Spanningsbogen

I wish. I wish for this, I wish for that. I wish death and war and diseases didn’t exist. I wish I had a silver buckle and a golden sleigh and a slingshot hat. How simple it is. How simple it is to wish. I wish I was rich and young and a highly regarded numismatist.

What is it to wish? It's desire. It’s a form of desire. A shade. A nuance. Not the full deal. Not a lust. Not a craving. Not an ardor or longing. Those are strong. Those have power. Intensity. Wishing is softer. Wistful. A fantasy while gazing out of a window. A woman braiding her hair in front of a mirror.

Why is it even worth mentioning? It's always a boost to the spirit to at least appear interested in life. Wishing is a confirmation that life sometimes lacks the right spice, a satisfying response to an elusive flavor. A debt paid in full. Wishing isn’t like that. It’s just a confession that this is what might make things better, but it’s not within the realm of the possible. Or it’s possible but is it worth doing? Not currently. Perhaps never. This is why people gaze abstractedly at the ground. Or the sky. Or the view out of the window. Which is quite often shrubs. Trees. Pigeons in a parking lot. Trash bins. A drunk cursing the traffic.

Wishing is a glass of wine. Ambition is thirty gallons of gas and a red Silverado.

Wishing is wistful and pensive and doesn’t hurt anybody. Ambition pleases the stockholders and puts 5,000 people out of work.

When desire doesn’t take itself seriously we call it a wish. When desire takes itself very seriously we call it Richard III.

Writing is feeling increasingly like wishing because we live in a postliterate world in which millions are captivated by a social networking service called Twitter in which statements are limited to 280 characters, which is death to literacy. Death to thinking. But a boon to wishing. Wishing is quick and evanescent and walks around with a glass of chardonnay admiring all the artwork on the gallery wall without being able to afford anything. Wishing is tweeting and tweeting is fleeting.

Let’s look at more granite kitchen counter samples when we leave the party. That’s wishing. Nimble and carefree. You can be starving and wish you had a slice of bread to eat but that’s not really wishing. That would be the wrong word for that situation. If you’re starving you’re not going to wish you had a slice of bread you’re going to be murderous and desperate to get something into your stomach. You’re going to be haggard and dangerous.

That’s not wishing. That’s staring daggers at a couple dining on Hudson Valley Moulard Duck Foie Gras at Per Se on Columbus Circle in midtown Manhattan.

And wishing you could write like Chekhov.

You could be in jail and wish you could be invisible and had the ability to walk through walls. You could be in jail and so desperate to get out you carve a handgun out of soap. This is what the spectrum of desire looks like from a human perspective. On the one hand soap. And on the other a gun.