During last summer, I brought with me from Zagreb a handful of old photographs and a few books. I've been preparing to do this for two decades, since moving to England, and somehow, I haven't done it till this year. Since the summer, it has all stood like that in the box it arrived in, until one evening my daughter expressed a desire to go through it. She found, for example, the identity card of my great-grandmother and her great-great-grandmother issued in 1975, photos of her great-grandfather and many other slightly younger photos of her parents, uncle, and grandparents. To me, leafing through these photos is still an inner, emotional twitch, and I just reached for one of the books, or rather a booklet called "Jonathan Livingston Seagull a story." I flipped through the pages of the book and along the way asked my daughter if she knew about the book. At first, she said she didn't know, and I told her I was going to buy her that book in English because I wanted her to read it. Suddenly she remembered, "Mom, what's that little blue book you gave me a long time ago?" I didn’t think much of it, but in a few minutes she left the room and came back with the English version of "Jonathan Livingston's Seagull." She said:
"Mom, you gave me that book when I was little. I remember not liking it at the time, but I read it anyway because of you. Just some weird seagull story. You told me I should read it again when I was older."
"How old do you think you were then?" I asked, and it slowly began to come back to me that I had bought that book for my daughter many years ago.
"Ten, maybe," she replied.
"Do you want to read it now?" I asked.
And so, we both read it, she the English version, and I the Croatian translation. It took us about 45 minutes to read. Here are some excerpts we selected from the book:
“Jonathan Seagull discovered that boredom and fear and anger are the reasons that a gull’s life is so short, and with these gone from his thought, he lived a long life indeed.” Pg. 26
“The same rule holds for us now, of course: we choose our next world through what we learn in this one. Learn nothing, and the next world is the same as this one, all the same limitations and lead weights to overcome.” Pg. 48
“If our friendship depends on things like space and time, then when we finally overcome space and time, we’ve destroyed our own brotherhood! But overcome space, and all we have left is Here. Overcome time, and all we have left is Now. And in the middle of Here and Now, don’t you think we might see each other once or twice?” Pg. 57
“No limits, Jonathan? He thought, and he smiled. His race to learn had begun.” Pg. 87
Love,
Kristina
Thursday, 06 January 2022
“Pravom galebu Jonathanu koji živi u svima nama”
Tokom prošlog ljeta ponijela sam sa sobom iz Zagreba naramak starih fotografija i nekoliko knjiga. To sam se spremala učiniti već tokom dva desetljeća, od preseljenja u Englesku, i nekako do sada nisam. Od ljeta je sve to stajalo tako u kutiji u kojoj je stiglo dok neko večer moja kćer nije izrazila želju da prođe kroz to i vidi što sve u kutiji ima. Našla je naprimjer, osobnu iskaznicu moje prabake, dakle njezine pra-pra bake izdane 1975. godine, fotografije svog pradjeda i još dosta, nešto mlađih fotografija svojih roditelja, uje, dede i bake. Meni listanje tih fotografija predstavlja još uvijek unutarnji, emocionalni trzaj za koji u tom trenu nisam bila spremna i ja sam samo posegnula za jednom od knjiga, ili bolje rečeno knjižicom pod naslovom “Galeb Jonathan Livingston.” Listala sam stranice knjige i usput pitala svoju kćer dali zna za tu knjigu. Na početku je rekla da ne zna i ja sam joj rekla da ću joj kupiti tu knjigu na engleskom jer želim da ju svakako pročita. Odjednom je nešto promrmljala: ”Mama, koja je ono mala, plava knjižica što si mi davno poklonila?” Nisam obraćala paznju, već zadubljena u čitanje, ali za par minuta Sara je došla iz svoje sobe sa engleskom verzijom “Galeba Jonathana Livingstona.” Rekla je:
“Mama ti si mi tu knjigu poklonila dok sam bila mala. Sjećam se da mi se tada uopće nije svidjala, ali da sam ju svejedno pročitala zbog tebe. Samo nekakva čudna priča o nekakvom galebu. Rekla si mi da ju trebam pročitati ponovo kad budem starija.”
“Koliko misliš da si tada imala godina?” pitala sam i polako mi se počelo vraćati u sjećanje da sam ja tu knjigu kupila svojoj kćeri pred puno godina.
“Deset, možda” odgovorila je.
“Jel ti se da da ju sad prtočitaš?” pitala sam. I tako smo obije čitale, ona englesku verziju, a ja hrvatski prijevod. Trebalo nam je nekih 45 minuta da ju pročitamo. Evo nekoliko isječaka iz knjige selektiranih od nas obije:
“Jonathan je otkrio da su dosada, strah i gnjev glavni razlozi zbog kojih galebovi žive kratko, a budući da se svega toga oslobodio, poživio je zaista dugo i lijepo.” St. 41.
“Sada naravno vrijedi jednako pravilo za sve nas: biramo svoj idući svijet prema onom što smo naučili u ovom. Ne naučis li ništa idući ti je život jednak sadašnjem, ista ograničenja i iste poteškoće koje treba nadvladati.” St. 55.
“Kada bi naše prijateljstvo ovisilo o vremenu i prostoru, onda bismo, svladavši vrijeme i prostor, upropastili i naše bratstvo. Svladamo li prostor, ostaje nam samo OVDJE. Svladamo li vrijeme, ostaje nam samo SADA. Zar ne misliš da ćemo se na tom putu, između Sada i Ovdje, ipak povremeno sretati?” St. 71.
“’Nema granica, Jonathane?’ pomisli još jednom smiješeći se. I tako započe njegova trka za znanjem.” St. 105.
S ljubavlju,
Kristina
Četvrtak, 6. siječnja 2022.
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