What is really important? What touches us today – and will not go away tomorrow? It’s the things that have moved us since human existence: happiness, love, family, partnership, time, stress, loneliness, farewell, grief.
BILD columnist Louis Hagen*, coming from a German-Jewish family, sought answers to the eternal questions of mankind from poets, thinkers and researchers. And found a few answers that are amazingly simple – and yet can enrich our lives.
★★★
The other day my ex-colleague said, and I knew he was lying, “Gosh, you haven’t changed at all, it’s been over ten years since we last saw each other.” I lied back, “But you’ve changed too not changed, my dear…”
There are moments when you’re allowed to lie, I think. Let’s call it cheating, fibbing, if you like. Maybe you don’t have to overdo it like Freddy Frinton as Butler James in the New Year’s classic Dinner for One. He says to his elderly lady of the house, Miss Sophie, “You’re looking younger than ever.” She’s happy – why shouldn’t she?
BILD columnist Louis Hagen
I just happened to see on YouTube how the literary critic Marcel Reich-Ranicki, who has since died, rejected the German Television Prize in 2011 (“everything is dirt”). The camera kept showing faces of celebrities that we almost all still know today: Gottschalk, Kerner, actors and actresses who all had one thing in common: They were famous – and they looked so fresh! Mostly bright, smooth faces; mischievous, youthful, exciting some lady.
A thought came to me when I saw the video: man, how young they were! And it’s only been a little over ten years. And then I remembered what my former colleague had said to me when we met again.
Cheat a little to outwit the ravages of time, why not! And let’s be honest: haven’t we all lied to our parents in order to secretly spend the night with our first love? How often did you pretend to be 18 to get into a club you weren’t actually allowed to go to? That’s life: people used to want to look older. When you’re older… well, you know!
In any case, I’m happy when someone says to me today: “Man, you look like you did ten years ago!”
Lies can be so beautiful.
* Louis Hagen (75) was a member of the BILD editor-in-chief for 13 years and is now a consultant at the communications agency WMP. His texts are available as a book at koehler-mittler-shop.de.