"A Note on Melancholy Euphoria" from The Love Letter with a Bullet Hole
Will their destinies allow them to cross paths again? Will Sam and Luisa ever be in the same place at the same time ever again? Will the War to End All Wars ever be finished? What good is it to live in this world if we don’t know if we will be killed tomorrow? Tomorrow – in all its mysteriousness. Sometimes anticipation is more romantic than the actual meeting itself.
1917 was chosen very intentionally for the setting of “Melancholy Euphoria.” 1917 … mysterious in its ambiguity. This was the year that the United States entered World War One. Did Sam know he was going to be drafted? Will he go off to war and die in the trenches, never to see Luisa again? Or was this earlier in the year, before Congress declared war on Germany: before Sam had any idea of what lied in store?
Likewise, Luisa is no less immune to fate. Unrestricted submarine warfare was sinking even civilian ships. Will Luisa’s ship be sunk by a German U-boat? Will she reach São Paulo? Will she make it home to read the love letter that Sam will mail to her? If Sam never hears from her again because her ship sank: he will die too - in his heart.
Just as this story, ink on paper, the fruit of the human imagination, is mysterious in its uncertainty, so too is life mysterious in destiny and fate. We do not know what will happen tomorrow. Rather than fear uncertainty, let us relish the moments, embrace the future and never stop dreaming.
1917 was chosen very intentionally for the setting of “Melancholy Euphoria.” 1917 … mysterious in its ambiguity. This was the year that the United States entered World War One. Did Sam know he was going to be drafted? Will he go off to war and die in the trenches, never to see Luisa again? Or was this earlier in the year, before Congress declared war on Germany: before Sam had any idea of what lied in store?
Likewise, Luisa is no less immune to fate. Unrestricted submarine warfare was sinking even civilian ships. Will Luisa’s ship be sunk by a German U-boat? Will she reach São Paulo? Will she make it home to read the love letter that Sam will mail to her? If Sam never hears from her again because her ship sank: he will die too - in his heart.
Just as this story, ink on paper, the fruit of the human imagination, is mysterious in its uncertainty, so too is life mysterious in destiny and fate. We do not know what will happen tomorrow. Rather than fear uncertainty, let us relish the moments, embrace the future and never stop dreaming.
