On a Hedi trip…
Now (As Always) I’m A Believer
Passage from Viktor Frankl’s “Man’s Search for Meaning,” in which he describes an early morning march from the camp at Auschwitz to a worksite in the dead of winter. The prisoners are malnourished, with frozen and wounded bare feet, and he thinks of his wife:
A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it has been set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth—that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way—an honorable way—in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. For the first time in my life I was able to understand the meaning of the words, “The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory.”
He goes on to explain that, either in spite of their poverty of existence or because of it, they gazed at the glistening mountains of Salzburg, at the sunset through cattle car peepholes, with an intensity of inner life that was powerful enough to transcend physical suffering; even having abandoned hope of liberty, of survival, they were “carried away by nature’s beauty.”
I see my own intrinsic optimism reflected in these accounts of love and beauty, and when I first read them I wept, overwhelmed by the harmony of my deepest beliefs resonating so profoundly in the words of another. Frankl’s main assertion in “Man’s Search for Meaning” is that man’s last and greatest liberty is his ability to choose his state of mind in a given circumstance, and this provides a framework for the discovery of a meaningful existence. Though most of us likely will be spared the degree of physical suffering of internment, few of us elude the sporadic shackles of personal hell. The greatest goal of humanity I can think of is that these epochs of vulnerability, in whatever form they take, are marked not by the powerful grip of fear, but by an adamant resilience to despair that owes itself to an abiding belief in the spiritual refuge of a rich inner life.
The Poetry of The Camera Bag
This kind of bag is made from pure cotton water canvas, texture is soft, strong and durable; carry comfortable. The Lord of the bag is a pocket, the upper uses the cotton rope of convergent way; plus a lid, the structure is simple. External vices and the ornament of fastener broke the appearance of drudgery, optional but not casually, fashion and brevity. It makes the whole bag beautiful and easy, and never lose plain. This kind of bag is very suitable for photography lovers, short trips, the daily travel. The setting sun under the afterglow, carrying such a simple and plain bag, walked slowly, keep the memory of the way with a camera, taste life gently, it will make your journey warm and romantic.
—Japanese to English translation of amazon.com, with slight editing by me
My contribution for Suzette Smith & Sean Christensen’s
Lars Von Trier fan anthology.
Lar’s wardrobe/memories.
I’m awaiting my copy with most eagerness.
