Music and Night

"Vincerò" is the strongest word in the aria, "Nessun dorma" from Puccini's "Turandot". I think it was the last opera I saw. A little surprising since I have seen so many and this one is one of the most popular and best known. The aria is one of the most heard by those not interested in opera.

What I want to say here is "Vincerò", which means "I will win", or more like, "I will conquer...." I will conquer, what? For me, that was the the power from the Pavaroti's voice when I heard the aria this morning as we passed by the midpoint of Bridgeport, as the poverty steadily turns into posh. I will survive this latest round of pain, and not only that, with what I have learned, I will be more ready for the future. I will conquer those demons that have held me back, made me a coward, made me wait for simply more anguish.

I miss opera. I miss the power of the human voice, more powerful than any instrument just because it is directly human, and when it is used as an instrument, it has the concurrent effect of controlling the emotions it wants to elicit. For that reason I always prefer the opera over other classical music. But classical music, in general, I miss listening to, and miss just as well attending concerts of. It is another reason to move to New York, to freely go on a Friday or Saturday or even Sunday matinee and enjoy something human.

It also reminds me of my best friend, who first introduced me to the opera, got me to see Mozart's "Zauberflüte" with her before seeing better known ones. Each time I meet someone, even if she caused a lot of misery, I always learn something practical if not simply intangible about life. With my best friend, I learned a lot. It is not without some confusion that I try to make my latest lesson without thinking about her as my first case. What I mean is that yes, I learned to not wait, ever. At least not for someone I am not in love with, not for someone who makes me wait for so long, not for someone who doesn't respect me. And even if she does all those things, I should not wait. I waited for my best friend to change her heart, but she didn't, not until I have changed mine away. If I hadn't waited for her, we wouldn't be such amazing friends now.

But what is done is done, and I prefer to make judgments on what I have now and now should have or not have happened in the past. Now I don't wait. Now I move on for my own sake.

I talked to my best friend today during work. She seems to be doing well, better than I feared because of the recent passing of her father. I did most of the talking. She is the only person I am still friends with that I feel I can trust to listen to me. It doesn't mean no one else listens; the point is that I feel she is the only person. I told her my frustration with myself. I wanted to be passionate about what I really like, but whenever I want to follow a passion, I feel so disabled by some mess I find myself with a woman. I felt I have wasted so much time with one woman or another. (Did that include her?) I felt I was sick or something, had to take some wonderdrug to snap out of this stupid "broken record", as I said. I am happy about everything else in my life, including the tough issue of my family, but the greatest misery in the past several years has been with women. With romance, that is. My closest friends are women, so I am not risking becoming a misogynist. Now I am so sick of this issue that I am not interested in developing a relationship with any woman. My art friend, my closest friend here, told me I should just start flirting around, even go sleep around (my Protestant sister reading this will love that), as a form of liberation. There's some truth to that, I believe. I have been so beaten down, my heart, my ego, my mind, by one woman then the next, that I need a liberating way to stand back up. Maybe not sleep around, not that I am such a Don Juan that girls are lining up outside my bedroom. But I think there's a point to feeling free instead of feeling lonely. Free from the drama, free from the inadequacies of those too blind to see what I have offered, free from their own walls. It's bad enough I have my own walls; it's so much worse to enclose myself even more with theirs.

So "Vincerò", I will conquer these obstacles. I was going to spend tonight watching this Hong Kong movie, a sort of sequel to "In the Mood for Love". But my Italian friend, another really close friend, called me up to meet for dinner. I knew that whenever I see her it would be a one-way conversation: her talking. I was really tired. I was glad that I wasn't in that tiring self-pitying mood. But still, I knew there wouldn't be many chances left to see her, so I agreed. And it was as I expected: her talking most of the time. She's not the best listener in the world, but somehow I love her. For the simple, simple reason that we are still talking, we, being such different people, always felt the other would be around. Isn't that enough for two human beings to love each other? To know that the other would be there?

And when we said goodbye, she told me I really should call her more. It's true, I never call her, not since she got together with the man of her dreams, of her live, the man that had caused so much anguish in her, caused her to talk so much to me; I know all the details, from the minutest of their sex lives to the big fights. It's true, I haven't called her since they got together. It's my fault. I am too engrossed in my own self-pity that I often avoid couples, even if they are my best friends. But she expressed how much she loved me, how much she would miss me, how much she would like me to join them at least one more time. I was touched. I was touched that thanks to her my Friday wasn't alone. I was touched that even though we saw each other about once a month we still loved each other so much.

I told her nothing about me, of course, not about my current mess that I am getting out of, not about the search for apartment. I did talk to her a little about how I want to dress, getting some fashion tips from an Italian woman I consider the best dressed in this town (which really doesn't take much, but still). I told my best friend today about my move. One thing I like about talking to her is to hear the absurdity of my self-pity. I asked her if she looked for her apartment on her own, and she said, "Of course!" "You mean you didn't drown in your own self-pity knowing that no one was looking for apartments with you?" She laughed and said, "So you are feeling sorry for yourself that you are going to look for apartment alone this weekend?" We both laughed. She's a strong woman. I look up to her. I want to be at least as strong as she is. I know I am. I not only have looked for apartments alone before, always, in Boston, in Switzerland, even searched for a sale in New York. I have also traveled a lot alone. What I lack isn't courage, but a way to circumvent that one mystery that hinders my courage. That mystery that comes out in the form of self-pity, of fear of loneliness. I don't know how to explain it. I know I will be happy and very smart about finding an apartment on my own. I am even happy I can go shopping for clothes that make me look great, alone. I have proven over and over again that I end up enjoying and learning a lot from traveling alone. I even live alone now, with my roommate rarely showing up. And I enjoy it. But if you read my blog, especially during the times when I am in a "mess", you'd think I am the weakest pathetic person ever lived. I complain a lot in writing. But I do feel also a lot of pain, and however inconsequential that pain seems, it often stops me from taking the first step that eventually lead to a lot of joy and learning once I take it. But something, not simply cowardice, not simply weakness, something more ineffable, stops me before I take the first step. I don't know what it is. It is very painful. It comes out when I am rejected, when I am jealous, when I feel unwanted, unloved. I hope the answer comes to me someday.

For now, I had a great start of the weekend. I don't know how many apartments I will get to see. I will be making calls tomorrow morning. And tomorrow perhaps I can do my taxes. The mundane things of the world when you stop thinking about passions, about women, about romance, about the mysterious impediments in life. All I know now is that I am brave, and my friends, my true friends, love me for that and other reasons.