Um destes dias,
hei-de ser como ele...


I have always been on the edge of
nothing, living in non-time. Each
little hapiness becomes part of the
past and each dream of the future
already seems to be a memory. Only
the sea and the voice of Leonard Cohen
are part of the present. The rest is
just projection, and i have learned to
be wary of that.

Photography has made it possible
for me to travel and to see the
difference between the possible
and the impossible. I can keep
things without owning them, remember
without fear of forgetting, survive
instead of merely living. Above all i
can know that everything has a story,
every story has 2 versions, and each
has it own past.

I travel in Asia, Europe and the Arab
world. In the banality of the everyday,
i see traces of things that will bind
me to them forever. I walked on the
trash in Cairo and i witness the
sublime, i look at the walls of
Auschwitz and i feel the presence of
something sacred, i stop in front
of a Vienna shop window and i glimpse
futility. I take everythig from
nothing. I sometimes think of all this,
burried in my memory. Alone in my
hotel room, at night, i think about my
fears, my mistakes, my parents faces,
my friends, the women i loved, my
children, death, the alcoholism i have
put behind me, my money problems.

When we ssek the absolute, there is
no peace. I always ended up thinking
about the simplicity of a day filled
of nothing. And that is enough for me.
I have always been on the edge of
nothing, and Cohen is still singing.

Nada,
Paulo Nozolino, Porto, 22/11/01