16 Comments

I guess I see this as a story of striving very hard for something - some perceived wonderful reward. Like working all one's life and expecting some great satisfaction at the end of all that hard work. Only to find the reward to be fleeting and unfulfilling. And perhaps instead of striving for some nebulous future satisfaction, we should find satisfaction in the here and now.

That's how I read it. But then again, my head is pretty much usually in that space, so maybe I interpret everything that way 😉.

Regardless, lovely story, Victor.

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I love your perspective, Mike. I think I'm sort of connected to the same or similar vibe. And I also need to remind myself about the here and now. Actually, it's mi querida that does most of the reminding and I most of the forgetting, but thankful for the reminding part. :)

Thanks for reading and your lovely comment.

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A fine allegory for refugees and immigration.

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What a cool perspective, thanks Clancy. Yours is the sort of thing that I really enjoy, gets me to thinking. One of my favorite things to do, and with help from others get a good mix of ideas. Thanks again!

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Striving, endurance, and reaching a destination. One of them wants to stay, the other must leave. There's a bit of the flavor of the movie Lost Horizon.

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I've not seen these, but from what I see on IMDB, sounds interesting. I'll have to check it out. Thanks for reading and commenting, Russell. All the best.

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Qué interesante Victor. Para mí, es como cuando emprendo algo sin un objetivo concreto y me lanzo únicamente con la meta.

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A veces, para mí, el viaje es más agradable que el destino. Y a veces es al revés. Y también hay momentos en que son ambas cosas. Gracias por leer y tu atento comentario, Mónica.

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There's a specific lens through which I tend to read allegories about trying to get somewhere. I have a fixation with ideas about social and technological progress, and think of Kafka's observation along the lines of

*Believing in progress is not the same thing as believing that's what's happening*

There are Tower of Babel shades here. But it's a success! Or is it..?

The bit I'm really looking at - the "David Lynch plot strangler", so to speak - is this:

"They came to the bottom of the ladder."

Thanks as ever for sharing your illuminating, shadowy tales.

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Thank you. I'm glad you enjoyed the shadowy tale. It's a success, or is it? I tend to leave things up to the reader to decide, and it's nice to know that some folks are okay with that. Thanks again for reading and your thought-provoking comment. I may need to revisit David Lynch. It's been a long while.

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Love this, Victor. Definitely a departure in style for you. I could feel the pain and loss of faith in the seemingly endless climb. Most interesting is the character's lament at having experienced perfection and realizing that there was nothing left to strive for.

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Yeah, this one's from a while back with its seemingly endless climb and seemingly endless tinkering with as I just couldn't seem to let it go.. ha... so maybe a different vibe from another while ago. Sometimes the journey is better than the arrival, weird creatures that we can be.

Thanks for reading Jim and for your comment!

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"... but once you have wrapped your pain in perfection, there’s nothing left to attain ... and then he’ll decide: if he wants to stay, descend rung by rung, or simply step from the edge and take flight." Wow, Victor. Beautiful. Be careful what you wish for.... right?

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Yeah, be careful, indeed. I guess maybe sometimes we value the journey more. Well, I do anyway, at least for some journeys. Thanks for reading and sharing your thoughts, Sharron!

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They've climbed the ladder to Heaven, only to discover that perhaps, Heaven is on Earth. - Whatever the meaning, I like it, Victor.

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I think you and I are on the same track, James. As I mentioned in another comment, this one's from a while back. And for some weird reason it just dawned on me as I was putting it the editor here and checking what I may have meant. Frequently I don't know, I just go. But more important to me is another person's perspective. Thanks for sharing that!

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