The Invention of the Wall-to-Wall Carpet

It appears difficult to discover who invented the wall-to-wall carpet. According to the Larousse dictionary, the carpet is merely “a rug sold by the yard.”Here we have an expression that offers undeniable proof of the pathetic nature of the wall-to-wall carpet, which has no relationship to calling somebody on the carpet. Thirty-seven

Markus was a punctual man and loved to get home at exactly seven fifteen. He knew the schedules of the suburban trains like other people know their wife’s favorite perfumes. He wasn’t unhappy with his well-oiled daily schedule. Sometimes he would get the impression that he was friends with the unknown people he ran into each day. That evening, he wanted to shout and tell everybody about his life. His life with Natalie’s lips on his lips. He wanted to get up and get off at the first station that came, just like that, to give himself the feeling of deviating from the usual. He wanted to be crazy, which was excellent proof that he was not.As he walked home, images of his Swedish childhood came back to him. It certainly had happened fast. Childhood in Sweden is like old age in Switzerland. All the same, he remembered those moments when he’d sit at the very rear of the class, just to look at girls’ backs. During those years, he’d admired the napes of Kristina’s, Pernilla’s, and Joana’s necks, and those of so many other girls in row A, without ever being able to come anywhere near all the other letters. He didn’t remember their faces. He dreamed of finding them, just to tell them that Natalie had kissed him. To tell them that they hadn’t been able to see his charm. Ah, how sweet.When he reached his building, he hesitated. We’re forced to memorize so many numbers. Cell phones, Internet access codes, bank cards … so, inevitably, there comes a moment when everything gets mixed up. You try to get into your building by punching in your telephone number. Markus, whose brain was perfectly organized, felt as if he were at the threshold of this kind of derailment, and that’s exactly what happened to him that night. It was impossible to remember the door code. In vain he tried several combinations. How can you forget by evening something you knew perfectly that morning? Will the welter of data unavoidably push us into amnesia? Finally, a neighbor arrived and stood in front of the door. He could have opened it immediately but preferred to savor this moment of obvious one-upmanship. From the look in his eyes, you’d almost have thought that remembering your door code was a sign of virility. Finally the neighbor got moving, pompously declaring, “Please, after you.” Markus thought, You stupid ass, if you only knew what was going on in my head; I’ve got something so beautiful it obliterates useless data … He took the stairs, immediately forgetting about this hapless setback. He still felt just as lightheaded, and a loop of the scene of the kiss kept playing in his head. It was already a cult film in his memory. Finally he opened the door to his apartment and found his living room much too small in comparison with his appetite for living. Thirty-eight

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