Adultery

IN JUST one hour the year will come to an end. The city decided on significant spending cuts for Geneva’s traditional New Year’s Eve celebrations, so we will have fewer fireworks. It’s just as well; I’ve seen fireworks my whole life and they no longer give me the same thrill as they did when I was a child.

I cannot say I am going to miss these past 365 days. The wind blew, lightning struck, and the sea nearly capsized my boat, but in the end I managed to cross the ocean and reach dry land.

Dry land? No relationship should go off in search of that. What kills a relationship between two people is precisely the lack of challenge, the feeling that nothing is new anymore. We need to continue to be a surprise for each other.

It all begins with a big party. Friends come out, the celebrant says things he’s repeated at hundreds of weddings, like that idea of building a house on rock, and not on sand. The guests throw rice; we throw the bouquet. The single women secretly envy us, and the married women know we are starting on a path that is not at all like what we’ve read about in fairy tales.

And then reality gradually begins to set in, but we don’t accept it. We want our partner to remain the person we met at the altar and with whom we exchanged rings. As if we could stop time.

We cannot. We should not. Wisdom and experience don’t change the man. Time doesn’t change the man. The only thing that changes us is love. While I was in the air, I understood that my love for life, for the universe, was more powerful than anything.