I once stayed in a hotel in Vienna, one of those self-consciously designed establishments with backlit photos embedded in the walls and tubes of blue, red, and yellow light placed strategically around every common space. My room had a soft blue light in it, a queasy kind of light that made me jet-lagged just looking at it. The desk in my room had a glass plate in the top, under which were four red jalapeño peppers. It took me five minutes to figure out how to turn on the shower.
Another thing the hotel had was aphorisms.
There was one on the wall of the lobby as I walked in, from Polish actor Ryszard Cieslak:
We play roles in life to such an extent that all we would have to do is stop playing to create theater.
Signaling the presiding spirit of a place through the strategic placement of an aphorism is an ancient tradition. Those consulting the oracle at Delphi read “Know thyself ” above the entrance to the Temple of Apollo. Montaigne had aphorisms carved into the beams of his study. Years ago during a sailing trip through the Netherlands, when I was just learning Dutch, I saw Elke morgen, nieuwe zorgen (Every morning, new worries) hung above the front door of a house.
After years of subsidence necessitated the repair and redecoration of much of our house, we painted an abbreviated line from Henry David Thoreau’s Walden on the steps to the bathroom. It’s the first thing we see after waking up and walking out the bedroom door:
Morning is when the dawn is within me.
So imagine my delight when, sipping apple juice the next morning during breakfast at the hotel, I discovered the following saying from Thoreau on the paper doily under my glass:
Water is the only drink for a wise man.
Realizing that I was surrounded by aphorisms, I went looking for them. I found Ralph Waldo Emerson on the Do Not Disturb sign on the door handle:
My hours are peaceful centuries.
and Saint Augustine on the cover of the hotel directory:
The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.
This immersive aphoristic experience got me thinking about which sayings I would choose if I had to place one on each of the objects in my house. On my earbuds, T.S. Eliot would be apt:
We are the music while the music lasts.
On my bookshelves, Arthur Schopenhauer:
Buying books would be a good thing if one could also buy the time to read them in: but as a rule the purchase of books is mistaken for the appropriation of their contents.
And on a Post-it note permanently affixed to my forehead:
Writing is thinking.
