Wanting for Nothing

I've been reading one or two Van Gogh letters a day, so I'm not very far along with them.  He was a polite and loving brother in those first letters. . . and I was getting bored.  Today I skipped ahead. . . to the last letter.  I just wanted to see.  I am feeling listless and needed company, I guess.  Someone who was feeling worse than I.  Looking for inspiration, I found a polite and loving brother in that last letter.  Not raging or ranting.  The thing that undid him is the thing that undoes any of us who want.  Wanting is the dangerous thing.

"He who does not want. . . shall have me for his friend."

Sounds like a quote, like the seminal line in some short story.  If it is, I don't know about it.  It is my take on

"He who has me for a friend shall want for nothing."

That is from "Godfather Death," one of the tales from The Brothers Grimm.  It is Death who is speaking.  And if you have ever met someone on friendly terms with him, you know.

But I am not, and so I want for much.  And so did Vincent.

"Ah well, I risk my life for my own work and my reason has half foundered in it. . . ."

This is the standout line for me in his last letter.  I still have to read the letters to find out on my own and to not take it second hand if it was really the work that drove him mad or the desire for some recognition of the talent.  Just now, I can only suppose.

But the factory is driving me mad.  It steals any creative thoughts or at the bare minimum keeps one from acting on them.  I have big plans when I am away, and I think, "I will steal time from them and work on my own thoughts and ideas," but it is impossible there under the fluorescent lights with the constant, smiling threat of some spiritual or emotional violence.  It is exhausting as you all well know if you, too, must work for a living.  And I think, "The weekend will come and I will explore my senses," but they are too dulled to explore and need balms and succoring.  And sometimes, at night, I photograph women who dream, who have dreams.  They, too, are looking for a way out.  And the cafes are filled with young dreamers who make films or paint or play music, or some who simply ride cool bikes and have cool clothes who watch cool films and listen to cool music, who dream that they somehow have escaped and are living the life the've read or seen, the envy of others, the ones who end up in trailer parks or cheap apartments smoking cigarettes and needing more and heavier medication every day. . . to keep living the dream.

Old Vincent, though, he really made it.