Slowly, surely...Hemingway

I sat in the pantry, looking out at chattering tree-tops. A kite soared miles above bricks and concrete. It seemed to do a soft salsa glide in the sky. Maybe it liked looking at brown-grey strips. It was going to be a long day at work. I wanted this tepid coffee to fill me with as much satiety as it could manage.


This sad satisfaction of looking at the world go by, to be dimly aware of time passing…this cusp of peace and wistfulness…I find it in Hemingway’s writing. As luck would have it, I read one of his short stories a few hours after my coffee-break. ‘A Clean, Well-Lighted Place’. This story is so ephemeral. Light, gossamer-like, sea-spray like. All true yet almost there. I love reading Hemingway’s stories. They’re so short, yet I lose myself in them completely. Not knowing how long I’ll be remembering pieces from it, or quoting from it.

Reading Hemingway is like sleeping off after doing something decadent. You may not recall everything, yet you’ll always remember waking up to chocolate on your fingertips.

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The short story is here: http://www.mrbauld.com/hemclean.html