I go to the Garden Party of Alma. Alma is good, smart and beautiful – it is a rare combination in one person, and in particular in one woman. She reminds me of my Russian godmother. I wish I could be like her one day, enwrapped in harmony and forgiveness like in a big warm glove. Will this day ever come? Will I be able not to lose myself in hours, seconds, semicolons and newspaper clippings?

Spring is coming and the Garden party is a blast. It is not really in the garden, as nothing is there yet, just some green grass and rose stems, but everybody is excited, people walk in circles and speak about spring. Spring turns the air in the city into some kind of drug. I also walk around “the garden”, dash from one corner to another with my cigarette and wine glass and with every circle I am getting more and more turned on. Suddenly Alma appears in the doorway and asks everyone inside to eat the carrot cake. I am so excited that I can not control myself anymore –  Reiner, Schmeiner, I forgot all the recent melancholies and am driven by an irresistible unbearable lightness of a pre-spring evening. I dart to Alma, not seeing anything in my way and almost crush a man who is also sprinting from the other corner of “the garden”. He must be as lost and crazy as me.