We gradually become accustomed to our delusions. If we are not too ambitious, we may have a chance of retaining a sufficient measure of optimism to defy the sadness that the years deposit on the soles of passing time. This truism applies to my visits to the sea as well, turned golden by a particular kind of melancholy and gratitude. Those who experience the sea as a kind of reward, a gift rather than a mere fact, will know what I am talking about. Some of us only become aware of the great blueness when we sink to the bottom of it, and there’s no shame in that. “That’s how I’ll be while I’m alive, he’d say always and everywhere, until summer love took him down. The season’s here, she’s here, her name is Libi, she comes from London.” The Split rappers TBF—The Beat Fleet—shout at me through my earphones. They’re great jokers, having found the perfect mixture of existential bitterness and the honey of human illusion. I’ve been here at this writer’s residency for only a couple of days but I’ve already fallen in love with Split and its smoothly polished kalas—the characteristic narrow streets of our Mediterranean cities—which I celebrate with the loyal company of my footsteps.