The greater the sensibility and the subtler its capacity for feeling, the more absurdly it shivers and shudders over little things. It takes extraordinary intelligence to feel anxiety because of an overcast day. Humanity, basically insensitive, doesn’t get anxious over the weather, because there’s always weather; humanity doesn’t feel the rain unless it’s falling on its head.

The hazy, torpid day humidly swelters. Alone in the office, I review my life, and what I see is like the day that oppresses and afflicts me. I see myself as a child happy for no reason, as an adolescent full of ambition, as a full-grown man without happiness or ambition. And it all happened in a haze and a torpor, like this day that makes me see or remember it.

Who among us, looking back down the path of no return, can say they followed it in the right way?