humiliated in front of girlfriends and friends alike.
The acomodador. For two years, I tried to learn how to play the guitar. To begin with, I made rapid progress, but then reached a point where I could progress no further, because I discovered that other people were learning faster than I was, which made me feel mediocre; and so as not to have to feel ashamed, I decided that I was no longer interested in learning. The same thing happened with snooker, football, bicycle racing. I learned enough to do everything reasonably well, but there was always a point where I got stuck.
Why?
Because according to the story we are told, there always comes a moment in our lives when we reach "our limit." I often recalled my struggle to deny my destiny as a writer and how Esther had always refused to allow the acomodador to lay down rules for my dream. The paragraph I had just read fit in with the idea of forgetting one's personal history and being left only with the instinct that develops out of the various difficulties and tragedies one has experienced. This is what the shamans of Mexico did and what the nomads on the steppes of Central Asia preached.
The acomodador: there is always an event in our lives that is responsible for us failing to progress.
It described exactly what happens in marriages in general and what had happened in my relationship with Esther in particular.
I could now write my article for that magazine. I went over to the computer and within half an hour I had written a first draft and was happy with the result. I wrote a story in the form of a dialogue, as if it were fiction, but which was, in fact, a conversation I had had in a hotel room in Amsterdam, after a day spent promoting my books and after the usual publishers' supper and the statutory tour of the sights, etc.
In my article, the names of the characters and the situation in which they find themselves are omitted. In real life, Esther is in her nightdress and is looking out at the canal outside our window. She has not yet become a war correspondent, her eyes are still bright with joy, she loves her work, travels with me whenever she can, and life is still one big adventure. I am lying on the bed in silence; my mind is far away, worrying about the next day's appointments.
Last week, I interviewed a man who's an expert in police interrogations. He told me that they get most of their information by using a technique they call 'cold-hot.' They always start with a very aggressive policeman who says he has no intention of sticking to the rules, who shouts and thumps the table. When he has scared the prisoner nearly witless, the 'good cop' comes in and tells his colleague to stop, offers the prisoner a cigarette, pretends to be his friend, and gets the information he wants."
"Yes, I've heard about that."
"Then he told me about something else that really frightened me. In 1971, a group of researchers at Stanford University, in California, decided to create a simulated prison in order to study the psychology of interrogations. They selected twenty-four student volunteers and divided them into 'guards' and 'criminals.'
"After just one week, they had to stop the experiment. The 'guards' - girls and boys with normal decent values, from nice families - had become real monsters. The use of torture had become routine and the sexual abuse of 'prisoners' was seen as normal. The students who took part in the project, both 'guards' and 'criminals,' suffered major trauma and needed long-term medical help, and the experiment was never repeated."
"Interesting."
"What do you mean 'interesting'? I'm talking about something of real importance: man's capacity to do evil whenever he's given the chance. I'm talking about my work, about the things I've learned!"
"That's what I found interesting. Why are you getting so angry?"
"Angry? How could I possibly get angry with someone who isn't paying the slightest bit of attention to what I'm saying? How can I possibly be angry with someone who isn't even provoking me, who's just lying there, staring into space?"
"How much did you have to drink tonight?"
"You don't even know the answer to that, do you? I've been by your side all evening, and you've no idea whether I've had anything to drink or not! You only spoke to me when you wanted me to confirm something you had said