Pe vremuri (hei, hei, nu chiar pe când cu descălecarea lui Mihai la Alba-Iulia!), exista în Cluj o stradă numită Amurg (notaţi: nu „Amurgului”, Amurg). Întotdeauna mi-a plăcut acest nume de stradă; mi se părea ciudat, aparte, straniu, poetic, „punător pe gânduri”. Numele îmi plăcea, strada nu. Nici nu prea avea ce să-ţi placă. O stradă plină de absenţe. Copleşită de absenţe. Adică, de ajungeai pe-acolo, puteai fi sigur că nu vei întâlni pe nimeni (poate câte o gospodină în capot, care trecea alături, la altă gospodină îmbrăcată în capotul ei, sau, potrivit anotimpului, în combinezon; cam atât). De prin curţi te mai lătra câte un câine care ţinea să se afle în treabă. Culmea (fireşte, depinde din ce sens o luai) strada ducea înspre... amurg. Nici după ce am aflat că pe această stradă a locuit (în gazdă) nevastă-mea, pe când nu era (nevastă-mea), dar era studentă.
Ce, naiba, puteai căuta pe strada asta!?! Ni-mic. Nimic. Nu tu prăvălii, nu tu o crâşmă, cât despre firme, pe-atunci, nici vorbă. („Pe-atunci” = în urmă cu vreo, pardon, 30-40 de ani, adică acum cam 1500 de zile; vă daţi seama? 36.000 de ore! Minute? O mulţime.) Aşadar: ce puteai căuta pe strada asta? Neamuri (nu era cazul meu), gagici (n-am văzut), frumuseţi arhitectonice (nici vorbă), umbra copacilor de pe trotuar (nu erau, nici trotuar nu prea era)... atunci, ce? Ori, în mod obligatoriu (de pildă dacă erai poştaş, miliţian sau executor judecătoresc – iarăşi nu era cazul meu), ori de-a nebun (era cazul meu). Adică, încerc să explic:
Atât de altcumva era strada asta încât de multe ori, de multe ori, m-am dus pe-acolo (şi, zău, aveam cam 1/3 din anii mei de astăzi) doar ca să păşesc dinspre levant spre amurg, sau dinspre amurg spre răsărit. Nu avea nici o importanţă.
Tudor Ionescu, „Amurgul pierdut”, published in „Tribuna” (issue 120, 1-15 September 2007) | Some time ago (but not quite as long ago as when Prince Mihai* colonised Alba Iulia – ha ha!), there used to be a street in Cluj named Twilight (note: not "Twilight Street" - just "Twilight"). I always liked this street name; it struck me as odd, singular, strange, poetic, "thought-provoking". I liked the name, but not the street. There was barely anything at all to like about it. A street full of missing things. Brimming with missing things. What I mean is, from the moment you arrived there, you could be certain that you would not come across anybody (perhaps an occasional housewife in her dressing gown, as she passed by to another housewife dressed in her dressing gown, or according to the season, in her petticoat; that was about it). Every now and again from the courtyards you could hear the barking of a dog that wanted to be occupied with something. To crown it all (depending on the direction in which you were heading, of course), the street led to... twilight. It wasn't until afterwards that I discovered that my wife had lived on this street (as a tenant), before she was (my wife), but she was a student.
What, in heaven's name, could you hope to find on this street? Not a thing. Nothing. No shops, no bars, and as for businesses at that time, they were quite out of the question. ("At that time" = something like, ahem, 30-40 years ago, so that's around 1,500 days ago; can you imagine? 36,000 hours! And minutes? A lot.) So: what could you hope to find on this street? People (not in my case), courting couples (I didn't see any), architectural gems (no way), the shade of trees on the pavement (there weren't any; there wasn't all that much pavement either)... so, what? Either because you had to (for example, if you were a postman, a policeman or a bailiff - again, not in my case), or because you were mad (as in my case). So I'll try to explain: this street was so other-worldly that I went there many, many times (and I shudder to think that I was around a third of my age today) just to walk from the east towards the twilight, or from the twilight towards sunrise. It really didn't matter at all.
* Mihai Viteazul, or Michael the Brave, was the Wallachian Prince who marched into the Transylvanian capital of Alba Iulia in 1599, becoming ruler of the province and uniting the principalities of Wallachia and Transylvania. |