During my year inRome, I kept a paperback next to my bed: “TheUnbearable Lightness of Being,” of course. Every morning I reread page 8 andthe sentences I had underlined as a moody,un-laid teen-ager already anticipating his

deathbed: “What happens butonce . . . might as well not have happened at all. If we have only one life tolive, we might as well not have lived at all.” Next to this I had written inshaded teen-aged block letters: “EUROPEAN CYNICISM OR VERY SCARY TRUTH???”Perhaps it was this book that had first launched my search for immortality.Joshie himself once said to a very important client, “Eternal life is the onlylife that matters. All else is just a moth circling the light.” He hadn’tnoticed me standing by the door to his office. I had returned to my desk intears, feeling abandoned to nothingness, mothlike, yet stunned by Joshie’sunusual lyricism. The part about the moth, I mean.

Here’s how I look at it. Money equals

life. By my estimate, even the preliminarybeta-dechronificationtreatments—forexample, the insertion of SmartBlood to regulate my ridiculous cardiovascularsystem—would run three million yuan per year. With each second I have spent inRome, lustily minding the architecture, drinking and eating enough dailyglucose to kill a Cuban sugarcane farmer, I have been paving the toll road tomy own demise.

But don’t bury me yet, judgmental diary. Anew Lenny heart beats more convincingly than the old one. Eunice Park will saveme. You just watch.

Last night, the last night of my Eurosabbatical, I told myself, Remember this, Lenny. Develop a sense of nostalgiafor something, or you’ll never figure out what’s important. Remember how youmet Eunice at your last orgiastic Roman party, how you rescued her fromwhat’s-his-face, the diabetic American sculptor with the Beatlesque mop andstubby teeth, how you dragged that nano-sized woman into the night with you.

我在罗马的那年，床边一直放着本平装书，当然是《生命中不可承受之轻》。每天早上我都会重读第八页，读那些我划线的句子，一如一个还未下葬的郁郁寡欢少年人预知了自己的眠床：仅发生一次的事......还不如从未发生的好。如果我们仅有此生，那倒不如从未来过。”旁边是我如青少年般稚嫩的黑色大写字母：欧洲式的愤世嫉俗抑或令人恐怖的真理？

或许正是这本书诱导我探索永恒。约西曾亲口对一个非常重要的客户说过：永恒的生命才是唯一有意义的生命，其他的不过是绕光飞舞的飞蛾。”他没注意到站在他办公室门边的我。我回到座位，满眼泪光，觉得自己陷入虚无，如飞蛾般，但仍震惊于约西异于寻常的抒情腔调。我是说，关于飞蛾那部分。

我的看法是：金钱等同于生命。据我估计，甚至初步的反慢性化治疗——比如，注射smartblood（斯玛特血液）来规整我糟糕的心血管系统——每年就要耗费300万。在罗马的每分每秒我都在精神振奋地研究此地建筑，吃吃喝喝所消耗的葡萄糖足可以让一个古巴蔗农破产，我呢，一直以来都是在花钱把自己送往去往死亡的路上。

但是现在不要埋葬我，爱论是非的日记老兄。现在的列尼心跳比过去的那个要有力的多。尤尼斯·帕克会拯救我的。你就等着瞧吧。

昨晚，我在欧洲休假的最后一晚，我告诉自己：列尼，一定要记住这些。一定要对某些事有一种怀旧感，否则你永远搞不明白什么是重要的。记住你是怎样在最后的罗马狂欢聚会上遇到尤尼斯，你是怎样将她从那个谁，那个顶着披头士风格的扫把头、牙齿短短的患糖尿病的美国雕塑者身边救出来的，你怎样把那个身材娇小的女孩拉到夜里和你在一起的。