The Nice People

  Back in my early youth, well, rather my childhood, I had a friend. Let's call her Sarah. She loved science fiction movies and always dressed in black. Some other day, fueled by a sudden nostalgia, I decided to look her up on Facebook. It's been more than a decade since I last heard from her. 

 Finding her in the cowebs of online contacts turned to be surprisingly easy. After few minutes I was looking at her smiley face on a photo. She didn't change at all- the same radiance glowing from her still youthful face, and the mieschievous charm playing in her eyes. On the photo she held a cute toddler in her arms, surrounded by her other three children. Her husband was standing on her left hand side, smiling and handsome, his hands placed on the shoulders of their eldest daughter. The sun was shining down on them as six happy faces stared into the camera. Nice people. 

  Suddenly something on her profile has drawn my attention: one of her photos had been remade with an anti-abortion hashtag. The template had been issued by a militant pro-life organization that Sarah, as I noticed, actively supports. Her deep support for 'Beatiful since Conception' is then explained simply by her being 'a Christian'. 

 Intrigued, I scroll down expecting to see more photos of her lovely children and some idyllic images of happy, family life in the country. But I am heading for a shock. 

 While browsing through her endless posts equipped with the same anti-abortion hashtags, I find a bunch of statements slut-shaming rape victims and calling up for a death penalty for 'unborn children murderers'. But a beautiful girl like her, a mother of four, with her loving smile surely doesn't mean it?

 I scroll down. Below the anti-abortion fever Sarah proudly states she is a 'gun lobby'. Like her whole family, for that matter. 

 Her family indeed plays an important part in her life, as they all join together in nationalist movement marches, holding a DIY banners prasing 'white Europe', 'defending Christianity' and expressing pride in their 'white blood'. I find these statements somehow puzzling: surely a mother of four would know that white is not the best colour as it gets easily dirty and white things are nightmare to wash. However, I must admit this discovery had some educational value for me. You see, till the date I believed that blood is always red by definition. I never heard of someone who would possibly have a blood of different tone. And I feel like I am emphasizing with Sarah on that one: apparently she and her children must suffer from some very mysterious disease that affects their blood cells. In that matter, I guess 'pride' is not the worst reaction ever. It is surely more constructive than despair. 

 Sarah's reactions to the modern world are in general quite impressive. For example, she shares an informative article regarding transgender people, to which Sarah's sole response is 'I don't even fucking know lol'. There were also some nice comments regarding the refugees, to which apparently Sarah 'fucking can't even'. In that moment I have to confess I wonder whether she spelled 'can't' correctly...

 I continue to browse through all the 'fucking whatevers' and 'don't you piss me off fuckers' and I am feeling more and more like an alien, trying to make something up of this bad grammar and swearings, and I forget the faces of Sarah's lovely children. Before I leave her profile for good, I take a final glance at her profile picture, to once again look at her unchanged happy face. In adult life we won't be friends. Her idyllic photo of happy, loving family still hangs in there untouched. Such nice people. 

Disclaimer: All persons fictitious.

The mysterious G minor- Albinoni's Adagio

  Few years back a friend of mine was asked to compose a piece for a short film. She came out with a beautiful classical guitar track, that was capturing many human emotions. There was sadness and melancholy, but also hope, like an image of a sunny, Sunday afternoon. It was a perfect presentation of what one can go through while sitting in a garden, drinking tea and romanticizing the past while also dreaming of exciting plans for distant future. I often listen to this track on an afternoon like this. Unfortunately, the producers of the short film were not as pleased. Curiously, it was the variety of emotions that worried them. They expected something people listen to when they feel, or want to feel, simply sad. Putting it straight they wanted a piece that would let their viewers despair. And when it comes to despair, it is hard to think of anything more fitting than Albinoni’s Adagio, that has been featured in so many movies that lots of people actually believes it’s Ennio Morricone’s track.

When it comes to Adagio in G minor, there is a phenomenal path to it, as this one single orchestral piece has been through so many exciting and rocky adventures that no other piece can ever compare. It is truly shameful that many ( and I don’t mean only those who assign the autorship to Morricone) recognize it only as soundtrack of nostalgic movies, but it is also a side effect of its’ phenomenal popularity in modern mainstream culture. Somehow, this neo-baroque adagio touches something in our souls. Specifically, this side of our souls that is a bit tacky.

But the real story leaves a lot of speculation, and ‘Adagio’ itself is not tacky at all. It is brilliant and sublime, gentle and uninsisting, surely not trying to be what it has become. Remo Gazotto, the actual author of the piece, did not expect this kind of success. I also disagree with those who call it ‘the biggest hoax in the history of classical music’. What about the guy who claimed he had found the original footage of Nijinsky dancing his ‘Afternoon of the faun’, while he just put together old photographs and was so good at editing that he almost fooled the whole world?