Do you want black or white?

     To put words in his nephew´s mouth, Basilio Nebreda was a man "resigned to the unhappiness of having no one with whom to share the activities that really fascinated him." And I must guess that he was mainly referring to his wife.

     That's what I think happens to that friend of yours, Fran. The young people of today check reality —they abren el melón as you say around here— after a few months of living together and thus they have the advantage of clarifying the situation and that each one goes in his own direction. We have made some progress. If after half a year it suits us, we continue together, if not… This way of acting, which at first glance seems frivolous, has managed to prevent two people who had very little in common they end up having to be condemned to see each other every morning to start another grey, monotonous day or something much worse.

     Dear Fran, in our generation this mechanism of mutual knowledge was not allowed and this is what happens to the vast majority of people who are in their sixties today.

     What can we do you ask me? Something I have already advanced you above. I see two ways. The first — although I understand that it is painful because in a relationship of twenty, thirty or more years’ time has been invested, sacrifices on both sides and love, yes love; that love with which a step to two begins and that at the end of the commitment has evaporated like the morning mist and we have the feeling that everything has been in vain, we should opt for separation.

     The second path — there is no other way — living  as Basilio Negreda does: make a selection of subjects (zarzuela, reading classics or chess), although now that I write it, how to play chess if you don't even have a nephew of fifteen or sixteen years to castling him. What I was saying, make a selection of topics that we like and dedicate ourselves to them almost in body and soul.

     Y. a.

     Mary