lost in transition

I saw a film, "Lost in Translation". Not bad, weird, about the Japanese and our limits of communication.
Now blogging from Edinburgh, having another coffee in another cafe, the Black Medicine Shop.
I am ususally so busy, time passes quickly, and I don't easily feel lost. My life has a continuous meaning, my own importance has grown into an awareness of self-importance to which I am accustomed by now. Now I am loitering around Edinburgh, watching so many eyes staring, hungry for life, pale kids at the side of sloppy fat mothers stepping into light, coming out of their dark dungeons, drug addicts begging for coins, school classes queueing up for a tour of the castle, their faces bored. I got hungry, bought some samosas, started eating them, placed the bag on top of a litter bin, drank my ginger beer. All of a sudden time appeared as a vacuum, I felt being pulled into nothingness, lost, meaningless, soon to be poor, hungry, thirsty, seriously ill and finally defeated.
The tall grey stone houses, these dark and narrow steps, Fleshmarket Close, a T-shirt shop at the corner, and towering above all of them the castle, the rock and Earl Haig on his splendid horse.
Somewhere near the Writer's Museum a step, a stone, enchisseled the words: "It's a grand thing to get leave to live." I still have to digest that.