Tamaryoku tea and George Benson are today’s hommage to my mother. I’m afraid her star is rising high in my universe today. It’s Valentines day. It’s all about love. While in the background George Benson is smoothly singing about love is a masquerade. My unique mother killed herself this very day of the year some few hundreds years ago. The special Japanese tamaryoku tea warms me up inside out. The taste can only be described with words that talk about products that seem quite revolting as tea flavorings: cod liver, a deep well, stagnant water covered by tiny little spots of duckweed. You get the taste of it? The Japanese and we after them, call it umami. For me now I don’t care much about the name, as I am completely intrigued by the effect it causes. A very subtle guitar softly touched, the slow beat of the eighties, long stretched rhythmical sequences, instrumental only; one easily visualizes the stardust through the air slowly and softly touching the face of the earth. Did I mention snow flakes softly fluttering outside my window? Uncertain and insecure about their very ice cold presence this Valentine’s day, they add up to the magic multiple impressions of the moment. Attentive listening, attentive tasting, attentive seeing evoke an illusion. An illusion of a special moment in time, unique, as elusive as it is eternal. And this makes me dwell over the difference between reality and fantasy. In what reality did my mum dwell? Did she not taste umami and listen to the soft tones of an electric guitar? Don’t we all do this? What made her renounce it? Wise woman, tell me your secret. Your secret of not being attached. Your secret of being a hero. Is it a life full of pain that formed you? No, Not at All! Because in that case you would have loved and cherished the little things. If your life would have been full of dreadful pain, wouldn’t you? Or am I mistaken? Probably I am. It’s not to me to understand you. We shouldn’t focus at understanding each other, shouldn’t we? We should focus at loving each other. Even if that takes evoking an illusion. Even if that takes soft music, snow on Valentines day and tamaryoku tea to tantalise the senses. We should do that. Because that’s what we have.