I have no idea how to deal with all this, and all the while my desk is spilling over with things to do. There are things, too, that I have to do for myself, for pleasure, or to remind myself who I am, to subsist and existand I can’t do them. I can’t even create the necessary conditions in which to do them.

March 15

Today’s exercises are like a branch I’m clinging onto after falling off a cliff. I’ve never been in such a desperate situation as this, though I’ve had plenty of difficult times over the years. At least before, there was a deep-down, “magical” confidence that kept me going, a secret, mysterious presence within me like a kind of guardian angel. Beneath everything else, I had a hidden and convoluted confidence in myself, and an even more hidden and convoluted confidence in God. And that confidence always sustained me. Now it’s as if I’ve lost my footing completely; my mind is fragmented and I’m in the grip of a psychological paralysis that, little by little, is becoming physical as well. Nothing about the present looks like happiness, not for a moment; there’s no peace or respite, no dreams to remember—my spirit’s like an arid pasture, a desert. And there’s not the slightest glimmer of a future, of any desirable future whatsoever. The whole thing feels like I’m hurling myself vertiginously downward through days, weeks, months, and years that pass without a trace, completely empty of content, toward death, the only certainty. Every day, for too long now, all I’ve been able to do is passively observe the progress of my ruin.

This is all very abstract, I know. It’s not that I can’t be more specific, but I’m tired of being more specific, and I don’t want to repeat myself. After all, this is just a handwriting exercise. There’s no point worrying about making its contents more concrete. It’s just filling a sheet of paper with my writing.

March 17

I need to establish some form of discipline, however hard that may be. These exercises are always the first step in my attempts to do that—attempts that normally never get anywhere. And yet I keep on beginning with these exercises, partly because they’re the simplest way to begin. All you need is a ballpoint and a sheet of paper, whereas everything elseeverything else I might want to domeans first carrying out a search for the necessary equipment, which puts me off before I’ve even started. Calligraphical exercises can also be done anywhere, though it’s still not easy to find an appropriate place for them in the new house, since all the possibilities have very serious potential drawbacks. For example, I’m now sitting at my desk in the room next to the first-floor bedroom; this spot can only be used on a day like today, when there’s a cool breeze. Otherwise, the temperature in here is unbearable at almost all hours of the day or night because of a zinc roof that’s lacking the proper insulation. It’s also very small, and there’s no space for my stuff; even as I write, papers and other bits and pieces on the desk are getting in my way, and I can’t put them anywhere else because there’s nowhere else for them and no suitable furniture. I can think of lots of reasons why my handwriting’s so bad today, among them the fact that I haven’t practiced much lately, but I’m also feeling unsettled and obstructed by the untidiness of the desk. Other simple tasks have become nightmarish, because to do them I have to go and get things from the back bedroom, where all the stuff is in precarious piles and the unpleasant climate is very off-putting.