When the Ateneu closes

It's May Day and, fortunately, my life doesn't change much. I only detect the sign of the holiday in question when -on the way to Can Brunells, crossing Via Laietana- a rude mob bothers us with a booming salad of firecrackers. However, I detect that the trade unionists of this country of ours look better dressed every day; like good Catalans, they champion lost causes (of which they haven't the slightest idea) like that of Palestine; but they also carry the flag of the tribe and know how to intone Els Segadors with great competence. I can also certify that they have abandoned Marxist doctrine, since they speak little of working-class consciousness and much about the housing problems of the old middle class. We are a neighborhood that lives to sell itself and most establishments in Ciutat Vella are open, so I can get away from the noise and embrace the coixinet of ham and cheese, slightly warm, from my favorite pastry shop. 

But everything turns out to be a mere false alarm and, in a short time, the morbid habit of playing hooky eventually takes its course. Among the greatest inconveniences of this Labor Day is the fact that the Ateneu Barcelonès closes its doors. Stopping the work of such an important cultural and leisure entity as the Ateneu, and even more so when everyone boasts of a lisping stance, turns out to be an idea with devastating consequences, only comparable to the days when my beloved entity decides to stain its well-deserved reputation with absurd open house days. The hours of the day pass and, as one wanders through the neighborhood, one meets fellow members of the entity who —without the possibility of fleeing home to read or distract themselves for a while in our Romantic Garden— bear a grimace of frightful helplessness on their faces. We don't know where to go, we have no place that incites our thoughts; the Ateneu closes and we are a group of castaways.

Today the Ateneu has closed and I know that its very intelligent workers (who have the saintly patience to put up with the horrifying quirks of most of us, probably the most picky social mass in the entire Mediterranean) will tell me that they also have the right to wake up late or to eat a paella. I understand them perfectly, but they must also understand that we don't know how to drink coffee anywhere else but the Docta Casa, and today they have forced us to go to a series of absurd terraces in our neighborhood; and they must also understand that the members of the entity cannot read at home, because we have been reviewing Kierkegaard for decades at the same desk in our sacrosanct and glorious library, so today we have been forced to stay at home and lie stiff on the sofa with a book in our hands, like vulgar socialists of those who have their home pillows overflowing with drool…  

"When the Ateneu closes, it can be easily verified, Ciutat Vella and the entire city fill with authentic helpless zombies"

When the Ateneu closes, it can be easily verified, Ciutat Vella and the entire city fill with authentic helpless zombies, beings who—although inside the house they don't even dare to greet each other—when they cross paths on the street on holidays, they exchange a look of compassion, sweet as cottage cheese and as unhappy as a wedding between people with disparate incomes. This tragedy cannot be tolerated and something should be done because, at this point in the game, at a time when any contingency can kill us, days like Labor Day should not make us waste twenty-four hours in such a supremely stupid way. This seems like a trivial and capricious plea, but life is only a sum of these kinds of mild requests, without much sense, as harmless as anything a common unionist can do...