Pariscope

Pariscope is, it seems, a Paris weekly focusing on events ... events ... what exactly is an event? A phenomenon: "an observable occurrence". The more observable the occurrence, the more of an event an event is. Thus the sparkling of cameras - to catch the light that shines on it. Thus the interviewing of athletes - to catch the last  gasped inhalations and exhalations of their exertion. Thus the ink-emanations of birthdays in The Times. We can be seen, we breath, we live! We are - events. It doesn't really matter that there is - a party, a race, a birthday... What matters is that there are people who are allowed ... allowed ... to jolly well show off for a while. If girls behaved as they do at parties when they were not at parties - they would be thought very silly (and conceited) indeed (sometimes, of course, they are anyway).The party is an excuse. In a supermarket, purchasing, say, chocolate biscuits ... to dance (there is often music, of a sort, in supermarkets...) and flounce and giggle would be deemed ... rather odd. Add enthusiastic photography to the above and it becomes ... odder  - it would be assumed that one were on one's way to a party (and being not-entirely-serious), or on one's way home from one (and being not-entirely-serious) - or damned eccentric. We do not, again, tend to interview people who have run for buses... Why not? What they have done is probably far more practically worthwhile than what the athlete, running in circles around a track like a personification of circularity has done. That is the point - it is not l'art pour l'art.  Why not post the words 'I [insert name here] am alive today' or 'I exist'. That, after all, is what a birthday is all about - continuing to exist. One is only allowed to notice the fact one a year: gosh, here I am still... Which seems rather a pity. Because every single second that one exists (yes I know I know - you know you know) is a near-miracle of wonderfulness ... and all that. An event. My inhalation is an event. My exhalation is an event. My every proof of continued existence is an event. My every word is an event. My every pressing-down on my every key of my every laptop is - an event. But this - as perhaps is being illustrated - is prone to become ... repetitive and quite the opposite of the wonderment-expression that it is intended to be. Our minds seem only to be able to cope with concise wonderment - births marriages and deaths ... and all that. This, I suppose, is because we have to concentrate. This, I suppose, is because we have to not exhaust ourselves with sensory input after sensory input being given vast attention. This, I suppose, is because we get used to yo-yo-ing between on and off like switches leveled. We don't want to blow our fuses. But - every day is an event, if you want it to be. The option is there.