I Think I Will Not Hang Myself Today

Last Friday evening, luxuriating @Fosters in Holland V, and lost in our traditional English fare, dear Elaine and I were making tiny sighs of contentment, on how during moments like these, it seems that we were still very, very young and how everything would look not-so-dreary after all. Time was on our side, and ours to splurge on friends, with friends. Frivolity was not the stuff of dreams, and work, merely a pleasant distraction, a tool to earn the moolah, and not the all-consuming demon that drains us of life’s vitality.

We concluded blithely that in moments of despair, we must always cling on to the consoling fact: At least we are not married with children.

Yes, and so the future was unfettered. We are not in emotional debt for the rest of our lives. It was still ours to decide, to live stubbornly, wildly and selfishly.

I need to remember that: At least I am not married with children.

Signs of how tired I am:

- I rather go on a cruise to nowhere with Shimin and nua on deck doing nothing but eat and sleep and gym and dream. Instead of somewhere we have to plan and walk and do sightseeing. The very thought of the latter fills me with great horror.

- Best Friend’s idea sounds awfully brilliant to me. We will check into a local hotel with fluffy pillows to sleep and read. Minimal interaction between us except for the meal breaks. Oh, what wouldn’t I give to sleep and read more? The book shall be Atonement when this happens.

A Ballade of Suicide
G.K. Chesterton

The gallows in my garden, people say,
Is new and neat and adequately tall;
I tie the noose on in a knowing way
As one that knots his necktie for a ball;
But just as all the neighbours on the wall
Are drawing a long breath to shout "Hurray!"
The strangest whim has seized me. . . After all
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

To-morrow is the time I get my pay
My uncle's sword is hanging in the hall
I see a little cloud all pink and grey
Perhaps the rector's mother will NOT call
I fancy that I heard from Mr. Gall
That mushrooms could be cooked another way
I never read the works of Juvenal
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

The world will have another washing-day;
The decadents decay; the pedants pall;
And H.G. Wells has found that children play,
And Bernard Shaw discovered that they squall;
Rationalists are growing rational
And through thick woods one finds a stream astray,
So secret that the very sky seems small
I think I will not hang myself to-day.

ENVOI

Prince, I can hear the trumpet of Germinal,
The tumbrils toiling up the terrible way;
Even to-day your royal head may fall
I think I will not hang myself to-day.