The Copper Box

If anything worries me with the years, it’s stories about human destinies. Told without any special detail—simple, even detached—they’re like a monologue of a fellow traveler in a long-distance train. And after a sleepless night, everything blurs: the names of people and cities, the dates of meetings and partings. What remains in memory are the yellow bands of light from lamps at remote stations, the little sound window that flashes in an abandoned house, and a slightly muffled voice that, at times, hangs in the attempt to find the right word… The most precious thing here is the narrator’s voice—how it cuts off somewhere unexpectedly, or suddenly softens into a smile, or freezes as if, having been surprised all over again, by something long lived.

By the way, I heard many of these stories precisely on a train or on a plane—simply put, on the road. Apparently, the very feeling of travel urges us to rethink long-ago events, voicing reflections on what can no longer be changed.