I ought to have gone away that evening and never seen her again. I sensed there and then that in a love that is not shared - one might almost say in love - we can enjoy only that simulacrum of happiness in which a woman's good nature, or her caprice, or mere chance, respond to our desires, in perfect coincidence, with the same words, the same actions, as if we were really loved. The wiser course would have been to consider with curiosity, to appropriate with delight, that little particle of happiness failing which I should have died without ever suspecting what it could mean to hearts less difficult to please or more highly privileged; to pretend that it formed part of a vast and enduring happiness of which this fragment only was visible to me; and - lest the next day should give the lie to this fiction - not to attempt to ask for any fresh favour after this one, which had been due only to the artifice of an exceptional moment. I ought to have left Balbec, to have shut myself up in solitude, to have remained there in harmony with the last vibrations of the voice which I had contrived to render loving for an instant, and of which I should have asked nothing more than it might never address another word to me; for fear lest, by an additional word which henceforth could not but be different, it might shatter with with a discord the sensory silence in which, as though by the pressure of a pedal, there might long have survived in me the throbbing chord of happiness.
Marcel Proust, Cities of the Plain, p. 864
I should probably dissect this section thoroughly, and on a day when I am being pulled in less directions simultaneously I will revisit it, but let me at least take a quick stab at a couple thoughts before they disappear.
First off, as I say to often, note to self: make use of the word simulacrum in polite company more often. Or at least say it around David Kite, because he'll certainly nod in recognition.
There is so much that is good and profound in this brief section that I feel that I am desecrating it by this morning's cursory reflection, but let me at least say this by way of starting the discussion. I think all of us have a day that defines all relationships. Off the top of my head I think I can easily come up with one for every serious relationship I've ever had (although it would be interesting to see if the women involved would choose the same day). It's that day when all the fates are aligned and you think that you could never, ever be happier. At the time you're greatest fear is that what if you were never that happy again, or, God forbid, that you would never see that person ever again. But here's the thing, it is the happiest that you'll ever be with that person, and, in fact, every day after that fact is at best a dim reflection in a cracked and fogged mirror. And one of the reasons why all those days is never going to be as happy is because they compare so unfavorably to that perfect day. Maybe the answer is that it should be the last day you're ever with them. Maybe Proust is right: "I ought to have left Balbec, to have shut myself up in solitude, to have remained there in harmony with the last vibrations of the voice which I had contrived to render loving for an instant, and of which I should have asked nothing more than it might never address another word to me; for fear lest, by an additional word which henceforth could not but be different, it might shatter with with a discord the sensory silence in which, as though by the pressure of a pedal, there might long have survived in me the throbbing chord of happiness." While no other day can rival that one day, maybe your memory of it, which you can cherish in your heart, can rival it.
There's too much here, so I will return.
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