A Greek painter once said that Greece is beautiful as a set but lousy as a play. During the end of the summer at the Cyclades, when all the actors had departed to their urban caves, the Aegean regains its splendor. A sense of possibility envelops the narrow streets and whitewashed houses, as the clouds start reappearing in the crystal blue sky – the possibility of a play as beautiful as the scenery in which it takes place.

I walked the winding streets, the strong autumn winds whistling through the electrical cables, whose unsightliness was compensated by the allure of a sound so eerily enchanting. A sound that prepares the senses for the mysterious, and on a starry night, the awesome.

There is something characteristically nostalgic about the end of the Greek summer. The cafes empty. Hundreds of chairs missing their squatters. Footprints on the beach left by a couple on a summer fling, slowly washed away by the ever stronger autumn waves.

It is the sense of the end of life; free life, as it should be, a permanent vacation from the drudgeries of existence, filled with summer grapes, love making under the stars and the knowledge that tomorrow will be a good day, out in the sun, or into the sea.

Yet I was there. Witnessing this emptiness made me wonder whether I was transgressing some natural law. How come I was there, when everybody was missing? Had I beaten death? Yes, that’s how it felt. I was experiencing life in a place devoid of life. A contrast that made you feel so alive. Each breath a victory over death; each step a victory march.