Before all this, the cat had carried out a cautious, systematic, and highly meticulous investigation of the inside of our house. One day I came across him standing at the kitchen door, not asking for any food, and I left the door ajar as if to invite him in. He took a few steps over the threshold but then raced straight back out again as if he’d seen a ghost. The same thing happened a few days later, but this time it was clear he had a plan: as soon as he was inside, he made a beeline for the bedroom. He explored it systematically, inch by inch, including the dark corners behind the wardrobe; he peered around the back of the bedside tables and inspected the space under the bed. He examined everything with a computer-like intelligence, compiling and storing the data. After that, he slowly progressed into the back garden. His research continued over the next few days. First he retraced his steps through the bedroom, only more briskly this time, as if to confirm certain details he already knew, and then he began venturing a little farther into the house every day: the kitchen, the dining room, the front hall …

That was how trusted this perfidious animal had become by the time I uncovered his perfidy and put an end to his food and kind treatment.

Exercises

January 2, 1991

I’m still suffering from various illnesses, or from one illness that’s showing itself in various ways—in particular, through some persistent eczema that’s sticking around for longer than it usually does. I’m also having digestive trouble, most likely related to my liver. There must be something psychological behind all this. Today I had a dream it seemed important to retain, but not long after waking up I’d forgotten what it was. A curtain’s been set up in my mind, a blockade in the form of an obsessive melody, and the more I try to remember the dream, the louder and faster the music becomes. This obstruction seems like a maneuver on the part of what Freud calls the superego, since it’s the consciousness that’s struggling to remember the dream and the id must be what produced it. Why this repression? Why is something it tried to do and, to some extent, achieved (becoming conscious) then rudely pushed under once again? (Come to think of it, I wonder if it has to do with the fact that I’ve learned to interpret my dreams; the superego now knows about this skill of mine, and although it begrudgingly allows its contents to be seen in dreams by means of symbols, it doesn’t want me to remember those symbols afterwards because it knows I may well be able to decipher them.) (But, again, what possible interest can the superego have in keeping the ego in the dark?) I’m not entirely convinced by that explanation, I have to admit. There must be more to it. Perhaps my conscious self has something to do with the repressive maneuvers after all. It could be that the self feels overloaded with responsibilities coming from the outside world, and so I myself don’t feel like taking care of things in the inner world, which is certainly what happens, for example, when it comes to literature. Every time I feel the urge to write a story or a novel, I repress it, thinking: “If I make a start on this, who knows if I’ll be allowed to finish it. I’ll be interrupted and the beautiful impulse will be left incomplete, frustrated, and ruined.”