Friday, May 21:
As we sit down to breakfast, R. says to me, "How different it will be tomorrow!" Then he reads to me Schopenhauer on beards and also the introduction to the "Apparent Deliberateness" chapter, praising Sch.'s hypothetical skill.
The weather is gray and showery, and R. says the good Lord owes it to him to behave nicely, since he is taking so much trouble with him. Friend Gross sends me news of a death; I interrupt my little preparations to express my sympathy for him.
Yesterday, while I was shopping in town, I was vividly reminded of the stultifying effect of a big city: at the cafe, where I was ordering champagne, beggars; in the carriage in which I returned home, flowers, put there for me by R.; while, as I get in, a funeral procession meets my eyes, and all of this accepted without reflection, my mind full of my shopping. And thus is life, day after day, for city dwellers.
At five o'clock rehearsal of the Parsifal choruses, separation at last at 10 o'clock, after a day containing five rehearsals.