Thank you to everyone who joined us for this session!

For this session we read an excerpt “The person in the picture” from Ersi Sotiropoulou’s collection of short stories, The Art of Feeling Nothing (ΗΤέχνηνα μηνΑισθάνεσαιΤίποτα) Translated by Vinia Ntakari, posted below.

Our prompt was: “There is a picture of me ...”

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"The person in the picture" an excerpt from Ersi Sotiropoulou’s collection of short stories, The Art of Feeling Nothing (ΗΤέχνηνα μηνΑισθάνεσαιΤίποτα) Translated by Vinia

There is a picture of me in Madourí.* I'm wearing a white t-shirt and I'm coming from the sea with a bucket full of water. I'm in the light, the sun beating down from above. I'm obviously heading to the outdoor bathroom to put the bucket back. Each of us, when finished, had to go down to the beach and refill it for the next person. 
The lens probably caught me off guard, I'm not smiling, but I don't look bothered either. In my left ear, a small earring is noticeable. Even though I remember the earring, a gold hoop, I don't feel any familiarity with the person in the picture. It's entirely me, yet simultaneously, it isn't. For some reason, I don't recognize myself. The years that have passed stand between us, a heavy cloud of friends gone, appointments missed, significant and insignificant events. A lot has happened and the person in the picture is unaware of it all.
 
(* a small uninhabited island in the Ionian Sea, near Lefkada, Greece.)