2 + 8 = a perfectly imperfect score

It's been over a month since I've written, well, anything. I'm not sure what I really want to say in this entry, which is always a risky way to start -- so "bloggish" -- which I hate. Nonetheless, Virginia Woolf, hear my cry, and may this stream of consciousness find its own theme. 

~~~~~

My dad called me last night to wish me an early happy birthday, and as we wrapped up our conversation, he said, "Well, it was about this time, twenty-eight years ago that your mom and I were headed to the hospital...." I think I've heard him say some version of this phrase nearly every year; yet this year, for some reason, it made my throat tighten more than it usually does during those moments that say "I love you" better than any "I love you" ever could. What a memory to have and then to relive on each child's birthday. We all have them. Several of them. The "this time last week" or the "this time a year ago" or the " it was the summer of . . ."

                                                                            ~~~~~

I was trying to teach the words retrospective and nostalgic to a student the other day by using the phrase "that's so retro." He got it, and even laughed at my lame joke about cassette tapes; yet I thought, "Buddy, you have no idea. Not yet, anyway." I feel nostalgia so keenly (which is largely due to my grudgingly-admitted romantic nature), and I haven't even hit the big 30 yet. Sometimes I think that's what will kill me in the end -- the emotions of remembrance. 
                                                                            ~~~~~
It's not that I really want to go back in time; rather it's more a fierce wish to hold on to the vividness of it all. It always feels like a small death (not THAT little death, you dirty minds, you) when I realize that a significant moment in my life has some mold growing over the edges of it, threatening to cover it in grey fuzz. Eventually we cast out the moldy items, don't we? Maybe that's how we survive "death by memory," after all. I dunno....I know I fear the fuzz, though.
                                                                           ~~~~~
At my last birthday party, a dear friend said "27's your year. I know it." In many ways it was. I've certainly learned more about myself this past year than any other, and I certainly hope that becomes a pattern each year. I have fit quite a bit in -- quite an amazing bit. A bit that, as I look back, will probably end up being the catalyst for the best elements of my life. Every year is "your year" in a way, though. 
                                                                           ~~~~~
I don't dread my days, anymore. I haven't for awhile, but as I've started new job ventures, I was fearful that the sheer relief of the summer would once again be quelled by the demands of supporting "living." Though I probably have more stressors in my life at the moment, the fact that I actually wake up and anticipate the day does wonders for handling the minutiae -- which is really all those stressors are in the grand vista of it all.
                                                                           ~~~~~
Minutiae. How it gets in the way. How it creates vast misunderstandings, starts wars, kills moments, worships deafness, defies stick-to-it-ness. How it reveals. How it IS nuance, complexity, diversity, and individuality. How.
                                                                            ~~~~~
It is midnight now. I'm 28. It's my year this year, too. And so the page turns . . . poems to come. Thanks for reading again.

Home

I've been home a week now. Yesterday I was recounting to someone what I had done with my summer and his response was "Gosh, I bet you hate being back." I don't -- far from it. Of course I would have relished staying longer, and of course I don't like the fact that I have to come home to bills or laundry or the stark reality at the moment that I am unemployed. Yet, despite the fact that there will always be some wanderlust in me, I know I will always be happy to come home. I was almost ten when we left Ghana, and I think my child's memory of those goodbyes has imprinted a strong sense of "homebodiness" on me. Somewhere deep in my young unawareness was the knowledge that I would never see most of these people again -- people who had been a part of my home since my first memory. Now, somewhere deep in my adult awareness is the fear of saying those types of goodbyes. I still tear up when I pull away from my grandmother's or nana's house after a trip up to see them. I still get a bit misty when either one of my parents leaves the country for a bit. I cried talking to my nana right before I took off for Paris, and I was on the verge of tears saying goodbye to my hosts in Paris. Goodbyes will always be hard for me, even if they are simple, temporary ones. Yet, the emotion of leaving just makes the joy of returning even sweeter, and for that I am thankful. 

So, the grand question is, "Now what?" I quit my job, I left the country, I've come home, so now......what?

Since I resigned, it has been interesting to listen to friends' comments and suggestions regarding the next stage of my life. I realize that I have done something that many people wish they had done or could do at some point - quit their job and leave the country. I've done that, but now I'm back home and I think it is very easy to continue romanticizing what should happen next.

"Why didn't you just stay and teach in Paris?" "Why don't you teach overseas?" "Have you thought about relocating?" "You should start your doctorate!"

What is most interesting to me is not these suggestions (all of which I've of course considered - some for years on end -- and they do bother me a bit, because in the suggesting is the insinuation that I've not seriously considered them -- give me some credit, folks!), but the fact that they don't seem to quite buy my response, which at this point is simply to say "I've thought about that, but it doesn't feel quite right, and I have too many other doors here that I don't want to close just yet." Once this comes out of my mouth, I can see the ticker-tape in their heads clicking with she just isn't ready to really take a big risk, she is so tied to that church performing arts program, she is just too afraid to go it alone and really see what the world holds, she just isn't driven, she really fears true independence, she isn't taking advantage of the opportunities outside the world she has created here...

I know this all stems from a love for me and a desire for me to have and do what's best. I get that and appreciate it. I want that too, and for now I think "the best" is manifested in simpler things - things that may not measure up on a global scale of success. (What's also interesting, too, is the suggestions above usually come from friends who have at some point traveled extensively and/or lived overseas, relocated several times either for a job or for the adventure of doing so, or climbed the degree ladder and/or pursued their career to a higher level of "prestige.") We really do only know how to advise based on our own experiences or regrets of not having certain experiences....

What was so wonderful about this trip was the time of quiet I had -- even admist a tourist-bustling Paris. In this quiet, I was able to take the time to mentally wittle down all the possibilities, far and near, to what I really want at this point.

• I want to find a job that enables me to contribute positively to society w/o having to compromise my ethics or sit in front of a computer screen all day, that enables me to make enough money to cover the basics....and still have the occasional treat or trip if possible, and that enables me to devote the time I'd like to give to growing artistically.
• I want to be as near as I can to the people I love.
• I want to finally be confidant enough in what I offer to the world so that whoever becomes a part of my life is not a missing piece of the puzzle, but rather someone who admires the fact that I put the puzzle together myself and now wants to start putting together a new puzzle - with me.
• I want to finish a collection of poems before the year ends.
• I want to direct a play sometime in the nearish future.
• I want to continue voice lessons.
• I want to get involved in some acting classes and writing workshops.
• I want to be preparing for a theatre or musical production as often as I can.
• I want to be open to the unexpected, even if that means not having or doing some of the above.

I'm not discounting living in another country or city or getting my doctorate, but it is just as wonderful and just as valid that I am here and might stay here. I will always want to travel, and I will always want to know more, but I do know, now more than ever, that I will always want to come home.

Below was today's Writer's Almanac poem. I needed it after a week of being back in the "real world" and the certainty of my uncertainty.

The Real Work

by Wendell Berry

It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work,

and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.

The mind that is not baffled is not employed.

The impeded stream is the one that sings.

"The Real Work" by Wendell Berry, from Standing by Words.

Omega Sorbet

Ah, endings and beginnings. Circles. I leave Paris today -- longing to stay longer, but rested and ready for the next phase. Paris has been a beautiful bookend to each side of the last decade of my life. Ten years ago I left Paris, wide-eyed, naïve, uncertain of the college experience waiting for me, and horribly "in love" with my high school crush. Ten years later I am leaving Paris again, still able to widen my eyes, wiser, again uncertain of what lies ahead, and wonderfully experienced in a host of ways I never would have imagined ten years ago.

I finished my Paris journey yesterday at La Place de Contrescarpe, just around the corner from Hemingway and Hadley's flat. I drank a beer and let the past week, then month, then year, then three years, and then decade wash over me, each period marked by its own wave of salt and sand and water.

Paris has been a deliciously refreshing palate-cleanser -- a sorbet that sits on the edge of your tongue, so good and so cool that you just want to hold it there until it starts to burn a bit, then melt. The choice is either to swallow or spit. The next course is waiting -- and if you swallow, you'll get to taste every aspect of what that dish holds. Today, I'm swallowing. Au revoir, Paris!

~~~~~~~~~

I haven't posted this week because I've just been doing, doing, doing. So below is the list w/ commentary - enjoy!

Saturday - workshop at Shakespeare and Company: I read "The Mango Tree" in a library, over-looking the Seine and Notre Dame, received wonderful feedback and good thoughts to consider, met wonderful, new and extremely talented people, had beers with said people, and then met Anja to go to a jazz club. A yummy day.

Sunday - I slept in and had a beautifully lazy day lounging on the top of a roof during a BBQ hosted by new friends. At some point in my life, I would like to live where I can have a rooftop garden...enchanting.

Monday - wandering, lots of walking (partially due to train malfunction), cello concert in front of Shakespeare and Company, eating of best falafel EVER, evening at Au Chat Noir café for Spoken Word Paris - an open mic night for anyone who wants to try out their stuff in front of an audience.  I read a new poem (below) for the Ghana collection, and chatted and drank the hours away with some of the people I had met on Saturday until they kicked us out of the bar at 2.

Tuesday - rented a bike and spent the days roaming the old hunting grounds of Versailles. Beautiful. Much of the time, it was just me, my bike, the sunshine and a sheep or horse. Ate lunch with my feet cooling in the canal as I watched the rowboats and swans float by.

Wednesday - explored the chic side of Paris with new friend Gabriella. Walked in Hermès, drooled, bought the best macarons in the world at Ladurèe, lunched in a cafè...later that night saw Batman!!! Loved it. Just loved it.

Thursday - farewells to all previous and current locations of Shakespeare and Company, wandering of favorite streets, lunch with Sharon and Ricky Nuckols and two grandsons (friends from Dunwoody), final drink, fixing of farewell and thank you dinner for Andrea and Anja, evening stroll looking at lovely French houses, started the packing feat.

Here is the poem I read - not sure about it yet, but since I read it already, I figured I'd post it. It is still untitled, and very much a draft.

[Untitled]

on the hottest days

near Christmastime

i'd hop

on one foot then the other

until my burning soles

could take no more

then i'd run on tip-toe

to the veranda

and sinking against

the outer wall lean

to press my cheek

to the ceramic

and soak 

up the cool

then if the heat didn't press

me

inside I would climb

our compound wall

and sit on top

under the fire tree

below

our housekeeper sold

groundnuts

sweets

verbena-scented

hand-salve

i would strip the fan-

like branches

and toss

them into the still

hot air

pretending

they were snowflakes

i'd never seen

and i was the angel

who made it snow

whenever little children

prayed

Moments that come. . .

Today I went to Le Centre Georges-Pompidou, France's national modern art museum. This just might be my second favorite museum ever -- second after Le Rodin, of course. The architecture of the building is really something to behold, and it has what I think is the best view of Paris in Paris. Their reigning temporary exhibit is one of Gerhard Ritcher's works -- a fascinating artist (I've included a picture of his painting "September" below -- the subject is the attack on the Twin Towers). Next to each stage of his exhibit, there were quotes by him about his work or art in general, and one that caught my attention, which of course I did not think to write down in the moment, was something to the effect of letting art be a reflection of "what comes" and not something that is forcibly "created." This struck a chord with me, for I feel so keenly that forced creativity is quite obvious: perhaps, and unfortunately so, not always to the artist, but certainly to the audience. This is something I fear in all of my own creative ventures. For example, I can feel the moments on stage when I'm actively "acting" versus the ones when I'm truly present in my circumstances as a character. The ones when I'm conscious of acting are the devastating moments in my life on  a stage. How can I expect an audience to believe me if I am aware that what I'm portraying is an "act?" I cannot. Yet, I think most things in life are true to this sentiment. Whenever we say something we don't really mean, but rather, forcibly create in order to obey convention or propriety or to hide our own insecurity of not knowing what to say, the forcedness of the comment is seemingly always evident. I thought today that the world might be a very different place if humanity consistently created based on what naturally came to us, through our unique experiences, versus creating what we want or what we know others expect of us.

Over the past three days, I've had some amazing moments. Moments that I very much hope I will let something "come" out of, even if it is a merely a memory that doesn't fade as quickly as the rest.

Instants à se rappeler (Moments to remember)

- saying a quiet "thank you" and placing a flower on the graves and memorials of Oscar Wilde, Maria Callas, Gertrude Stein, Molière, Chopin, and Edith Piaf (at Cimitière Perè LaChaise)

-staring at Dalì sculptures - ones I'd never seen nor knew existed

-eating apricots on the lawn in front of Sacre Coeur

-having my portrait sketched on the streets of Montmartre . . . Story: I knew it was a scam when he said "a mee-lee-on booocks" when I asked how much it cost. Of course he had already began sketching and I thought, Why the hell not? So, yes the price was ridiculous, but I received a very lovely sketch (an investment, he said - ha) and two fabulous compliments from him. The first was in French -- he said I had a "bouche sensuelle" ( which he made sure to clarify as "non sexuelle, sensuelle"  -- I assured him I took it as a compliment). The second came after I had talked him down to half his asking price in which he told me, in English, that I was a "good beezness wooman." And his name was Robert.

- writing in a couple cafès and feeling good about what I was able to put down on paper

- being fully aware in the moment that I just might be eating the best pastry I will ever place in my mouth (it is called a Paris Brest and the chic shop from whence it came had won the prize for making the best of these)

- savoring the last dregs of a St. Bernardus (Belgian brew) on the Rue de l'Odéon

-walking down a cobbled sidewalk by an old man and his old dog, recalling the words to "Autumn Leaves" as he played it on his old clarinet:

The falling leaves drift by the window,
The autumn leaves of red and gold.
I see your lips, the summer kisses,
The sun-burned hands I used to hold.
Since you went away the days grow long,
And soon I'll hear old winter's song.
But I miss you most of all, my darling,
When autumn leaves start to fall.

"September" by Gerhard Ritcher

Antypocots

I have discovered two new loves today: fresh apricots and Montmartre. Today was a beee-yew-tee-ful day, and I was finally able to wear one of my sundresses! O, the joy good, clean sunshine and breezes un-laden with rain can bring!

Below is another old poem of mine that will be included  in the collection on which I'm currently working (along with "The day . . ." and "The Mango Tree"). It expresses the antithesis of today's weather.

Miasma

For a third of every year growing up, the sun was brown.

Harmattan would descend on the West African coast

as the Sahara reached her arms across grasslands

to dip her fingers in the sea.

She slipped past cracked windows

and squeezed through screens,

layering surfaces with a coarse film.

Nothing stayed clean for long.

In the middle of these days, I would squint

against gritty breezes, to see the sun squinting back.

Once the rains came, the sand ran down drains and out to sea

or sank into the mud, mixing the desert with cocoa soil and gold.

I would put on my swimsuit and stand under the carport,

watching the rain rinse the grime from my red tricycle.

I knew that when the rains stopped, I could look out my window,

and see a polished sun unrolling pearl-colored ribbon

onto bananas, ripe in the morning’s green.

Tonight the storms will come—with another sort of rain.

I’ll watch behind candles and sliding screen doors,

knowing that tomorrow’s sun will rise behind a haze.

- Emily Anne Decker (2009)

Disclaimer: (my vanity speaks)

I've been doing some re-reading of these posts, and I must insert a brief disclaimer about the numerous typos I've seen. I have become more adept at typing on a French keyboard (many key things, like the period and the 'a', are in different places - hehe, pun intended), but I still have to fix several typos at the end of each post. In re-reading, I see my editing skills are also on vacation a bit. Please forgive the errors; I shall try to fix them as I come across them.

At a loss...

If I had posted on Thursday, I would have titled it "Waiting for Death and Transportation." If I had posted Friday, it would have been "Helmut." Yesterday would have been "Où est le Bastille?" So today, I really have no idea what to title this post. Titles are important to me - they have to symbolise a great deal in a small amount of text and not solely represent the subject of the text; it must go beyond. . . For example, if I were to write about my breakfast this morning, "My Breakfast" would be, in my opinion, the drabbest of titles. On the other hand, "Toast" is a fabulous title. There are just so many directions one could take with "Toast." But now, I've waited too long to encompass everything in the past four days into a meaty post, and therefore I'm at a loss for a decent title. So, I'll choose one topic, and then for those of you who are reading for a vicarious experience and just want to know what I've done, I'll provide a list of my activities at the bottom.

Grr, grr, grr...

He finished his cappuccino with a quick toss back of his head, folded his English map of "Discovering Paris"  and stuffed it in his back pocket, hoisted his  R.E.I. backpack and his shopping bags (yes, a bit of an oxymoron, which means he was probably fabulously interesting), and, with a quick glance back at me, strode out of the café. I had said nothing to him. I was waiting for a friend who was late -- I had finished my cappuccino, and had been looking at my map, and had been slyly glancing in his direction . . . and I said nothing. It would have been the easiest phrase ever uttered just to  say, "Are you in Paris for long?" or "Are you here on vacation?" or "Would you like to see my map?" Nothing. He was four feet away, he was alone, he was cute, he spoke English, he looked like he needed/wanted some conversation, he was dressed too butch to be gay, he seemed a few years older than me ... I can't help but feel that I lost an amazing opportunity. Or at least one in which to be nice to someone.

Of course, he didn't speak to me and so was just as gutless as I. But I do have to say that when I am unsure and on my own, I think I have this ability to take on an aura of unapproachability that really only the most unaware or arrogant of men would have the nerve to puncture. 

This was Friday. So now I have lived all weekend (in which fireworks and bars and dancing were all factors) being the 3rd or 5th or 19th non-French-speaking wheel, churning with the what-ifs, what-onlys, god-i-wish-i-hads, and all manner of self-deprecations. This experience exposed a characteristic of mine that I have been and am desperately trying to improve, if not annihilate altogether: my perpetual second-guessing of my gut. I've got good instincts. I get people. I'm a good listener. I see. And yet, stepping out on a limb sometimes is like asking me to jump down a dark hole of unknown depth and destination. Even if every nerve-ending in my being says do it. It's your chance. It's now or never. It's not a pit of vipers; it's a front row seat to the rest of your fabulous life, baby, I still opt for never too many times. 

Grr...grr...grr.

So. Now, I must let this go. I have two weeks to improve upon this trait, and I shall try to do thusly. Just had to air my frustration.

Thursday - "Waiting for Death and Transportation"

- after standing in line for two hours,  descended the depths of the Catacombs. Eerie and fascinating.

-mastered the French transportation system by riding two buses and four different trains to arrive at my destinations and not once wound up in the wrong place

-went to Père LaChaise. Was rained out after 20 minutes and decided to shell out the bucks on a sunnier, warmer day for a guided tour. LOTS of famous graves, ya'll. And they ain't easy to find. (Guided tour is on Tuesday)

Friday - "Helmut"

- slept in, went to Helmut Newton exhibit -- ah-freakin'-mazin'

- had experience which has been foretold, 

- went shopping with Anja (host) on Rue de Rivoli

- went to a b-day party in a bar -- It: crowded, hot, loud, Me: 19th wheel, trapped in corner unable to converse with younger-than-me strangers I probably would have never spoken to first based on my behavior during the experience which has been foretold.

Saturday - "Où est le Bastille?"

- slept in, breakfasted, Saturday house chores

-went to open air market/festival and bought a CUTE skirt

-jumped out of the car (it had stopped) to photograph the steps on which Edith Piaf was born

-drove by where the Bastille used to exist -- in my ignorance, I forgot that it was destroyed the night of the revolution and so asked where it was

-lovely dinner with hosts

-longingly looked at fireman hosting a dance 

- with older hosts and too late, so we zoomed off to a hotel to watch the fireworks

-fireworks started before we reached destination, so jumped out of car and stood on a wall and peered over a chain-link fence with little French children crowding in around me to ooh-and-aah in our universal tongue

Today - "Sole"

-went to Sunday market to purchase ingredients for lovely Sunday dinner of sole - C'est magnifique.

-went to Rodin's house in Meudon where he is buried. beautiful. house for sale next door. want to buy it. very much.

-afternoon champagne with friends of hosts and their ah-dorable two-year-old

Beaux Arts

The weather here, though gloriously cool, has been on the gloomy side . . . yesterday and today especially were, so I thought they would be good museum days. Upon my encountering the line to get in to the Musée d'Orsay, I decided to buy a  2-day museum pass, a handy ticket that allowed me to skip the lines and have unlimited access to most of the major museums and monuments in Paris . . . for two days. I calculated that if I went to at least four museums in those two days, the price would even out, and I would still get to skip the lines. So yesterday I went to the Orsay and the archeological crypt of Notre Dame, and today I went to the Orangerie and the Louvre. Folks, I have crammed in more famous art than you can imagine. I realize that I'm here for an extended stay and could have tackled these at a leisurely pace, yet there is SO much to do, and though I do like art and museums, I would much rather wander a Paris street than a Paris museum. Nonetheless, one cannot come to Paris without seeing the masters and their masterpieces, no? It has been wonderful, but it also feels like I've eaten just a bit too much of something very rich and, as a result, lost the savory quality of the experience towards the end. Over the past few days I've sampled Monet, Manet, Renoir, Cézanne, Soutine, Picasso, Gauguin, Matisse, Rodin, Van Gogh, Modigliani, Da Vinci, Michaelangelo, Botticelli, Lippi, Vermeer, Delacroix, Van Eyck and many more whose names I cannot recall at the moment. I'm stuffed. The beauty is, if I want to go back and taste something again before I leave, I can. I just have to wait in line and pay the entrance fee . . .

L'Orangerie was my favorite . . . small and on the edge of the Tuileries, it features a fabulous collection of Modern artists and Monet's vast Water Lily panels in rooms he designed just for those paintings.

On another note, I solidly decided just this morning,  to add on to the poems set in Ghana that I've already written, and compile a collection entitled (this is a working title, ya'll, so have mercy) Gossamer and Ghanaian Fruit: A Collection of Poems. I don't think I'll post many of my poems up for a bit, but in the interest of the theme of this blog and in honor of my past two days, below is a poem by W.H. Auden.

Musée des Beaux Arts
About suffering they were never wrong,
The old Masters: how well they understood
Its human position: how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:
They never forgot
That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse
Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.

In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water, and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

Finding the steps of The Lost Generation

According to Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein was the only one who really thought the artists of the 20s were "lost." She had heard the owner of  a mechanic shop scolding one of his young workers by saying "You are all a lost generation." She reiterated this thought to Hemingway one night, agreeing heartily with the sentiment. Hemingway later used the phrase, but he never agreed with it: " . . . I thought that all generations were lost by something and always had been and always would be . . ."

Yesterday, I decided to walk in the steps of Hemingway based on passages from A Moveable Feast. This memoir covers 1921-1926 of his years in Paris -- years he struggled to write his first novel and yet was happily content in his marriage to his first wife, Hadley, and their humble life together with their son, "Bumby." He was around my age during these years, which were extremely formative for him. It's no wonder that this was the time he chose to memorialize, the time when "we were very poor and very happy." Yet my steps yesterday were not just the steps of Hemingway. They were the steps of Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot, F. Scott Fitzgerald, James Joyce, and all who found shelter in the arms of the Left Bank in the years following WWI. I'll let Hemingway's words help narrate my path.

I began by finding the old location of Shakespeare and Company (quite by accident I stumbled upon the street of its original location - by the time Hemingway arrived in Paris, it had moved.) "In those days there was no money to buy books. I borrowed books from the rental library of Shakespeare and Company, which was the library and bookstore of Sylvia Beach at 12 rue de l'Odéon." What he doesn't have room to explain is that Sylvia Beach is responsible for the unification, nuture, publicity, and literal survival of most of the notable writers in Paris at the time -- established and fledging, American, British, and French alike.  She single-handedly published Ulysses (first - before Joyce became greedy and let another company publish the 2nd edition). I am currently reading a fascinating biography on her and this bookshop (which I purchased in the new version of this shop)...I was awe-struck when when I found it. I stood where this picture was taken. That is Sylvia Beach in the doorway.

Then ". . . I walked down by different streets to the Jardin du Luxembourg . . . through the gardens and stop[ped] in at the studio apartment where Gertrude Stein lived at 27 rue de Fleurus." Stein's salon was quite famous and was frequented by writers, artists (Picasso, to name one), and philosophers. Her salon held Cèzannes, Matisses, Picassos....everyone who wanted a start in Paris tried to get an invitation to meet with her. People easily fell out of her favor, though, and Hemingway eventually did. It was quite an experience to stand across the street and imagine all these great artists walk in and out . . . 

Next, I walked "up the rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs to the Closerie des Lilas. I sat . . .with the afternoon light coming in over my shoulder and wrote." And had a pricey, but wonderful lunch. It wasn't so famous when Hemingway, Pound, and Fitzgerald frequented it. Both Hemingway and Ezra Pound lived on the rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs for a few years - Pound for several. I wasn't sure of the numbers and didn't see any commemorative plaques...still it was nice to walk the street they walked many times a day..."Ezra Pound was always a good friend and was always doing things for people. The studio where he lived with his wife Dorothy on the rue Notre-Dames-des-Champs was as poor as Gertrude Stein's studio was rich. It had very good light and was heated by a stove and it had paintings by Japanese artists that Ezra knew." I then made my way over to 74 Cardinal Lemoine - one of Hemingway's and Hadley's first Paris apartments. "Home in the rue Cardinal Lemoine was a two-room flat that had no hot water and no inside toilet facilities except an antisceptic container, not uncomfortable to anyone who was used to a Michigan outhouse. With a fine view and a good mattress and springs for a comfortable bed on the floor, and pictures we liked on the walls, it was a cheerful, gay flat." It's a cute address now, with a little boutique under it called, aptly, "Under Hemingway."

 My last stop before just wandering the St. Germain area and the Blvd. St. Michel in general was the point of the Ile de la Cité (the oldest part of Paris on which sits Notre Dame). "At the head of the Ile de la Cité below Pont Neuf where there was the statue of Henri Quatre, the island ended in a point like the sharp bow of a ship and there was a small park at the water's edge with fine chesnut trees, huge and spreading, and in the currents and back waters that the Seine made flowing past, there were excellent places to fish."

Today, there is still a lovely park with large, spreading trees. A weeping willow crowns the point, and in place of the fishermen are many cuddly couples.

I think this day will remain one of my favorite days. For it is not often one gets the chance to consciously walk in the steps of those who have created a movement, especially a movement such as that which rose from the ashes of the first world war and the inklings of the destruction mankind has the power to create. Yet, they were not lost. . . and whenever they thought they were, they found themselves in Paris.

"Paris was always worth it and you received return for whatever you brought to it."

All quotes taken from: Hemingway, E. A Moveable Feast. Scribner's and Sons: New York, 1964.

Pilgrimage

There is a sacredness in all this walking -- walking over stones and dirt and layers of bones, walls, pamphlets, shrapnel . . . I've traversed over the Gauls, the beginnings of revolutions, the literary birth of Hemingway and Joyce, and the German occupation. It is too much to be be aware of, too much to hold in one's consciousness. 

This trip is becoming a pilgrimage of sorts . . . one that started to become such after I read Hemingway's A Moveable Feast, his memoirs of his time in Paris in the early-mid 20s. Before I left, I imagined myself retracing his steps, sitting at the cafe where he met F. Scott Fitzgerald, frequenting the bookshop which is now an homage to the bookshop that fostered the Paris community of Modernists and the best minds of the 20th century, sitting on the left bank of the Seine with a baguette, a bottle of wine, and writing. I have done  some of this and will do some of this. Yet there is more. Each spur-of-the-moment decision to walk down one street melds into other decisions . . . some loosely planned, others not. I don't know how much I'll "produce" on this trip, but the emotional, and therefore spiritual, quietness that comes with a journey of purposeful wandering is one that can't help but yield creative musings . . . one quickly discovers why Paris has been both such a haven and catalyst for great art and thought. The city bleeds depth.

As a result, my weekdays have become days of proximal wandering, and my weekends are being reserved for little days trips. For those of you who are reading primarily to keep up with what I'm doing, below is a brief play-by-play of the past three days of sheer wonderfulness.

Friday - I slept in, then took the bus/train in to Paris, near Notre Dame. My first stop was Shakespeare and Company (I'll probably do another post on just this mecca; this is the homage  I mentioned above), where I sat in the reading library overlooking the Seine and Notre Dame and read portions of the collected poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins. Next I sat on the bank of the Seine with a sandwich and people-watched while I munched. Mid-afternoon I cued up to go into Notre Dame for the Consecration of the Crown of Thorns (a service they have every 1st Friday of the month). It was glorious...the organ, the chants in the most beautiful tenor voice, the incense...next I crossed to the other side of the Seine and found a spot at a cafe for an apertif just before a deluge of rain occured (I successfully managed the odering and paying in French - yeehaw!). Then my day ended by attending a showing of the film Klimt (2006), which was part of the Paris Cinema Festival currently taking place. It was fabulously abstract and dark -- John Malkovich plays the role of Klimt. Love him.

Saturday - After a fabulous brunch, we drove out to Monet's house and gardens . . . oh the beauty . . . the clouds parted and the rain stopped for the exact two hours we spent wandering the most beautiful gardens I've ever seen (with the famous water lily pond). The day ended by going to a birthday party . . . fun times conversing in broken French and English with people in their very young twenties. Yes, good times.

Sunday (today)- We drove out to Alexander Dumas' house (aptly called Monte Cristo). He was such a man of unfathomable imagination and joie de vivre  (sp?). He is the man who gave birth to D'Artagnon and the Three Musketeers, the Man in the Iron Mask, and the Count of Monte Cristo. How does one create such adventures? I haven't the faintest.

So those are my adventures over the past few days . . . I promise not to write every post like this, but thought many of you might like a bit more detail. Tomorrow I'm exploring the rue de l'Odeon and the St. Germain area a bit and attending an author's reading and lecture at Shakespeare and Company. Grin, grin, grin!

To wandering . . . and creating a pilgrimage out of one's wandering.

Vocabulary

So this post has been shared on facebook in quick succession of my last one because I am typing on a French keyboard (pecking, to be exact b/c the keys are in different places to accomodate all the characters), and I could not figure out how to type the @ symbol and therefore could not sign on to FB (until I finally asked today) oh-la-la-la.

Today was yet another adventure in observation and really "getting the lay of the land" so to speak...tower view from Notre Dame, more Seine boating, hoards of walking, avant-garde art gallery, cafe in a garden, French grocery store... you know - the usual. Today my revelation was that I have a very skewed knowledge of French nouns due to the fact that most of my exposure to the French language has been through French art songs and arias. L'oiseau, ombre, papillon, femme, nuit, mer - these are the sort of nouns I know (bird, shadow, butterfly, woman, night, sea). Yet, when asked today if I would like salt and pepper, I hadn't the faintest notion. So, there ya have it. Culture does not trump the common.

I did not include a poem yesterday, so below is one that I did not write, but read in my Writer's Almanac subscription the Saturday before I left. I have reread it many times, for it reflects quite aptly what this time is for me. I wish desperately that I had written it.

The Poet Visits the Museum of Fine Arts

by Mary Oliver

For a long time
     I was not even
        in this world, yet
           every summer

every rose
     opened in perfect sweetness
        and lived
           in gracious repose,

in its own exotic fragrance,
     in its huge willingness to give
        something, from its small self,
           to the entirety of the world.

I think of them, thousands upon thousands,
     in many lands,
        whenever summer came to them,
           rising

out of the patience of patience,
     to leaf and bud and look up
        into the blue sky
           or, with thanks,

into the rain
     that would feed
        their thirsty roots
           latched into the earth—

sandy or hard, Vermont or Arabia,
     what did it matter,
        the answer was simply to rise
           in joyfulness, all their days.

Have I found any better teaching?
     Not ever, not yet.
        Last week I saw my first Botticelli
           and almost fainted,

and if I could I would paint like that
     but am shelved somewhere below, with a few songs
        about roses: teachers, also, of the ways
           toward thanks, and praise.

"The Poet Visits the Museum of Fine Arts" by Mary Oliver, from Thirst. © Beacon Press, 2006.

Paradox

Depsite the fact that I am a product of the 80's and have experienced at a fairly maleable age the technological wonders of our time, one thing consistently continues to amaze me: flying. It is truly the closest thing we have to time travel.  The day before last, I flew from the day of one coast over an ocean, through another's night, and arrived on the other side to a sunrise.Homer's "rosy-fingered dawn" to be precise. And I watched those fingers spread from above the clouds. That is the way to arrive in Paris, my friends. So, for any of you still wondering, I arrived!

After settling in and relaxing yesterday, I decided to begin my Paris epic today with an old friend: Rodin. Ever since my father took me to Paris a decade ago, Rodin's sculptures have stayed with me; and it was today that I identified why. Rodin took the hardest, coldest of mediums and created life -- passionate, searing, vulnerable expressions of need, despair, innocence and vulnerability. His art is living paradox. The museum is under quite a bit of construction at the moment, so most of his marble sculptures were in one large room. I had just come to this paradoxical conclusion when I entered the exhibit and read these words: "Marble  is considered  the material most apt to represent flesh, perhaps because it has an inclination for paradox and virtuouso; hard and cold, marble acquires suppleness and warmth as it is transmuted beneath the artist's chisel..." It is only through the work and warmth of the artist that the beauty is bared - in it's rawest, truest form. Not all his work was in marble, but even in his bronze pieces, the effect is the same. Some images are below...his most famous is perhaps "Le Penseur" ("The Thinker" - not shown).

"Despair"

"The Kiss"

"Adam"

Thoreau-ing thoughts around

This past weekend I decided to make a quick jaunt up to see my grandmother. My goal was to come back with a new poem....I came back with several ideas. So a new poem is TBD (but I'll post an old one up anyway). Regardless, it was a really wonderful mini-trip, well worth the seven hour drive each way.

My grandmother lives on a plot of land that my grandfather purchased in the 60s with some business partners. It's a little hide-away of a "neighborhood" on what used to be the Roanoke River (it was dammed up in the 50s and is now Buggs Island/Kerr Lake - depending on whether you are in NC or VA). When my dad went off to college, my grandpa sold their house in McClean, VA and built their retirement home (a two-story cedar cabin) on this plot of land. This lake is where I learned to fish, waterski, drive (golf-carts, and then cars on the backroads), kill all manner of insects, and appreciate the magic of the North American woods.

I had so many moments at the lake this weekend of thinking That's a poem, but it was hard to write anything down. So I've decided to share three of these moments with you,  and then I'll just let them sit for a bit and see what emerges later.

Sunday morning: I sat on the "beach" alone, half in shade under "the big tree" where all manner of life-vests, chairs, and floats are kept out of the sun's fading rays. On the ground, not too far from my chair were two butterflies - one monarch and one black and blue. They were fluttering their wings, but not flying, which in my book meant that they had just burst from their coccoons and were drying their wings before trying out the bright, big world or... they were dying. I decided they were dying, because that seemed like a better poem. I jotted down some observations about their movement, their struggle, where they chose to flutter their last, and then I walked down to the water to cool off. When I returned, they were gone....so I guess they had learned to fly after all. I then remembered it was under that tree I received my first waterskiing lesson from my grandpa. I've learned to "fly" under that tree as well.

Sunday afternoon: My dad and I pulled out our little "Sunfish" - a small sailboat. We had a wonderful sail and some good conversation. My dad mentioned that he had visited my grandpa's grave on his way down the day before. He said something to the effect of, "You know there are Confederate soldiers buried in that same cemetery, and there is still what was then called the "colored" section. It's amazing how history gets recorded by people's burial sites." We then talked a little about the lake and the Native American history that we were currently floating over. The keen eye can still find arrowheads on the shores of this lake, and I thought that it is amazing how water can cover a multitude of eras which will never be remembered in a burial of earth.

Later that afternoon, I saw my first bald eagle in the wild.

Monday morning: My dad and I had to get the sailboat out of the water and store it again, so we bumped our way down to the shore in Grandmother's golf-cart. Right before we hit the beach, my dad stopped the cart and pointed to a spot in the grass. There, my friends, was the largest snake I've seen since I lived in Africa. He was eyeing my dad, who had jumped out of the cart to get a closer look....boys. We could tell he had something in his mouth, but we weren't sure what until my dad took one step closer, causing the snake to drop his meal and zoom into the brush. I then inched my way over to get a good look, and there, half-eaten and bloody, was a copper-head. After pulling ourselves away, we loaded the boat and started back to the house. As we passed the spot where the snake had dropped the copper-head, we saw that he had come back, reclaimed his venomous lunch and disappeared once more into the brush.

So - three poems? Or maybe one long one...Below is an old poem my dad asked me to post. The tie-in is that it has to do with death and animals. Enjoy.

The Day We Ate My Pet Chicken

They told me halfway through the meal.

I dropped his leg, ran to the toilet.

I had named him and called him mine in the back of our white jeep.

As we bounced down village roads past dripping banana leaves

and women of burden lugging water and babies,

he screeched and lost his feathers while I sang lullabies

and caught those feathers in the air.

He had been a gift to my father from the villagers

Thankful for his visit, his words, their language on his tongue.

Days later, the gift cluckclucked around the yard, haughty and fat with grain.

I was a good little mama, the gardener had said.

I couldn’t bring any part of him back up and so returned to the table.

I shrugged and sat until the licking of bones turned into the clatter of dishes.

I didn’t know if I should mourn when the scraps were given to the dogs.

 

Emily Anne Decker (2009)

Idiomaticness

Last night I went to see a live broadcast of Christopher Plummer in The Tempest. It was enchanting and beautiful, and it reminded me that two of my favorite Shakespearean quotes come from this play:

"We are such stuff / As dreams are made on; and our little life / Is rounded with a sleep."
- Prospero (IV. i)
"O brave new world, / That has such people in't!"
-Miranda (V. i)

These are certainly not Shakespeare's most quoted lines, but they have somehow retained their familiarity, and therefore their influence, in the English language.

The night before last I went to Write Club - a once-a-month gathering of writers and wits who face-off with their expositions addressing universally thematic rivals (ie. Method vs. Madness, Sacred vs. Profane, etc.). As I listened to these writers tackle these topics with (in most cases) a fabulous ripeness of humor and relevance, I thought that it really is interesting, from a linguistic perspective, how much of our communication (and often our most intelligent communication) consists of idioms, colloquialisms, abbreviations, and allusions. We've taken the simplest metaphor - a word - and chained it with others to create metaphors on top of metaphors on top of metaphors. Not suprisingly then is the fact that these tend to be both the most lasting and the most dynamic bits of language.

About a year ago was the the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible, and I was involved in an homage of sorts to the lasting effects this version of the Bible has had on our culture since its publication. My portion of the performance consisted of reading an original poem in which I wrote each line using or alluding to an idiom from the KJV. It was a fun and complex feat, despite it being ripe with clichés -- purposely so, of course ;-). It is below.

The Writing on the Wall

When the sweat of my brow seems more like peace offerings

Of sour grapes, and labours of love become like lambs

Led to the slaughter, how will I read the writing on the wall?

Will I join the ranks of blind leading the blind

Who live in a daily surrender to the powers that be,

Never noting their pearls as they are cast before swine?

Or will I sit with the salt of the earth

To whom everything there is a season and all things must pass

From strength to strength thru songs of “Thy will be done.”?

Maybe I’ll wash my hands of fighting the good fight

And eat, drink, and be merry till my fall becomes

Merely a fly in the ointment of faith.

Perhaps I’ll become a voice crying in the wilderness of wolves

In sheep’s clothing, clutching the thorn in my flesh as I yell, “Blessed

Are the peacemakers” while suppressing my thirst for my eye and my tooth.

Or maybe, I’ll harden my heart and bite the dust 

As I bury my face in the sand, moaning a final “woe is me”

While the grit and dust fill my mouth and stop my breath.

Yet, if within myself I find the strength to not be me of little faith,

Or let the wall’s writing put words in my mouth, my heart’s desire just might rise

Out of the ashes and the dust, and erase the writing, etching instead

“Let there be light!”

-Emily Decker (2011)

"The Mango Tree"

I often feel like the moments of sheer uncertainty in my life are the ones in which I end up feeling the most nostalgic. Perhaps my memories, often of my childhood, act as a buffer between the fear of not knowing what lies ahead and the anticipation of the novelty in what lies ahead. I had a fairly idyllic childhood in Ghana, and the memories I've retained of that time surface more when I need additional certainty in my life.

Tonight, I've decided to share one poem I wrote several years ago. It is set in Ghana - I've written a few poems set in Ghana; I'm sure I'll write more. I think it's interesting how the seeds of creativity often seem to stem from places much farther back in my memory than I often anticipate. This poem took me by surprise once I had written it, and even more so once it had been work shopped by others. Perhaps it's the somewhat darker turn at the end - I'll let you come to your own conclusions. Bon nuit.

"The Mango Tree"

The day I found snake skins on my swing,  

draped like discarded clothes thrown on the bed,

Daddy said I couldn’t play in it anymore.

The mambas, shedding and cranky, had taken over my tree.

That season I stayed near the veranda and watched the branches

start to bend with rains and ripe fruit,

sagging like arms stretching to touch toes.

We picked mangoes carefully that year, alert

for a darting flash of bright green against black bark

and sage-colored leaves. I decided the mambas had left,

leaving behind their skins and S-shaped signatures in the dirt.

I was still told to stay away from the tree, so I did,

except for one day. Toting two Barbies and a picnic,

I climbed into the Y halfway up the trunk.

There were noises – my brother crying,

the thump of coconuts hitting the ground.

I heard the wind in the leaves.

When I felt the sting, sharp and burning, I laid my dolls side by side,

rigid and staring up at the light piercing the canopy.

I turned to look at my foot and saw the black ant

crawling up my ankle and the red welt swelling my toe.

I watched the ant travel to my knee, then brushed him away.

Once I’d gathered my dolls and jumped, I looked up:

one silky skin, caught on the knotted branch above my swing,

fluttered in the breeze.

Emily Anne Decker (2009)

Echo and Ephemera

This is my second go at blogging, and I think a bit of explanation is in order.

Why: accountability to writing, mainly ( also a good way for friends and family to keep up with my adventure in Paris later this summer - yay!)

Poème: the french word for poem...the medium in which I hope to do most of my "blogging," a forum to post new and old material. I've learned that, simply put, a poem is a piece of communication as art, as metaphor, and as it moves outward, also moves inward -- that is all I wish for this next venture in online expression.

Echo and Ephemera: the titles to two beautiful poems (posted below) on the surface about love, but more deeply about reflecting, searching, finding, letting go, and moving on. I thought they might be appropriate "mascots" for this blog.

A bit about recent events: Two weeks ago I walked away from my life as a teacher. There is too much to say about the past three years, but I'm sure the remnants of my experiences will be revealed in many ways through this new forum of expression. We'll see. I finished the school year and resigned without knowing what the next step is...I am both extremely proud and daunted by this decision.  As a result, I am certainly seeking...and looking forward to the journey ahead. I hope you'll enjoy joining me as I search through my observations and attempts to communicate in art, in metaphor.

"Echo" by Christina Rossetti

Come to me in the silence of the night;
Come in the speaking silence of a dream;
Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as bright
As sunlight on a stream;
Come back in tears,
O memory, hope, love of finished years.

Oh dream how sweet, too sweet, too bitter sweet,
Whose wakening should have been in Paradise,
Where souls brimfull of love abide and meet;
Where thirsting longing eyes
Watch the slow door
That opening, letting in, lets out no more.

Yet come to me in dreams, that I may live
My very life again tho’ cold in death:
Come back to me in dreams, that I may give
Pulse for pulse, breath for breath:
Speak low, lean low,
As long ago, my love, how long ago.

"Ephemera" by W. B. Yeats

'Your eyes that once were never weary of mine
Are bowed in sorrow under pendulous lids,
Because our love is waning.'
                                                  And then she:
'Although our love is waning, let us stand
By the lone border of the lake once more,
Together in that hour of gentleness
When the poor tired child, passion, falls asleep.
How far away the stars seem, and how far
Is our first kiss, and ah, how old my heart!'

Pensive they paced along the faded leaves,
While slowly he whose hand held hers replied:
'Passion has often worn our wandering hearts.'

The woods were round them, and the yellow leaves
Fell like faint meteors in the gloom, and once
A rabbit old and lame limped down the path;
Autumn was over him: and now they stood
On the lone border of the lake once more:
Turning, he saw that she had thrust dead leaves
Gathered in silence, dewy as her eyes,
In bosom and hair.
                                   'Ah, do not mourn,' he said,
'That we are tired, for other loves await us;
Hate on and love through unrepining hours.
Before us lies eternity; our souls
Are love, and a continual farewell.'