, once you’ve accepted the credulity of a few reported events, then your powers of imagination shift into high gear (not my expression and not exactly Malina’s, but it did amuse Malina enough that he brought it back from a trip to Germany, since words like “high gear” can only be found in countries of such motion and activity). But I can never manage to abstain from reading newspapers for long, although I am experiencing increasingly longer periods when I read none at all or at most one I’ve removed from the storage room where a stack of old magazines and newspapers is lying next to our suitcases, I look at the date with dismay: July 3, 1958. What arrogance! Even on this day long past they drugged us with unwanted news, with commentaries on the news, they informed us about earthquakes, airplane crashes, domestic political scandals, foreign policy blunders. When I look down today at the paper from July 3, 1958, trying to believe in the date and a day to go with it, a day which may have indeed existed, but on which I can find nothing written in my calendar, no abbreviated marks — “3 pm R! 5 pm called B, evening Gösser, Lecture K.” — all entered under July 4 but not under July 3, where the page remained completely blank. Perhaps a day without riddles, certainly without headaches too, without states of fear, without unbearable memories, with only a few memories at all, derived from various times, but perhaps just a day on which Lina performed a big summer cleaning and drove me out of the house into various cafés, where I read a newspaper from July 3, which I am again reading today. And with that this day does become a riddle: an empty, robbed day when I grew older, when I didn’t resist and when I allowed something to happen.
I also find a magazine from a certain July 3, and on Malina’s shelves the July issues of a journal for culture and politics, and I begin to read every which way since I’d like to learn all about this day. Books are announced I never saw. Where to with All the Money? is one of the least understandable titles, not even Malina will be able to explain that to me. Where then is the money, and where would anyone go with what money? That’s a good start all right, titles like that can make me shiver and shake. How to Stage a Coup d’état. Written with authoritative expertise and dry, casually sarcastic humor . . . Reading tips for readers who want to think politically, who want to be enlightened . . . Do we need that, Malina? I take a pen and begin filling out a questionnaire. I am satisfactorily, well, very well, better than average informed. The pen first smears, then seems to be empty, then again writes in a fine line. I make x’s in little empty boxes. Does your husband give you presents never, seldom, to surprise you, or only on birthdays and anniversaries? I have to be very careful, everything depends on whether I’m thinking about Malina or Ivan, and I go on writing x’s for both, for example giving Ivan a never, Malina a to-surprise-me, but that’s not a reliable answer. Do you dress to look good for others or to please Him? Do you visit the hairdresser’s regularly, weekly, once a month or only when you absolutely need to? What kind of absolute need is meant? Which coup d’état? My hair is hanging over the coup d’état in absolute need, since I don’t know whether I should have it cut or not. Ivan thinks I should let it grow. Malina thinks it has to be cut. With a sigh I count the x’s. In the end Ivan has a total of 26 points, Malina also has 26 points, although I had to make x’s in completely different boxes for each. I add again. The totals of 26 points for each remain.“I am 17 years old and feel I cannot love. I get interested in a man for a few days but switch to another right away. Am I a monster? My boyfriend of the moment is 19 years old and is desperate because he wants to marry me.” Blue Blitz Express crashes into Red Blitz, 107 dead and 80 wounded.
But that was years ago, and now it’s being dished out once more, automobile accidents, a few crimes, announcements of summit meetings, conjectures about the weather. Today no one knows anymore why that all had to be reported. Back then they recommended Panteen Spray, which I’ve only been using for the past few years, I don’t need their advice on a July 3 so long forgotten, and even less today.
In the evening I say to Malina: A hairspray might be all that’s left, and maybe that covers everything, as I still don’t know where to go with all the money and how to stage a coup d’état, and at any rate I am throwing too much money away. Now they’ve done it. Once this can is empty I’m not buying another. You have 26 points, you can’t ask for any more, I just can’t give you any more. Do with them what you want. Do you remember when the Blue Blitz crashed into the Red Blitz? Thank you very much! That’s what I thought, so that’s how much you care about catastrophes, you’re no better than I am. But it’s probably all an unbelievable swindle.
* * *
Because Malina hasn’t understood a word, while I’m see-sawing in the rocking chair and he’s making himself comfortable, and after he brings us something to drink I begin to explain:
It’s all an unbelievable swindle, I once worked for a news service, I saw the swindle from up close, the origin of the bulletins, the indiscriminate pasting together of sentences flowing off the teletype. One day I was supposed to switch to the night shift because someone was sick. At eleven o’clock in the evening a big black car picked me up, the chauffeur made a small detour in the Third District, and somewhere near the Reisnerstrasse a young man climbed in, a certain Pittermann, we were driven to the Seidengasse, where all the offices were dark and abandoned. Only rarely did someone appear, even at the night desks of the editorial office located in the same building. The night porter led us to the farthest rooms, over planking since the corridors were torn up, on some floor I have forgotten, I can’t remember, I don’t remember anything . . . Four of us were there every night, I made coffee, sometimes we had ice cream delivered around midnight, the night porter knew where to get ice cream. The men read the sheets of paper spat out by the teletypes, they cut, pasted and collated. We didn’t actually whisper, but it’s almost impossible to speak loudly at night when the whole city is asleep, the men must have laughed now and then, I just quietly drank coffee by myself and smoked, they would toss reports on my small table with the typewriter, random reports chosen by whim, and I would rewrite them into clean copy. Because I didn’t know of anything to laugh about with the others, I wound up becoming thoroughly familiar with whatever news would wake people up the following morning. The men always closed with a short paragraph concerning some baseball game or boxing match from across the Atlantic.
* * *
Malina:
* * *
What was your life like back then?
Me:
At three in the morning my face would turn grayer and grayer, I slowly deteriorated, it bowed me down, I was bowed down at the time. I lost a very important rhythm, you can never regain that. I would drink another coffee, and another, my hand often started shaking while I wrote, and later my handwriting went completely to pieces.
Malina:
That’s probably why I’m the only one who can still read it.
Me:
The second part of the night doesn’t have anything to do with the first, two different nights are housed in one night, you have to picture the first night as high-spirited, jokes are still being told, fingers are hitting the keys quickly, everybody’s still in motion, the two small slim Eurasians fancy themselves smarter and more extravagant than the fussy Herr Pittermann, who moves so clumsily and loudly. Movement is important, because it’s easy to imagine that
elsewhere during the night people are still drinking and shouting, possibly embracing or wearing themselves out dancing — all out of boredom with the present day and revulsion at the next. In the first night it’s still the day, with all its excesses, which is the decisive factor. You don’t realize it’s really night until the second night comes, everyone has grown calmer, here and there someone has gotten up to stretch, or secretly find some other movement even though all of us had arrived at the news service well rested. Around five o’clock in the morning it was horrible, everyone was weighed down by some burden, I would go wash my hands and rub my fingers with a dirty old handtowel. The buildings in the Seidengasse were as eerie as a murder scene. Where I heard steps there would be none, the teletypes would be still, then again start to rattle, I would run back into our big room where you could already smell the perspiration, even through the cigarette fumes. It was the beginning of fatigue. At seven in the morning we scarcely said good-bye to one another, I climbed into the black car with young Pittermann, we looked out the windows without saying a word. Women were carrying fresh milk and fresh rolls, men were walking with purposeful, confident steps, with briefcases under their arms and coat collars upturned and puffing out small early morning clouds. In the limousine we had dirty fingernails and our mouths were brownish and bitter, once again the young man climbed out near the Reisnerstrasse while I got out at the Beatrixgasse. I dragged myself upstairs by the railing and was scared I’d run into the baroness who left the building at this time, on her way to the municipal welfare office, because she disapproved of my mysterious coming home at this hour. Afterward it took me a long time to get to sleep, I’d lie on the bed in my clothes, smelling foul, around noon I’d manage to discard my clothes and actually sleep, but it wasn’t a good sleep, since it was constantly interrupted by everyday noises from outside. The bulletin was already in circulation, the news reports were already having an effect, I never read them. I went without news for two whole years.
Malina:
So you weren’t living. When did you try to live, what were you waiting for?
Me:
Esteemed Malina, there must have also been a few hours and one free day a week for very limited undertakings. But I don’t know how people live the first part of their life, it must be like the first part of the night, high-spirited, it’s just hard for me to gather those hours up, because that’s when I entered the age of reason, that must have claimed the rest of my time.
* * *
I dreaded the big black car, which called to mind secret drives, espionage, sinister intrigues, at that time there were always rumors floating through Vienna that there was a loading ramp — an Umschlagplatz — that there was a slave trade, that people and papers disappeared wrapped up in rugs, that everyone was working for some side or another, without even knowing it. No side revealed anything. Everyone who worked was a prostitute without knowing it, where have I heard that before? Why did I laugh at that? It was the beginning of universal prostitution.
* * *
Malina:
* * *
Once you described it to me completely differently. After the university you found work in some office, it paid all right but not really, so later you took the night shift, since you could earn more money than during the day.
Me:
I’m not telling, I won’t talk, I can’t, it’s more than a mere disturbance in my memory. Tell me instead what you did today in your Arsenal.
Malina:
Nothing much. The usual things, and then some film people came, they need a battle with Turks. Kurt Swoboda is looking for something to use as a model, he has a commission. Besides we’ve already given permission for another film that the Germans want to shoot in the Hall of Fame.
Me:
Someday I’d like to watch a movie being made. Or be an extra. Wouldn’t that make me think of something else for a change?
Malina:
That’s just boring, it goes on for hours, days, you trip over cables, everyone’s just standing around, and most of the time nothing is happening. Sunday I’m on duty. I’m only mentioning it so you can make your plans.
Me:
So now we can go eat, but I’m not quite ready. Let me make one phone call, please, it’ll just take a minute. Just one minute, ok?
* * *
There is a disturbance in my memory, I shatter against every memory. Back then in the ruins there was no hope at all — so people said and kept repeating — they tried to sound convincing by describing a time they called the first postwar era. You never heard anything about a second one. That too was a swindle. I almost believed it myself — that once the window and door frames are reinstalled, once the mountains of rubble disappear, then all of a sudden everything will be better, people will again live in their homes and be able to continue living. But just the fact that for years I wanted to say how strange I found this living — and continued living — is very revealing, though no one wanted to listen to me. I would never have thought that everything would first have to be plundered, stolen, pawned and then bought and sold three times over. The biggest black market was supposedly at the Resselpark, because of its many dangers you had to give it plenty of room, beginning in the late afternoon, all the way up to Karlsplatz. One day the black market ostensibly ceased to exist. But I’m not convinced. A universal black market resulted, and whenever I buy cigarettes or eggs, I know — but really only as of today — that they come from the black market. Anyway the whole market is black, it can’t have been that black before because it still lacked a universal density. Later on, after all the display windows were full and while everything was piling up, the cans, the boxes, the cartons, I could no longer buy anything. Scarcely would I step into the large department stores on the Mariahilfer Strasse, for example Gerngross, than I would feel nauseous, Christine had advised me to avoid the small expensive shops, Lina was more for Herzmansky’s than Gerngross, and I did try, but I just couldn’t, I can’t look at more than one thing at a time. Thousands of fabrics, thousands of tin cans, of sausages, shoes and buttons, the whole mass of items before my eyes blackens each single thing. In large numbers everything gets much too threatened, a quantity needs to remain something abstract, has to be the postulate of a theory, has to remain operable, it has to have the purity of mathematics, only mathematics allows billions to be beautiful, a billion apples, on the other hand, is unpalatable, a ton of coffee in itself testifies to countless crimes, a billion people is inconceivably depraved, pitiful, loathsome, entangled in a black market, daily needing billions of potatoes, rations of rice and loaves of bread. Long after there was plenty to eat I still couldn’t eat well, and even now I can only eat when someone else is eating with me, or if I’m alone and there’s just an apple lying there and a piece of bread or a leftover slice of sausage. It has to be something left over.
* * *
Malina:
* * *
Well we probably won’t eat at all today if you don’t stop talking about it. We could drive up to Cobenzl, get up, get dressed, otherwise it’ll be too late.
Me:
Please not up there. I don’t want to have the city at my feet, why do we have to have a whole city at our feet when we only want to eat dinner. Let’s just go someplace nearby. To the Alter Heller.
* * *
It began as early as Paris, after my first escape from Vienna, for a while I couldn’t walk very well on my left foot, it hurt, and the pain was accompanied by groaning, oh God, oh God. Dangerous impulses of great consequence are often felt first in the body, where they cause certain words to be pronounced: previously my only acquaintance with God was a conceptual one from philosophical seminars, along with being, nothingnes
s, essence, existence, the Brahma.
* * *
In Paris I mostly had no money, but always, whenever the money was coming to an end, I had to spend it on something special, incidentally this is still true today, after all it can’t be spent on just anything, I have to have a final inspiration as to how it should be spent, for if an idea does come to me I know at least for a moment that I too, populate the world, that I am a part of a constantly, heavily increasing, lightly decreasing population, and am aware that this world, overcrowded with a needy population, an insatiable population living in a constant state of emergency, is spinning through the universe, and as long as I am hanging on to it by means of gravity, with nothing in my pocket and an inspiration in my head, I know what is to be done.
Back then, in the vicinity of the Rue Monge, on the way to Place de la Contrescarpe, I bought two bottles of red wine in a little bistro that was open all night, then a bottle of white wine as well. I thought to myself, maybe somebody doesn’t like red wine, after all you can’t sentence a person to red wine. The men slept or acted as if they were sleeping, and I crept over to them and placed the bottles near enough to avoid misunderstanding. They had to understand the bottles were legally theirs. When I did it again another night, one of the clochards woke up and said something about God, “que Dieu vous . . .” and later I heard something in England like “. . . bless you.” Naturally I’ve forgotten the circumstances. I assume that those who have been wounded sometimes talk that way to others equally blessed with such wounds, and then go on living somewhere, just as I, too, go on living somewhere, blessed with all kinds of wounds.
Malina Page 24