On Things

my notebook.

It’s an attractive and slim chap with an elegant design, capable of giving a prompt response and providing excellent performance. It is extremely loyal and, unfortunately, also extremely jealous. It loves my touch and it loves being alone with me for a long time. Should any young man appear in its proximity, it gets furious and demonstrates its jealousy by going on strike. And, God forbid, should any strange men dare to touch it - other than select professionals and for the shortest time possible. It requires delicate handling and takes revenge upon any sign of my unfaithfulness. Recently, I bought a new desktop computer. I guess my notebook must have been scared, thinking I wanted to delegate it to second place or even replace it… and it ceased to operate. It froze several times while I was working so that I had to restart it, it changed its internet connection settings, started toying with the firewall settings and other such nasty things. Those around me recommended taking it back to the store and burst out laughing when I said that everything was going to be ok and I just needed to have a talk with it. During a quiet moment, I sat down with my notebook, gently stroked it and explained that I really didn’t intend to replace it, that it was still my ‘No.1’ and my only sweetheart; my desktop computer was only for humdrum tasks while my notebook would be used for creative work. I restarted and everything was alright. “How did you do it?” asked my friends. “Well, I had a word with it,” - amused smiles and no more comments.

my car.

I have always had a very intimate relationship with my cars. Through their gear levers, I have heard their heartbeats, felt their pain and listened to their desires. My first car was a beautiful, streamlined silver Opel Calibra. She was an elegant and vigorous young lady, admired by everybody. At first, I thought we wouldn’t understand each other but she was incredibly quick-witted and intelligent and saw that it made more sense to respect me and cooperate. She really liked me but being female by nature, she also allowed - with great pleasure - a few men to get in from time to time. But they had to be good drivers; she couldn’t stand idiots. In such cases, she was grumbling and thudding, her valves sputtering and she would threaten to switch off the electronics. Her ladyship left me in the lurch only once. It was midnight, we were somewhere near Pohorelice, it was pitch black, nobody around - the silence and darkness would have even made a car scared. And this is exactly what happened. Her ladyship took fright and dropped us right in it. Thank God, I already had one of the first attempts at a mobile phone - Benefon - and despite the late hour I succeeded in calling for help. Those 30 minutes we spent together that night, alone in the darkness, were hard. But I forgave her - I’m reasonable, after all.

my mobile phones.

I like them - I do, but unlike many users I don’t sleep with them. Faithful and calm chaps they are, both young. The slim one wears a bitten apple on his back and loves letting me stroke his belly, which is shiny and smooth as ice. The other one is quite big and stout and likes to sprawl out in all directions. And he’s also heavy. Together we have a harmonious relationship without any surprises, except for the occasional game of hide-and-seek which is their favourite way of teasing me.

my apartment.

A peaceful, spacious place full of fragrance and light; we mutually love and respect one another. It is full of sunlight, loves listening to baroque music and purrs with joy while Mrs. Fislova cleans it so well that you could eat your dinner off every inch of the floor. Only the bedroom constantly worries me. There are strong ley lines running through the room so it doesn’t receive many guests, which frustrates it and makes it jealous, as they in turn prefer to sleep in the place intended for meditating.

my house on the islands.

It’s a lazy and ignorant beast. A sprawling greybeard of a place, which isn’t actually old, it just pretends to be. It enjoys being spiteful - endlessly highlighting things about the place in need of repair. Well, fortunately I personally don’t have to repair anything but you still need nerves of steel for it. And the greybeard, instead of appreciating that there are birds flying around and sitting on its banisters, that it is alive with many brown, green and other coloured lizards, that there is plenty of sunshine, trees and flowers and that it has a wonderful view over the ocean, instead of appreciating all this, it just grumbles all the time. It grumbles and grates, screeches and splinters, sprawls out and then shrinks again, making an incredible cacophony of noises. However, I think it has a good heart and that it actually likes me. But when it comes to love, deep down it loves the valley and the bay in which it stands.

my hippos.

Awww, my cuddly hippos. And I also mustn’t forget Bingo, who isn’t a hippo. Bingo is a tiny cuddly frog-hippo-teddy with a smile so charming that you would pay a million dollars for it. I mean the smile, not the hippo. But if you’re interested, tell me anyway - I’ll talk to him, you might be able to make a deal. And then there is my group of hippos: Nuki, the tiniest; Jumbo, my present bunkmate (who is floppy and soft to the touch); and the biggest, Pipsqueak. They have recently been joined by Hugo of the big blue eyes and Tarty Marty, who has a pink heart on his tummy.

my shoes.

A weak point… well, I’m a woman, after all. My brother says that my attitude to shoes borders on the obsessive-compulsive, citing the unprecedentedly high number of pairs I buy in any given month… Well, he’s exaggerating… you know men.

my ‘Parenica’ cheese.

Rolled into lovely balls, white Parenica cheese is usually bought in bulk and rests in my fridge until Adam or Gabriel pull it into long thin strips. They do this out of love and friendship so that the cheese hardens a bit and can be enjoyed with wine. I would therefore like to take this opportunity to express my thanks and respect to Adam and Gabriel and to also let them know that I am well aware that a few balls of cheese go missing from time to time for their own enjoyment.

my wine from Mirecek.

Mirecek belongs to the ‘Friends’ category and the wine he produces is so good that I’d rather not publicize it because you might buy it all up and there won’t be any left for me. I would like to point out that the first time I met Mirecek was in the Seychelles, on the beach belonging to our house and I thought he was some cheeky French pirate. No, he’s not a pirate; he’s a cheeky and great guy from South Moravia.

my sunglasses.

So, my glasses - all of them!!! - are incredibly malicious, even wicked, scamps. They devised a plot against me called ‘Play Invisible!’ which involves hiding from me right at the moment I take them off. They always choose to hide in the most inexplicable places in my apartment or in the room or house I’m just in. Sometimes it’s in the fridge, other times on top of the cistern in the bathroom or the upper shelf in my wardrobe where I usually only keep my panties or other nice underwear. The last time was even on the roof of my car in which I’d just driven home. Trying to find such scamps is a never-ending game and I already lost my patience a long time ago. Yet they always win as they know I need them.

Kaja’s chicken broth.

Kaja is my sister-in-law. Technically, she doesn’t figure in the hierarchy of people I know because family members are exempt and therefore don’t belong to any categories. If they did, she would be categorised as ‘Friend likely to become a close friend’ which is one of the top categories. I would even say that I prefer her to my brother, who grumbles and complains all the time and, what’s more, I think he takes her for granted. Let me tell you, Kaja is not only a kind and faithful wife but also an attractive and wonderful woman who, in other circumstances, would be awarded the Nobel Prize for ‘Best wife in the world’. Besides this, she also cooks - and often only because of me - a chicken broth so delicious that even Mrs Beeton herself would commit murder in order to know the recipe. At first, she would probably torture Kaja and then, after my poor sister-in-law had revealed the secret of her broth, do away with her. Luckily I don’t have to do this because every time I come back from the islands, she gives me a bowl full of the most amazing soup the world has ever seen.

There are far more things around me that I could write about but I won’t bother and bore you. I will only give you some advice - look around and you will find that some things love you more than others, that there are mischievous things and also things that devoutly admire you and will ‘miraculously’ serve you without any trouble for many, many years, long after their service life has expired. That’s just how it is.