Wednesday 29 December 2010

you start to think it’s normal

From The Time I Heard the Private Donald J. Rankin String Concerto with One Discordant Violin, by the American Composer John Morton by Yann Martel:

I hate this place. I hate it because whenever I come here during the day I like it and nearly fall for it. It’s comfortable and warm, the people are nice, and you know what’s expected of you. I say to myself, You should get a daytime job here. The pay’s good, better than what you make now anyway, you work with people, the hours are sane — hey, why not?
Then I catch myself. This place is dangerous it’s so cunning. It crawls up on you stealthily. You get used to it, the routine, you know. You start to think it’s normal. Finally you think there’s nothing else. Then you blink, forty years have gone by, and your life’s over. Sometimes I come here during the day and I look in from the outside and I ask myself, Why don’t these people ask for more?

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