A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman

     Her great-grandparents lived in a cottage, in the north, but not terribly far north - a small, plain abode nestled between the dense forest, a quaint garden of lilies, tulips, and hydrangeas, and the lake. Often they drove out, in late summer, and when they arrived the girl would head immediately for the lake, nearly flinging her shoes off and tiptoeing into the dark, tepid water, careful not to disturb any minnows. It was the minnows that she especially liked and which she would catch and and pour into a bucket only to later dump them clumsily into the lake. When the minnows were in hiding and the bumblebees cared not to hover lackadaisically about the tulips, she would be listlessly wandering inside the cottage. Sometimes, the girl would sit cross-legged on the navy blue armchair, her feet still rough and cold from the lake water, and watch her great grandmother solve a crossword puzzle. Perhaps it was the boredom, or perhaps it was the slow, elegant way with which her grandmother scribbled on the page; nevertheless, she would get lost in this quiet observation for half an hour at a time. She thought it would be a sad life, her grandparents living in this cottage, since she was able to amuse herself for a week, but could not imagine staying there for an eternity.
      There was one food which she would eat at the cottage and never at home, and that was strawberries and cream. She would lean against the kitchen counter and address her grandmother in the politest tone she could muster, "Cottage grandma?" - as her great grandmother lived in a cottage and the girl was unable to distinguish between her grandmother and great grandmother - and her grandmother would reply, "Yes, peaches and cream?" The girl thought this particularly strange and wonderful, how her grandmother would call her peaches and cream, as she's never had peaches and cream before, only strawberries and cream. Peaches and cream this, peaches and cream that. It sounded good coming from her grandmother's mouth, her grandmother who smelled like flower-scented soap and lake water.
     Boredom was a continuous feeling during this time spent in the north, one that the girl combated with surprising ease. She had two movies that she enjoyed: Matilda and The Little Mermaid. She would lie, feet interlocked in a portrait of childlike leisure, on the pine-scented quilt on the bed beside the window over-looking the lake. She would watch these movies on the small television over and over again until she was able to recite the lines backwards and forwards. Matilda was the story of a little girl with selfish parents that treat her terribly, and one day Matilda realizes that she has telekinetic powers which she uses to her advantage. Sometimes, as the girl was eating brown sugar and oatmeal at the cramped dining room table, she would try to make her oatmeal move in the slightest just as Matilda had with her Cheerios. One day, she swore she saw the soggy bowl of oats jump.
    The next summer went by and the girl didn't visit her grandparents at the small, plain cottage in the north. The reasons why were unclear to her, but the same foreknowledge which had before simply brushed the lining of her mind now laid a heavy weight on her skull. Her grandparents were old, and the cottage was difficult to maintain. She now understood why her heart sagged and her chest stung when she considered what it would be like to stay there for an eternity. A somber dusk like that of the sky at the cottage hung in her mind as she remembered the pungent smell of bug repellent being sprayed on her knobby knees and bruised legs and heard the soft, elegant scratches of the pencil on the crumpled newspaper in her grandmother's lap.

Tous les mêmes? Pas du tout

There is something inherently fervent about French people. Parisians, especially. There is an urgency in their step, knitted brows, sharp tongues. Beautiful words spill like warm water from their mouths, quickly, carelessly, seductively, as if they are utterly and completely unaware of how saccharine their voice is to my ears. Les mots ne peuvent pas la décrire. Not English ones, at least. The soft clinking of cutlery, like the sounds that tiny stars would make; the hazy, sooty smell of cigarettes brushing the tip of your nose. I was in love with the vague concept of France until I had an affair with Paris.

I stood for hours in the Orangerie. There was a painting by Monet called "Argenteuil" that I remember staring at for a good ten minutes. It was a beautiful impressionist piece, with a gold, antique, very French frame. A small painting. Capable of being looked over, dismissed; eyes carried over it but the feet of passerbys kept moving. The subject is boats (Boats. You laugh. You rub your eye with one hand. 'It's just boats.' That very fact was what captivated me.), with such depth that the minute I laid eyes on it, I fell into it. I stumbled, tripped, and settled into these subtle, comforting colours. I wanted to touch it. Maybe because I wasn't allowed to - when a person is told that they cannot do something, the desire to do that very thing burns now inside them, even though it didn't before. Being rebellious is a pleasure in which only the willing can indulge. The urge to take my face and press it against the painting was so strong that my hands were tense and I could almost feel the canvas against my cheek, like waking up to find yourself lying on hard, cool pavement. Looking at that painting left me standing there, crossed arms and cocked head (in true connoisseur of fine arts fashion) like an idiot, a true simpleton, a cherub freshly dropped on Earth and has scraped its knees.

It's funny, the things that people are willing to put themselves through when they're travelling. On any other day in Canada, waiting in line for two and a half hours in the heat to see a pile of bones underground would be a colossal waste of time. But in Paris, somehow it just feels right. Waiting in that line, as sweat filled my tank top and even my sunglasses couldn't completely block the glaring sun, I felt dizzy from both the impending heat stroke and the excitement of what was to come. The sun beating down on me simply alluded to the culture I was about to absorb. This is worth it, I kept saying every time I had to lean against a tiny fence that wrapped around the perimeter. Somehow, this ridiculous waiting time felt justified. The catacombs were chilling, both physically and mentally.

When we went inside Notre Dame, I felt like I was being assaulted - I somehow didn't expect it to be beautiful, and severely so. On the other hand, I felt slightly sheepish and guilty - I was infatuated with the gorgeous religious imagery. My grandmother is religious, a Roman Catholic with a capital C, devout and stubborn, so naturally I was sent to a catholic elementary school in which I found nothing stimulating nor believable. So, standing in the grandiose yet crowded cathedrale de Notre Dame, I couldn't help but feel strange about my love for the art but apathy for the religion. We lit a candle for my grandmother in one of the cathedrals and thus ended our personal tour de Notre Dame.

I said to my mother one night, "I think that Paris would be the perfect place to take a significant other. Now I know why everyone says this place is so damn romantic. That's because it is." People who visit Paris without a significant other still become a lover of Paris, but also become Paris' lover. She caresses you in the cafes, holds your hand in the art galleries, and messes with your hair in Versailles. She never sleeps, her soft lights shining in the dark, crisp street.

I have never been more introspective. I didn't learn much about myself, but I was very much content on the inside. My thoughts were constant and loud, but happy. On the last night, as I was leaning my hips against the wrought-iron bars across our large apartment window and playing Francoiz Breut on my phone, my mother was chattering away with my sister on her phone and I felt... full. It was cold outside, the night for Parisians had not ended yet, and I felt full of culture and experience; soft, warm, and satisfied. Paris was a hearty meal, one with which I needed no dessert or tea afterward.

Je suis desolee que je ne peux pas trouver les mots qui sont le plus beau pour decrire Paris, mais j'espere que vous me comprennez.

Short story

The boards are terribly brittle. His breathing is heavy and his hands are clammy and cold; shut tight like a clam. There's no pearl in there. The sky is a rich, heavy dark blue, the kind of sky people drink wine under, and the image of a demure woman leaning her hip against a kitchen counter dances across his mind and then dissipates. The boards groan and sigh under his weight but he feels strangely sedated. To look up, however, would be obscene, an almost instant reveal, a head peeking from a slit in the curtain before a big show. So instead he looks down at the planks as he nimbly hops from one to the next across the abandoned building, partially exposed every few seconds by the large windows. He notices that the planks are all the same dull maroon colour, like dried blood that was ineffectually scrubbed out of a garment and left to become a permanent blemish. He feels like this colour. His legs are starting to hurt and the air cuts his lungs, but a small part of his brain tells him that everything he's feeling is deserved. He starts to sprint, and as his limbs carry him, he feels untouchable, suddenly he's not there anymore, he's not anywhere; her blood isn't cascading, a beautiful arch, a crescendo like Beethoven; the silver edge isn't sharp, it's glistening; his footprints are in the sand, he just needs to get to the other side -

He slips. It isn't a noble, merciful plunge, it's abrupt, and throws his body against itself as he claws at the plank and finally grips it with an awkward slap. His body now swings dilatorily, like a pendulum. He pauses to catch his breath, then like water sputtering through a spigot, he lets out an uncontrollable sob. It pours from him, emptying him, an hourglass turned over. It's a breathless shout that doesn't fill the space. It's unsatisfactory. What immediately follows is deathly silence. Somewhere a rat skitters across the cement and a horn honks apathetically.  He shakily heaves himself onto the plank, coughing from the dust and the dryness of his throat. He brushes the paint flecks off the hem of his jeans, a habitual act of vanity, and sits down, legs dangling like a child. Emptying the contents of his pockets, he pulls a stick of gum, a receipt, some lint, and exactly $1.35. He reads the tiny inscription at the bottom of the soft, crumpled receipt. Thank you, please come again. Usually this message is impersonal and passive, but tonight it speaks directly to him. Thank you. Thank you for what? He says it out loud. Thank you. It feels gentle, yet solid on his tongue - hard to swallow. It means nothing to him, but he smiles anyway. Please come again. I can't, he urges the words, as if they're physical. But they remain there nevertheless, printed on the receipt and branded under his eyelids. 

His mind wanders and lands on the faceless woman sipping wine from a clear glass. Her hip shifts slightly, almost provocatively, as she leans against the counter. She's laughing. But this time, he imagines the glass dropping on the floor, shattering but making no sound, the wine snaking across the tile floors. It looks like the colour of the planks before they faded. The dark sky drips on the floor, in her hair, it covers her, and the image is gone. 

He leaves the receipt, arranging the coins and the gum on top of it. All that remains are the words and the sound of runaway feet hitting decaying wood. 

Thank you, please come again. 

Sonnet

Who is it that winks in soft daylight here?

If I were but a shell of myself you;

Of all would turn away and disappear

For all is changed save my skin and its hue 

So wherefore, I ask, is your laugh so strange?

These lines so unfamiliar and new

Are etched into your porcelain skin; changed

Not thy appearance, but thy moral view

Milky white is your treachery and though

Your sweet speech is still novelty to me

It is cold, near hated, and lost its glow

And I know not the person that I see.

   What appeared to be a look of true pain
   Was to me indifference; cold before rain

The laundromat

I'm in a laundromat. When I was 9 years old, I always went to a laundromat - I lived in an old apartment, how else was I supposed to wash my clothes? It was an occasion nevertheless; we went, (usually in the evening, when the sky was light enough so that you could see in the distance if you squinted, but dark so that people's faces were obscured save for the orange glow on half of their skin - or at least that's how I remember it) loading into the car the plastic white and blue baskets filled with white socks turned brown on the soles and sweaters camouflaged in thin dog hairs. The smell is the same. The smell of lavender fabric softener that was strangely far from lavender-smelling, lemon-scented floor cleaner, and a faint tinny smell, like sterling silver or metal machinery. I think of the different ways different people make decisions. Some are calculated, some logical, some prepare and deliberate so intensely that the actual deciding of the matter is no longer important, or even necessary. In their fervour and anxiety, they forget the actual weight that their decision held in the first place. I remember sitting on the entirely incommodious bench, swinging my legs and watching whatever was on the small television set suspended above my head. Sometimes it was good - like a music video on MTV, or it was not so good, like a bizarre TV show I'd never heard of, or even worse - the news. We would all sit waiting, painfully (for me, at least), disinterestedly waiting. I, feeling especially blasé, would walk up and down the aisles and observe people busying themselves with their laundry. An older woman, but not that old, folding a yellow pastel t shirt dejectedly. A young man, probably mid-twenties, tossing his wet, dark towels into the dryer. Two women, chattering away, like birds, about some trivial matter or other, some she-did-what-but-get-this-he-said-that nonsense, while they swiftly fold their delicates. Mostly, I remember the laundromat in close-ups and long shots only - the rows upon rows of washing and drying machines, the ridges on a loonie, the small TV sitting crudely in the ceiling, like a half-hearted smile; the dryer lint and the spotless silver interior of the washing machine.

Now I think, a synonym for clean is laundered.

I clumsily slide a few quarters into one of the washing machine coin slots. I don't have any clothes to wash.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

The elevator

This elevator has twenty-three buttons that shine with an almost bioluminescent glow. Twenty-three buttons and twenty-three floors with people busying themselves in their apartments in this very moment. Like bees in a beehive; like ants in an anthill. The buttons are smooth, small, cold to the touch. Yes, the carpet is green and blue and beige with little diamonds lined up in a never-ending pattern of stars. Yes, the mirror is there, too big, making my head look tiny and deflated. Yes, the emergency stop button and the handrails are there (safety first). I can hear the elevator groaning as it crawls up the shaft, and if I close my eyes I can imagine the cogs and wheels and various other mechanisms stirring together, working perfectly, with stability, with an almost artificial beauty. But I can't shake this feeling, the feeling that something is wrong. Like something is missing.

Doors, perhaps? he says.