Thinking it over, one’s life is both the longest possible and the shortest possible, simultaneously, because it can be rethought and reexperienced in a moment, always in that moment in which such a (bold) thought occurs to one. Always wanting the impossible and left with the possible in his minimal existence, the individual always finds himself in the lowest depths of dissatisfaction. Nevertheless he always manages to create another life situation for himself, probably because he really loves life, just as it is. We always crave something other than we can have, than we have, other than what is suitable for us, and so we’re unhappy. When we’re happy we immediately analyze this happiness to death, if we’re like Roithamer andsoforth, and are right back in misery. As I’d heard something that was different from what I’d been hearing till then, I’d gotten up and gone to post myself at the window, to look outside. The darkness was kept at bay by the workshop lights, Hoeller was busy stuffing a huge bird, I couldn’t tell what kind of bird. It was a huge black bird which Hoeller held on his knees, cramming polyurethane into it with a stick. It was eleven o’clock, and inasmuch as Hoeller always got up at four in the morning, all his life, even as a child, he’d always gotten up at four in the morning, because his father also had always been up by four in the morning, everybody in the Aurach valley got up between four and five o’clock in the morning, and so because Hoeller is always up at four in the morning, keeping such late hours, such very long late hours as these in these circumstances, will undermine his health, I thought. From my window up in the garret I kept watching Hoeller down there in his workshop stuffing that huge black bird, how he kept cramming it with more and more stuffing, I thought I’ll watch him from this. excellent vantage point until he’s finished stuffing that bird, and so I stood there motionless for a good half hour until I saw that Hoeller had finished stuffing the bird. Suddenly Hoeller had thrown the stuffed bird down to the floor, he’d jumped up and run off into the back room where I couldn’t see him anymore, but I waited, looking into the workshop, until I could see Hoeller again, he came back and sat down on his chair again and went back to stuffing the bird, now I noticed a huge heap of polyurethane on the floor beside Hoeller’s chair and I thought this huge heap of polyurethane is now going to be crammed into this bird which I’d supposed had already been crammed full long since. By stuffing this bird he is making the night bearable for himself, I thought. At twelve he was still busy stuffing that bird. Off and on I kept wondering what kind of a bird this was, I’d never seen so large and so black a bird before, probably a species never seen in our country at all, and I toyed with the idea of going down to the workshop to ask Hoeller what species of bird this was. It’s certainly possible that this bird is of a so-called exotic species, that one of the hunters living out there on the plain, living in affluence in that fertile country out there, men who take frequent hunting trips to foreign countries and overseas, brought the bird back from South America or Africa, with what incredible energy Hoeller was now stuffing that bird with polyurethane, I couldn’t imagine that so much polyurethane could be crammed inside that bird, yet Hoeller kept stuffing some more of the polyurethane into the bird, suddenly I felt repelled by the process of stuffing polyurethane into the huge black bird, I turned around, looked at the door, but found it impossible to look at the door for more than a second or so because even looking at the door I kept seeing the huge bird Hoeller was stuffing with polyurethane, so I turned back again and looked out the window and into Hoeller’s workshop, if I must see Hoeller stuffing this huge, black, really horrible bird, then I might as well see it in reality and not in my imagination, clearly I could not possibly expect to get any sleep now, full as I was of my impression of Hoeller stuffing that huge black bird with polyurethane, constantly accelerating the speed with which he was doing this job, it was nauseating, still I had to keep looking out the window and into the workshop as if hypnotized. I could no longer turn away, compelled to surrender myself entirely to watching this procedure of Hoeller’s cramming that bird with polyurethane, I was about to vomit when Hoeller suddenly stopped his horrible activity and set the bird down, with its huge claws and long heavy legs, on his worktable. Now he’s going to sew the stuffed bird together, I thought, and sure enough Hoeller had gotten up and disappeared into the back room of the workshop to bring in whatever he needed for sewing the bird up. Or else he’s stopping work now and is leaving the workshop to go to his room and lie down, I thought, but Hoeller was already back with various balls of thread and needles and had sat down at his worktable to continue his work. Why am I watching Hoeller at his work, I thought, why don’t I do something myself, start something that I can keep on doing all night if I like, I thought, no matter what I do, as long as it gets me through the night. But what could I do? There was no manual work of any kind I could have done in Hoeller’s garret, it wasn’t set up for anything like that, and my head was no longer clear enough for any kind of mental work. On the other hand I didn’t permit myself to go down to Hoeller’s workshop, in case I could be of some help there. I certainly could have found something to do in Hoeller’s workshop, even if it was only to sweep up. It took all of my willpower to get myself away from the window and I turned around and took a few steps toward the door, thinking as I did so that my situation was really desperate, that I was possibly already quite seriously insane. Had I gone crazy as a result of moving
precipitately into Hoeller’s garret? I wondered, but then I immediately thought, what an idea, that’s what’s crazy, such an idea as that, and I walked over to the desk and took the yellow paper rose out of the top drawer. Something happened to Roithamer at that music festival, I thought, as I held the yellow paper rose up to the light, a change had come upon him during that music festival, even if I don’t know, or can’t know what kind of a change it was. But don’t we always immediately see and seek a meaning in everything we see and think?