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This was my experience and it hit me upon my return from Paradise, when I stepped out in the drizzling rain of London. Here was nobody waiting for me, not even a black Princesse. I had slept badly that night after our arrival. That was not due only to jet lag, but also because being alone in the company flat in Maida Vale weighed on me more and more. My loneliness increased and often I sat till late at night reading or making notes of what has happened and what I observed in life, important or trivial, marginal comments, but also the trivial was somehow important. I leafed through my notebook that I often had with me of an evening and came across an older entry:
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In my present life there is no weekend. Every day is like another one. Today I come home at 10.30 is Friday. The flat is dark. I have nothing to eat in the house, I think. A platter of old salmon, prepared by the catering service around the corner, is on the sideboard in the kitchen. It bores me. I am looking for a more enchanting way of leading my life, after all, it is Friday, weekend for the middle class, and I have no plan, I am waiting for Monday. I drink two vodka tonics. I notice the influence of alcohol when I set off to a nearby Italian restaurant named „Pinocchio“. Here I feel less alone, they know me. The staff cannot put me in any category. Behind the bar there is a very attractive young woman with curly black hair.
„Where are you from?“ I ask.
„I am Italian – Napoli.“
Another lost soul in a melting pot - I think. We exchange a shy glance. Of course I know I am older, but I also know she has a problem in placing me among the network of the other guests. Why does she talk to me at all? - I wonder. I observe the young woman, she notices that I am observing her, and she does everything with a special gracefulness. My God, the vanity of women! It is all only a game. Women play with all and sundry as long as it gives wings to our fantasy. A few months ago her predecessor with the pierced belly button asked me if I know where she could find a flat. I have a second bedroom in my flat, but would I offer her that without dirty ulterior motives? My fantasy works faster than my understanding. I draw back. All of it a gut reaction.
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Sometimes I felt contempt for myself because of the lack of discipline. At what level am I ready to stop just to not be alone? What do I really want from life - and what is life prepared to give to me? Here in London my private life had reached rock bottom. I had no real private friends to meet. All live far away from each other and outside London.
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