Here, more than anywhere else, I have trouble discerning and comprehending the present moment, the meaning of everything that I see while moving about. All I see of people is their bodies, their appearance, their gestures. And what they put in their basket or cart. From which I deduce their standard of living, more or less. But I cannot see the essential, which remains concealed even by the overflowing carts of weekend shopping: the incessant calculations most people are forced to do, back and forth, between the need to eat and the price of food. The less money one has, the more carefully one must shop, making no mistakes. More time is needed. A list must be made. The best deals in the sales flyer must be selected. This is a form of economic labor, uncounted and obsessive, that fully occupies thousands of women and men. The beginning of wealth, of the levity of wealth, is discernible in the act of taking an item from a shelf of food without first checking the price. The humiliation inflicted by commercial goods: they are too expensive, so I’m worth nothing.
From Look at the Lights, My Love by Annie Ernaux (31)
Yale University Press, 2023
Originally published in France, 2014
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