The difficulty of simplicity

The lapping of the waves. The calm sea. The birds. Sitting in the cool air. The short, endless nights between the Sant Joan festival and the Sant Pere festival. The quiet evenings with stars in the sky and crickets chirping. The naps without an alarm clock. Going down to the beach and the only conflict being over forgetting your towel, the only worry being choosing between ice cream or a slush, the only arguments being the ones we're laughing our heads off after dinner.

Having nothing pending, much less a global debt exceeding three hundred trillion dollars. The absence of fear, the absence of pain, the absence of anguish, the absence of noise. Good news. Intimate resilience. Time to read. Time to swim. Time to be with the people you love and the ones you love. Not wanting to win doesn't mean defeat. Not wishing ill. Not hating. Music. Dancing. Sleeping well. Being well.

From A to Z, starting with P. A monosyllable. A name. An olive branch.

What goes from A to Z, starting with P. A monosyllable. A name. An olive branch. A mature childhood wish. A symbol in which some see the footprint of a dove, others the initials for Nuclear Disarmament in the alphabet of flags, and still others, the man before the firing squad in Goya's painting. A hippie slogan. A papal blessing. A reggae song. A flower on a rifle. The ability to value what the earth gives and understand what we are capable of without imposing force on others. Cooperation. Physical, mental, and social health.

Concord, harmony, agreement, friendship, union, accord, understanding, tranquility, serenity, repose, quietude, armistice, truce are inexact synonyms. Nonviolence. Equality. The vindication in Gila's jokes. The demonstrations that demand it. Martin Niemöller's warning, attributed to Bertolt Brecht: "When they came for the communists, I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist..." and so on, even: "When they came for me, there was no one left to protest in my name."

Read also The air conditioning Llucia Ramis

Books by Svetlana Aleksievich, Charlotte Delbo, Mercè Rodoreda, Martha Gellhorn, Ursula K. Le Guin, Margaret Atwood, Simone de Beauvoir. The Dawn of Everything, by David Graeber and David Wengrow. What almost everyone wants and a few prevent. It shouldn't be a utopia. What is peace? That the simple isn't so difficult.