AND FINALLY City where everyone has a halo
A FOUR-NIGHT break in one of Europe’s most beautiful capitals refreshed my spirit.
For one late afternoon in Lisbon we were walking westwards and the low sun was so blinding that the throngs coming towards us were just dark outlines bathed in golden light. I was suddenly moved.
Why was this? I’d been reading about the devastating earthquake, fire and tsunami (all together) that destroyed the city in 1755, killing an estimated 50,000 people. Unimaginable horror. Yet within a year it was cleared of debris and plans drawn up for the big squares and wide streets that make Lisbon so beautiful today.
Events such as this put our political squabbles (and whinging feebleness) in perspective and remind you of the huge resilience of the human spirit.
People pick themselves up, cities fall and are rebuilt, nothing lasts — not even grief.
The night of that sunset we went to an eccentric bar in the city’s cool Bairro Alto area and heard a young woman called Rosina (accompanied by two guitars) sing fado — traditional Portuguese songs about fate, struggle, longing and survival.
As one expert puts it, ‘the fado speaks with a quiet dignity born of the realisation that any mortal desire or plan is at risk of destruction by powers beyond individual control’.
Is this depressing? No! Because people still survive, and love each other, and raise families — so that life goes on.
To accept fate — yet throw back your head and sing defiance and delight in its face — is to be strong, not weak.
None of us have any idea what lies ahead, so to cherish the moment is the wisest, bravest option. Another line from the Pessoa poem I quote above says: ‘This moment is who we are and that is that.’
Yes, that’s how it is. These are the lessons from art. And on that glorious evening in Lisbon I observed with elation that when people walk towards you out of the sun, back-lit, every single soul wears a halo.
Bel answers readers’ questions on emotional and relationship problems each week. Write to Bel Mooney, Scottish Daily Mail, 20 Waterloo Street, Glasgow G2 6DB, or email bel.mooney@dailymail.co.uk. Names are changed to protect identities. Bel reads all letters but regrets she cannot enter into personal correspondence.