Trafika Europe 11 - Swiss Delights

Michel Layaz

Passing the driver, I’d let drop: Goodbye, sir, thank you for your careful driving. I’m going fishing . All discord evaporated. Dark masses dissolved into dust. I was heir to a joy safe from chaos and the void. The very first time I settled myself on the riverbank on a round rock under which a few weeds grew that tickled my calves, as soon as I cast my line with a worm stuck on the hook, I knew. I knew that no fish would ever come nibble on my line. If it were any other way, I’d have given up the bus ride, the bucket, the lemonade with the light pink foam that stained my lips, and the fishing rod. At home, in the beginning, they laughed at me and made fun of my efforts. They nicknamed me the fish-hobo . They soon grew tired of my empty buckets and my failures, which I continued to experience as ineffable successes. * You want to know why I don’t have any mirrors in my own apartment, which is probably a third of the size of this one. You climb onto a chair. You’re ready to inundate me with theories about homes without mirror. You’re prepared to quote books that allow no uncertainty... I see your lips taking offence. I see your eyebrows growing infuriated... You want me to buy a mirror.

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