On my monthly journey to Sydney, at the exit of one of the small towns along the road, there is a shop selling old and antique objects that I always visit: old photographs, dusty books, and objects whose original owners left this world years ago.

The strange smell of age in this place creates a feeling in me that is difficult to describe. It brings me sadness, yet I love it. It feels like walking through an old, abandoned cemetery, reading the inscriptions on graves and thinking about lives that are no longer even remembered.

On my most recent journey to Sydney I stopped there again. In one corner of the shop my eye fell on an old spectacles case with its lid closed. I picked it up and opened it. Inside was a very old pair of spectacles with lenses thick enough to be used as magnifying glasses.

It was difficult to determine their age, but the shop owner said he thought they were between fifty and eighty years old, perhaps older.

I thought about the elderly eyes that had once looked through these lenses at writings about which I will never know anything.