Poor People

...And another thing, my dear: a man's a funny thing sometimes, a very funny thing. Oh, Saints alive, the things he'll talk about and come out with at times! And what's the result, what follows from it? Nothing at all follows and the result is such rubbish that may the Lord preserve me! I'm not angry, my dear, I'm not, but it's just upsetting to remember everything, upsetting that I wrote to you so ornately and stupidly. And I went off to work today strutting like a peacock; there was such radiance in my heart. For no reason at all there was such festivity in my soul; I felt cheerful! I started work on my papers assiduously - and what was the result of it later on! It was only later on when I looked around that everything became as it was before - grey and gloomy. Still those same ink-stains, still those same desks and papers, and me too still the same; so, I was exactly the same as I had been - so what reason was there to have been riding around on Pegasus? And where had it all come from? Because the sun had peeped through and the sky had turned azure! Was that why? And what are these fragrances, considering the things that turn up under the windows in our courtyard! Evidently it all seemed that way to me because of my foolishness. But after all, it does sometimes happen that a man can get lost in his own feelings like that and talk nonsense. It occurs for no other reason than the excessive, stupid enthusiasm of the heart. I didn't walk home, but plodded; for no reason at all my head began aching; it was evidently just one thing leading to another. (Maybe the wind got into my back.) I was delighted by the spring, like a complete idiot, and I went out in my thin greatcoat.