Guns and Snakes

 Last summer I was at a party and asked a friend, who was carrying a two-shot derringer in a belt holster (and showing it to everyone he talked to), why he thought he needed a gun when the only people in the room were friends and family and guests he had personally invited.

His answer? “You never know.”

Why is that always the answer? You never know. Really? Never? Can't you learn?

I've been reading a lot of online chat, arguments and anger about the murders in Connecticut. Twenty children and six adults massacred by a madman with his mother's guns. All of that is so Freudian and so sick that I can't get my head around it. The killer had been identified as “odd” by teachers and family members; a loner who showed no emotion. His mom was a “prepper”, a segment of the citizenry who, in their future-based, deluded fantasies, are preparing for Armageddon, which they are convinced is right around the corner. None of this stuff was a secret. There are no answers, yet, but there are plenty of opinions and haranguing and speculation including the old go-to crap about children of divorce and violent video games and porn and bullies, and god or no god.

Rick Perry, the insane governor of Texas, thinks school teachers should be armed. Remember your teachers? Which ones would you like to see waving a firearm while raging at a disruptive student? Are there too many guns in the US? I think so. Also too many knee-jerk strident third rate scholars defending their alleged second amendment rights and am I the only one who is tired of old horseshitters who keep banging away that “cars kill people too, so do you want us to ban cars?” If you don't see the difference, then you definitely shouldn't own a gun. Or drive a car.

Crazy people are everywhere and they are not going away. There are not many services left to deal with them. I'm currently living in Paris and I can attest to the presence of angry, drunken, wild individuals who are unable to integrate into society; I am really glad they aren't armed. Yeah, I know that Anders Breivik killed 85 people at a youth camp in Norway last year and there are instances of gun violence in other countries, but nothing like the overall body count we rack up in the USA.

Aurora, Colorado; Virginia Tech. There is no shortage of information about these killings. Nutty, angry men with access to plenty of guns.

One thread of comments theorizes that America's “war” mentality and international military presence supports a feeling of conflict and the need to be armed and vigilant. That sounds too easy and political. Overall, we are a very young country and still somewhat adolescent, undereducated, insular, overbearing, quick to anger and seek revenge, confused about the value of life. In ways it feels as though we are a developing nation with too many guns, too many loopholes, not enough oversight.

I can't realistically expect the elimination of firearms. That would be impossible because there are too goddamned many of them owned by dangerous assholes who are not about to give them up. What are we going to do, go house to house and confiscate them? That's a surefire path to a bloodbath.

I have many friends who own and shoot firearms. I have a family member who always (always) carries a concealed weapon. So does his wife. And his son. One of my best friends is a firearms instructor and has at least 50 personal handguns. I worked in the criminal justice system for years with decent people who owned and used firearms. I also knew, and worked with, mass murderers who ranged from from calm, funny, and educated, to pissed off, frightened and stupid.

I was one of the last people to shoot a classic .45 caliber Thompson Submachine Gun before it was retired to a museum. Packs a punch I can tell you. I've used shotguns, rifles and handguns on ranges and in the wilderness. I've had guns pointed at me by angry guys, and I was almost shot once, accidentally, by a brain-dead neighbor while I was hiking on the mesa behind my house in New Mexico. The neighbor and I had a serious discussion about gun safety that afternoon. I live in a town where a lot of the residents, men and women, own and carry handguns. Some are quiet about it, others are constantly bragging and blathering about their “piece”. Silly. Scary.

In the bad 1980s, in California, I sometimes carried a gun at the request of a friend who was a coin dealer. He paid cash for coins and silver, legally, and he'd go to private homes for “jewelry parties”. He'd bring expensive diamonds and rings and bracelets to a big house in Sausalito or Tiburon in Marin County and give deep discounts to friends of the wealthy homeowner. All transactions were in cash and I accompanied him, Glock in pocket, to make sure that no one robbed us. I was often drinking and using drugs and it is lucky that the wife of some venture capitalist didn't get plugged in her liposuction. That was thirty-five years ago and I am grateful and relieved that we all survived. Bad times in the 80's.

When I was a kid I took an NRA firearms safety course and learned how to use a weapon and to stay alive while doing so. It was a good thing to know. In my own limited way, I understand many of the uses and possible abuses of firearms.

I work hard to be a realist and I can't think of a way to gather in all the guns on earth and melt them down into plowshares or iPads and then we can all hold hands and live in Rainbow Land. That horse is out of the barn. The bell has been rung. The pistol has been fired. I can't see a way to undo the juggernaut of gun ownership and entitlement.

A guyI know bought a gun last year. He was constantly talking about international conspiracy theories and was manifesting more and more worry about the “roving bands of dangerous criminals” who would break into his house and kill him for his food. I don't know when this was supposed to happen. He bought a handgun and talked about it. A lot. I think he felt better and bigger. He spent hours on the internet checking world financial markets and currencies. He was diagnosed with cancer in March and died in August, still afraid.

Bad guys have guns; good guys have guns. Bad guys use stolen and unregistered firearms. The Pittsburgh father who accidentally shot his seven year old son to death in front of a gun store didn't know his legally purchased and registered gun had a round in the chamber. A breach of basic handgun safety. It happens much too often. We can't legislate against stupidity, or poor memory, can we?

The good news, if that can even be considered a concept at this point, is that dialogue has started and congress and our representatives are going to have to pay attention. Lobbyists may find it a little harder, I hope, to give away gun money to anyone but the most conspicuous congressional whores. The NRA has deactivated their Facebook page, for now, but you can bet that they are gathering their membership, working on clever press releases and digging into their wallets. Harsher penalties for irresponsibility and gun crime are being discussed by elected representatives with an eye towards their next campaign. Mental health evaluations and deeper background checks for purchase of firearms are a possibility. We're all talking about it in coffee shops, bars, schools and even the revered Facebook. With a nation where there are 89 guns for every 100 citizens and there were over 30,000 deaths by firearms in 2007 and over half of those were suicides, that has to be good, right? Talk? Conversation?

A few years ago there were a lot of snakes on my property. Big fucking snakes. I don't like snakes. A primitive, mythological, faux-Christian response, I guess. They would show up on the back patio, quietly eying me when I went outside to read. I stayed in. We had a hot tub and there were plenty of tasty prairie dogs around. The tub was hot and moist all year long and was an ideal herpetarium. The snakes lived underneath it and even when I was lying back looking at the stars, I couldn't stop thinking about what was slithering only a few inches under my naked body. I had the tub removed, and that afternoon I watched as several snakes wriggled away.

At first, I just stayed inside a lot. I'd look out the front and back door to make sure there was nothing coiled, waiting. If I went for a walk and saw a five foot long bullsnake, I'd turn around and jog home. I don't own a firearm, don't want one, but due to my fear of snakes I bought a Benjamin pump action pellet gun. I had one as a kid and it was fun to shoot, easy to use. I kept this one by the door and about once a year, when I saw a snake on the acreage behind the house, I'd shoot it. I was fighting back. So I went from total fear, to killing my perceived enemy, innocent though the poor animal was. I also read a lot about snakes.

I shot a few snakes, watched them die, picked them up with the fireplace tongs and dumped them over the fence at the back of our property. I felt, momentarily, safe. Fool. I knew I couldn't shoot all the snakes in New Mexico.

I was fearful and then I was deadly and then I was interested in my fear and decided to take charge of it. Last year I was hiking in a flat, hot area near where I live and there was a snake lying across my path. Big-assed reptile. Easily over five feet long. I examined it, watched it warming itself in the sun, and then I stepped over it and continued my walk. I came across that same snake several times during the summer and I didn't mind seeing it at all. I have learned about myself and my environment and the creatures that populate it and, for me, that has been the answer to snake-fear.

Somebody else might still need a firearm to address their fears and I can only hope they don't point it at me, drink, have anger issues, are clumsy, prone to sadness, holding a grudge from high school, have recently lost a job, are celebrating a winning season for their favorite sports team or think that they've emptied the weapon before tossing it in the backseat while I'm in the car.

Answering My Own Questions

Are the French people friendly? How's the Weather? Why do you keep coming back to Paris?

I've noticed, for the most part, Parisians are detached, unsmiling and relatively efficient. I was at the Post Office this morning, wondering how the hell to mail a big item in a small envelope, the most for the least, which is my personal motto, and the two young men who helped me were amiable and never even weighed the package, which was way overstuffed with expensive and luxurious Christmas gifts for my family.

I now dig the way the French respond negatively to everything. The first answer, to every question, is “No.” That's cool. I was once a civil servant and I understand that the culture of “Yes” usually leads to more work. But once you break through the “No” barrier clerks and shop keepers are helpful. I do this by either acting completely stupid (not impossible), aggressive (easier), or friendly (a new and effective solution).

I have coffee several times a week at a boulangerie on rue St. Antoine. Nice place, crowded and overheated, like much of the city, and the biggest goddamn croissants on earth. As big as my foot, but tastier. I enter, find a table, and the same young waiter asks for my order. After six weeks he began to interact, ask a few impersonal questions, toss off a joke. I figure, six weeks, that's a good time-frame. Now, most of his co-workers are pleasant, treat us like regulars and look us in the eye during short conversations. However, the cashier is a young woman, average to pretty in appearance, fashionable with black hair and fake-tanned red/orange skin, and she is completely self involved and dismissive and has never even been slightly affable. Huge croissants, though.

Young people are loud, silly, attention-seeking and don't consider anyone over 40 of any importance whatsoever; old people talk to themselves, a lot, and clog up the line at the grocery store while middle-aged men and women watch each other with urban suspicion and distrust.

At lunch yesterday on Rue de Turenne, our waitress asked us where we were from. We answered and she engaged and by the time we were finished with our meal, two hours later, we were exchanging Facebook info. I've done this before and I usually expect to have my bank account drained by Corsican cyber-pirates, but, so far, no one has asked me to sponsor their families for immigration or buy Amway products or save the Nigerian royal prince. I think they look at my Facebook page and decide not to pursue the relationship.

I'm pretty comfortable with that.

The weather. Today it's chilly and cloudy with a light rain. There was a little snow last week but I've only opened my umbrella about a dozen times in the past two months. I enjoy the cold and the dark, so the weather isn't much of a problem and I've learned to appreciate rain. There are less people out when it rains, so walking around the city is easier, not as much contact on the street and when the lights reflect off of the pavement at night it looks mysterious and appealing; it could be anytime in the city's distant past.

Additionally, if it wasn’t for the rain, there would be no puddles for people to dip their shoes into and wash off the dog doo. It's a real urban challenge and test of agility, striding down the pavement, making sure to look up at the oncoming crowd, ahead to my destination, and down, to avoid the large amounts of excrement. A couple times a day I watch as a fashion plate shouts, “Oh, la la,” (which they do), and then sidles over to the nearest gutter and dips her overpriced shoes into the rainwater, soaking off the inescapable dogcrap. The great equalizer. The circle of life. Hakuna Scatata

Dog owners are encouraged to clean up after their pets, but they don't. The droppings remain where they are deposited until an unaware pedestrian strides through. When I walk along the Rue de Rivoli, I see the stamp of a Gucci in the excrement and then, treading carefully, I notice the smudge becomes smaller and smaller as it disappears up the street. Sad that he never knew. Embarrassing and I hope I don't sit next to him at lunch.

More people equal more dogs equal more merde. It's one of the universal truths of existence, like the overcrowded metro, and it's a good argument for birth control, both canine and human.

So, why do I keep coming back to Paris? I was in a pharmacy last week, buying some much needed aspirin with codeine, (honestly, believe me, undetectable, no buzz, simple pain relief for a forty-year-old back injury, maybe a slight nodding, early to bed, but no bad behavior, or spilled drinks), and the helpful pharmacist asked why I was in Paris and not another big city.

I told her that, for me, Paris was a large package; history, culture, literature, art. The fact is I can't exactly pinpoint why I love it here. I could be in Rome or London, but Paris has an important history: monarchy, revolution, empire, republic, world wars, student rebellion. The desire to understand the world in relation to history and politics continues, too.

There is a show at Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris at the Palais de Tokyo called “L'Art en Guerre”. It covers the art and artists of Paris before, during and after WWII and shows, through the art that was produced at the time, how the world changed. There are drawings and paintings from the concentration camps which are sad, alarming and, sometimes, beautiful. I wasn't that interested at first. As an American, born after the war, I am distant from it. America won, right? Too simple. Most of the whole goddamned World was involved and a lot of people, while they appreciated the peace accord, can never say they “won”. I was amazed by the painting, the cruelty and horror. The show impressed me deeply and I've begun reading about the war from the European point of view, which tells different stories than the ones we learned in school.

Where else is there this much art? Impressionists, Renaissance geniuses,abstract art, mindblowing landscapes, still lifes and graffiti are everywhere. Wandering around the Louvre yesterday I eventually came across the paintings of Camille Corot, a painter about whom I know little. He is a link between neoclassicism and the impressionists and as I looked at his landscapes I felt like I was going to cry. Man, that is a very strange feeling for me, to want to weep when in the presence of beauty; to feel like weeping for any reason. It's one of the definitions of an aesthetic experience; people have been known to pass out or have seizures when overtaken by extreme sensual stimulation. Part of my reaction was that of an appreciative observer, of course, but I was also drawn into the pictorial representation of what I would like in my own life; serenity, purity, calm, nature, quiet, solitude. And I also realized that I already have that, if I want it, if I recognize it. So, my repressed tears were for beauty, desire and gratitude, which is a complicated cycle of feeling and something that I appreciate and haven't really experienced until I started traveling to Paris.

The French writers of the Nineteenth century own the epic historical novel. If I had not read Victor Hugo, Alexandre Dumas, Emile Zola I would have missed some of the greatest reading experiences of my life. The 20^th century giants, Jean-Paul Sartre,Claude Simon, Albert Camus, Simone de Beauvoir, Alain Robbe-Grillet, are stylists and scholars who have changed the way I write, read and think. My life is better and I am happier since I've been introduced to these authors and I don't believe I would have taken the chance to read them if I hadn't spent lots of time in the environment that has inspired discontent with the status quo, extraordinary stylistic experimentation, and the establishment of absurdity as an acceptable adaptation to the modern world.

Oh yeah, and cheese. There is nothing like ripe Camembert. I don't think I'd ever experienced it until I came to Paris for the first time. I can tell when I'm within 30 feet of a decent round of real Camembert. It has the aromatic decay chain of Uranium-235 and even though it is sealed in waxed paper, tightly seated in a form-fitting wooden box, wrapped in plastic, stored at the bottom of the refrigerator, in a separate drawer, the fridge snugly closed and the kitchen shut and locked, I can still tell if I have any fresh Camembert on the menu when I walk in the front door. I love that. I will miss that.

How Do You Spell “Merde” Without an “M”?

Lately, I'm distracted from writing fiction. I've been seeing astounding art, monitoring expenditures, trying to overcome my obsessive, controlling tendencies and visiting and dining and with friends. All crises solved, all questions answered. No sweat. I'm about three-quarters of the way through an outline for a new novel, but I will have to wait until I get back to the quiet solitude of New Mexico to do the actual composition. For now, I focus on the outline, short stories, notes, observations, irritations, enlightenment and the discovery of new, important and mindblowing French literature. An easy, worthwhile compromise.

I haven't found a decent place to write.

That's not true. I write everywhere, but I haven't found a place to set up my computer in a comfortable environment and relax and compose. I can plug in the earphones, turn on the Jazz, drown out the surrounding ambient sounds, but I am usually hemmed in by others. There are forty percent too many people everywhere on earth, even, I'm sure, in the middle of fucking Antarctica. I've taught myself to write in airports, coffee shops, amusement parks and on trains, but trying to write fiction in a crowded room is really challenging.

I often use the library and I have a French library card that gives me a feeling of belonging. When I enter the bibliothèque I present my card to the nice person behind the counter and he assigns me a numbered seat at one of the tables reserved for “travaux”, work or study. There are about ten polished wooden tables and 80 spots, four people to a side, facing each other. Each place has the same amount of room as a tiny table-top in a packed restaurant. A chair, of course, and a lamp. The individually-assigned area is covered by a two foot square of hard leather, similar to the kind that one finds on an antique writing desk. It's pleasant and every effort has been made to create a scholarly and serious atmosphere.

Under the table, nearly impossible to locate, is a plug for the computer. The French outlet is byzantine and complicated and never looks stable or safe. I expect sparks, fire and sewage to spew forth. The first day or two I spent fifteen minutes wrestling with my power cord and eventually had to ask a librarian how to hook it up. She showed me and since then it's been easy. I bend down, scramble around, hit and miss, and finally, et voila, the odd shaped adapter slips into the dangerous foreign outlet. I felt pretty stupid the first few times; doubled over, groping under the table, grunting suspiciously, muttering and swearing in English. Now I see that almost everyone, French, Chinese, American, Italian, has the same trouble when searching for an electrical connection. Confusion. When the architects designed the building in 1590 they didn't consider the future invention of the computer, electricity, the internet, smart phones, email, world wide pornography and Netflix, so the outlets had to be retrofitted into the historical building a few years ago. They've done a good job of hiding the modern essentials from view and everyone soon resolves the question of connectivity.

The library patrons are all very well behaved, too. This is not an American library, which often serves as a toilet for the homeless. I've entered the library in Taos, New Mexico, and mentioned to the staff that it smells like last call at the old Lucky 7 in San Francisco's Tenderloin. No one snores, drinks or talks to themselves in the historical Paris libraries. On the streets, bridges and in doorways, sure, of course, but the library clients are students and scholars. I take sidelong glances at their work and see that the young woman next to me has notebooks full of complex equations on graph paper and she's making entries on a spreadsheet.

An older man, older than me, balding, fat, waddles up and down the aisles, carrying heavy, leather-bound books of maps and charts back to his spot where he stacks them up and searches through them for hours, his head bent and his nose almost touching the open page. He doesn't use a computer, probably has never had an argument with someone about the Mac versus the PC. I envy him.

I travel with a netbook computer; efficient, small, utilitarian. I've had it for about six years and it's been everywhere with me, Asia, Europe, Mexico. It finally shorted out a few weeks ago and I panicked. How can I live without a computer? Right? Jesus.

The first time I traveled to Europe I didn't have a cell phone or a laptop. Everything I owned was in a carryon bag and S and I spent five months on trains and in second class hotels, checking schedules, learning the language. I had to make computations every time I crossed a border to figure out the money.

If I wanted to write, I'd use a lined notebook and fill up pages. It was fun and easy and when I had a long message to send, I'd work it out on the page and then find an internet cafe and email it to my friends. I remember learning to use a pay phone in Italy. I was living in Lucca, outside of Florence, and there was a phone booth across the street from the apartment. I watched Italian people drop in their coins (Lira in those pre-euro times) or insert incomprehensible phone cards, punch a few keys and talk, loudly, to their friends and family. I wanted to do that, so I found a place to buy a phone card, plugged it into the telephone, failed again and again, scolded by the disembodied Italian phone lady, and eventually got through to my friend Jonathan Lucero in the US. We just bullshitted like we usually do, no big conversation, but I felt completely assured and that was the moment that I knew I could solve any problem on my own. I was capable and imaginative. If I could learn to use an Italian pay phone, the sky was the limit.

If I got lost I had to figure out how to read a map. When I couldn't find a place to stay, I walked until I did. Questions were answered without Google, Wikipedia or translation programs. I acquired enough Italian to take care of all my needs. I even made some friends.

I use tech stuff at home and when I travel; I like the convenience and the programs and devices have become integral to my life. I was so freaked when my computer crashed a couple of weeks ago that I bought a new one right away, here, in Paris, in French (l'ordinateur = computer), with a weird French keyboard. (Why the crap would anyone switch the “A” with the “Q” and the “S” with the “Z”? That's just nuts. Where the hell is the “M”? The French use “M”, don't they? How can I write without an “M”?) It's cheap, slow, but I can email, write, and of course, check out maps, find when the Louvre closes, look up movies, bookstores and bus schedules. Amazing, indeed, but I felt, dependent, isolated and deprived when the stupid computer crapped out and I really didn't dig that at all.

I admire the old guy in the Paris bibliothèque, trudging from shelf to shelf, schlepping his giant, antique books around, doing something that he thinks is important, self contained and focused, without distractions.

I'd like to learn to unload the pain-in-the-ass cell phones and computers when I travel and go back to pay phones and writing long hand and using internet coffee shops, which are everywhere. I trust myself to surmount the inevitable difficulties that arise when I'm on the road, away from home. Christ, I've overcome bigger problems than bus schedules in the past twenty years. I don't have GPS on any device I own and here I am, safe, indoors, warm and comfortable. I write about four hundred words a day in my notebook, anyway; I could probably save it up and transcribe it into a computer when I returned home. I think, in the old days, that was called “revising”. What's the hurry?

Still, here I am, at the library, plugged in, typing quietly, navigating this goddamn weird-assed keyboard and I'm elbow to elbow with my table mates and, even though they are polite and quiet, I can feel them exhaling, shifting in their chairs, looking over my shoulder at my work, snickering at my inability to create believable characters and an engaging narrative. I often end up writing these blog posts because much of the time it's all I can manage in this environment and it keeps me occupied. I'm not sure it's real writing.

The old guy at the next table leans forward, breathing hard, his face an inch from a seventeenth century map, analyzing, nodding, scribbling strange words in a battered ledger. He doesn't have any devices other than his brain and his interest in his subject. Nothing to plug in, connect, recharge. I like all my stuff, sure, it's fun and pretty and efficient, but, today, I think my library card is a greater asset.

Rue de Foin

Sunday on the Rue de Foin

          After two years of sipping mineral water, Martin is desperate for a drink as he pulls on his pants, a t-shirt, and slips into his overcoat. He wears shoes without socks and takes the spiral staircase down four floors, pushes open the heavy street door and walks to the Tapas Bar on the corner. It is a typical overpriced Paris bar, but when he awoke from his nap he imagined the dark wood inside. He has passed by every night, looking guiltily through the front window, on his way home. He is standing at the bar, trying to find out how much the drinks cost, asking the questions in a language of gibberish and confusion. He has forgotten so much. What's the word for “red”? Red, rouge, rose, russ, ruff, rust. Damn. He is sure that “rojo” is the right word in Spanish, but this was Paris. He asks for red.

“Red what?” The barman answers in English.

Wine. Red wine.

“OK.”

Martin hopes that it isn't more than four euros a glass. Even cheap wine has become expensive. He worries that it will cost too much.

Now there is a tall, full glass of wine on the bar in front of Martin. The bartender takes one of the bills that Martin has dropped on the bar and walks away.

It is as he imagined. The first mouthful is bitter. It settles on his tongue and he considers spitting it out but it slips down and he feels the soft burn on his palate, the descent and arrival in his stomach; he closes his eyes and becomes aware of swallowing and taste.

         The next is sweeter, welcomed and when the glass is empty he summons the young man.

Again.

Encore.

Autre.

More.

Two, please.

Yes, two glasses, side by side, with no questions.

It is 11:30. He is finished.

Steadying himself, he enters the wet, empty street. The man who had been watching through the cafe's window is walking a block ahead. Martin sees him as the man disappears in the darkness between the streetlights, becomes visible, fades.

Now Martin is alone and there is a soft mist that quiets the street. He is relaxed, enjoying the wine, the flush of early intoxication. When he passes his building he does not press the numbers of the digicode, does not go home. He walks and, after some time, he is near the The Cafe de les Musees on Rue de Foin. The restaurant is shut tight, as is the Absinthe shop next door. The metal rolling doors are lowered and locked. The post card kiosk is also dark.

He thinks, I will walk for a while but stay in my quartier. It's been a long time since I've had the warmth of wine, and I want to be near my apartment in the event that old thoughts begin to bloom. I should avoid wandering into alleys and becoming lost.

He's not alone anymore. There are footsteps. Not the hard wooden heels of the men and women who are the aggressive, committed travelers, who take up too much space on the sidewalk and expect others to move aside. A softer tread follows Martin, who concludes by the sound that the walker is twenty feet behind. It is a guess, but he is confident that he has assessed the distance accurately. He doesn't want to turn around; that would be a sign of weakness and may neutralize the effects of the wine.

It is a man.

The footsteps speed up. Martin is grabbed from behind and can't turn. The attacker is strong, heavy and round, and determined to take him to the ground. A large wrist encircles Martin's neck and the a hand is groping in the pocket of his overcoat, searching.

A cheap, simple thief, but one who is desperate enough to attack. Martin bends his knees, instinctively, but also weak; he collapses and falls to the ground and the other man follows along, his broad arm still across Martin's throat, squeezing.

“Is he tying to kill me?”

This thought and the answer, “Yes”, take an instant and, falling, Martin turns to look, to see what is happening, to learn how he is going to die and who is going to kill him and the round man, now beneath Martin, slams onto the cobblestones and there is a dreadful, vegetable sound; the head. The arm spasms, jerks against Martin's neck, hard, and Martin wonders if he will now die of choking. The grip loosens and falls away. Silence.

Breathless, Martin rolls to his left, climbs to his knees and stands, leaning on the wall of a clothing store. A sale on shirts on the Rue de Foin.

The eyes are open, but there is a wide pool of blood seeping around the man's head. Martin turns away, fast, and retraces his steps, follows the empty street for many blocks, keeping to the shadows. He is relieved, exhausted and elated.

Again he slips by his front door and continues on to the rue Saint Antoine. Here there are people. L'Arsenal is open and a few stragglers gather there, finishing a final glass of beer, a coffee, a conversation. In the distance the pale green column of the Bastille points to the sky like a decomposing finger. Clouds are low and fast moving. More rain soon.

The two-tone notes of an emergency vehicle echo. Martin follows the sound and after a while he is back on Rue Turenne, near Rue de Foin. He should turn around, go home, lock up his door and sit quietly, forget what has happened, but he wants to see.

The thief lies on the sidewalk. The purple blood spreads out around the shaved white head. Yes, the sapeurs-pompiers, the firemen, have arrived and they are hard at work. A small crowd has gathered from their apartments, from the shadows, and are watching as the young handsome men pound on Martin's attacker. They have exposed the flabby chest, pulled up a yellow and brown polo shirt, and torn off his jacket, a parka; black and shiny, it lies discarded in the street like the shell of a enormous beetle. They pound on the body and with each blow folds of fat wobble up and down the pale torso like waves in a bowl of thick cream. So white; too white. He is both shorter and fatter than Martin thought, when the man was choking him and searching through his pockets. Martin is still drunk and ashamed. He knows that they are too late, the young men, the strong men. Their square van is parked at an angle in the street, its lights flashing amber.

They will not save him. Martin recalls the gunshot noise of the man's head when the body hit the sidewalk. But it is the glowing blackred halo of blood that surrounds the big, shaved skull that convinces Martin. The man is surely, completely dead. The head is whiter than the fat abdomen, but maybe that's because it is in contrast with the blood and the wet street.

Martin imagines that he is the dead man. He is humiliated by his own dying, by the care they are giving to his corpse, and by the crowd who watch his body, critically.

“He's dead.”

“He's fat.”

“He's ugly.”

“He's old.”

“He dresses badly.”

“He's bleeding. His skin is so white.”

“Let him lie.”

“Let him die.”

“Pick him up.”

“Roll him over. Cover him.”

“Is today Sunday?”

Martin wants to come back when they are gone, come back to the spot before the rain washes away the blood. He would touch the toe of his shoe to it. Perhaps dip his finger in and feel it turn sticky as it dries.

He licks his thumb, to feel the wet; the wine was three euros a glass.

Existentialism Explained

Misdiagnosis of the day: Liver cancer.

Actual affliction: Minor lower back pain

Duration of orthopedic condition: 30 years

Time spent worrying about cancer: 2 hours

Ratio of reality to fantasy: 101,400:1

Conclusion: I'm a fucking baboon.

Yesterday I didn't leave the apartment. S has gone to Germany to explore and I stayed in Paris because I love the city and wanted to do some walking/writing/reading/isolating. I listened to music, read an early novel by Sartre, browsed the news, ate a salad. By 9 p.m. I had decided that I'd wasted my life, the news was dismal, I ate too much, and Avant Garde jazz was making me jittery. The Sartre was terrific, though. In 1964 he became the only person to refuse the Nobel Prize for Literature. He is a great novelist and philosopher and I've been deeply caught up in his “Roads to Freedom” trilogy. It's an extraordinary literary experience, but I wonder if perhaps I've been influenced by his occasionally dark observations and malaise. Was I suffering from a case of unconscious existential anxiety.

I went to bed at midnight determined to awaken early. Early, in Paris, is between 8 and 9 a.m. The sun doesn't come up until then, the construction next door doesn't begin until 8:30 and the only people on the streets are those who look like they're just getting home. Nothing opens before 10. I've shifted easily into a Parisian schedule, but most mornings I have to set my alarm for 8 o'clock just in case the guys next door don't show up due to a strike or surprise holiday and the muffled pounding of hammers doesn't reach through the wall and provoke me into semi-consciousness. I've learned to appreciate their efforts. In a city this old, there is constant rebuilding and restoration. I'm glad they care.

This morning the unseen workmen were right on time and by 9:15 I was dressed and ready to leave, feeling good, feeling rested, preparing to overcome the previous day's indolence and get involved in Life, goddamnit.

I hit the street at 10-ish and decided that I'd walk to the bookstore near the Concorde. I'd ordered “Iron in the Soul”, the last of the Sartre trilogy, and they'd sent me a text informing me that the book had arrived. It would be a good hike, three urban miles from Le Marais, through dark alleyways, past drunks and beggars, along the lovely and picturesque Seine, into the courtyard of the Louvre and the length of the Tuilleries; the weather was dry and cool and I was sure that I'd feel better, active and oxygenated, from a good brisk walk.

I was right. Nothing like a little exercise for a welcomed re-set of all psychic and physical levels. I stopped in the gardens half-way through the Tuilleries and had a coffee. At Place de la Concorde I crossed the street and entered the bookstore on Rue de Rivoli. It wasn't too crowded and I browsed the shelves for a few minutes.

I am a big fan of another famous and important French writer named Alain Robbe-Grillet. He is one of the originators of the Nouveau Roman, a radical modern approach to the novel and I'm astounded by his writing. It's strange, disturbing, but also hypnotic and brilliant. I've looked for his book, “The Voyeur”, but haven't been able to find it. I didn't see it on the shelf so I decided to ask if they had a copy.

The severe, thick-browed short woman at the information desk ignored me for a few minutes while she pretended to look at her computer screen. That's cool, I'm used to it, all French service personnel ignore everyone for a while, French, American, Italian, everyone, just to let the customer know who's in charge. I get it. I've learned to be patient while being disregarded. Fine by me.

She eventually looked up, glanced away from me and said, in English, “Yes?”

I asked for “The Voyeur” by Alain Robbe-Grillet. She immediately corrected my pronunciation, but started tapping on her keyboard.

“No.”

“No? No what? You haven't got it or you won't give it to me?” A bit prickly, but I was starting to feel a tweak in my lower back, on the left side. A wave of concern washed over me.

What the hell is that pain, I asked myself?

“We haven't had that book in the store for four years.”

I placed my hand on my left flank, massaged my lumbar area, searching for a tumor, a tender spot, inflammation. I wonder if it's cancer? I hadn't thought about cancer for several weeks and was dismayed that it, the thought, had come back. I had hoped it was in remission.

The store had not had a single copy of a book by one of France's most celebrated modern novelists in four years. I would have engaged her in critical conversation, but I was preoccupied by physical discomfort and a growing cancer scare. I shrugged, which is an acceptable mode of conversation in Paris; it communicates all manner of dismay, disapproval and sarcasm. I'm getting good at it.

To obtain the book I'd ordered, the Sartre, I had to go upstairs, down a long hall, turn left and wander around a poorly-lit room until I saw a desk designated “Customer Orders.” It was staffed by a woman who resembled her counterpart at the Information Desk; short, stocky, unhappy. She was on the phone. I pressed my thumb deeply into the area below my bottom rib, probing.

I waited, with increasing concern regarding my medical status, for a full six minutes before she ended her call. She was speaking French, but I've learned enough of the language to know when someone is making lunch plans with a friend. I lapsed into my reverie, recounting all of my acquaintances who have died of cancer in the past forty years.

Finally, she asked, in English, what I wanted. I told her my name and the title of the book I'd ordered. I could see it on the shelf but she kept going past it. I directed her, in my rudimentary French. “A gauche”, I said, and she went too far. “ A droit.”

After some time she found it and placed it on the counter.

“Twenty-seven euros.”

I knew the price when I'd ordered it a week ago, but Jesus Christ, that is thirty-four dollars. All the books here are terribly overpriced. The same book, titled “Troubled Sleep” in an English version, is fourteen dollars from Amazon. As a bit of an obsessive-compulsive reader, I had to have it, can't get American Amazon to work here, so I paid my twenty-seven euros and left the store. I wondered if I'd be able to make it home; the sharp pain in my back became worse with every euro I spent, every person I bumped into on the street, every instance of neglect I experienced from a clerk. I decided to take the metro. The Concorde station is right outside the bookstore and goes directly to my block. I got on the train, stood against the rear door and felt massaged by the gently rocking car. I kept my eyes straight ahead, looking at my reflection in a window across the aisle. Cancer. That man has cancer. That man is me. C'est moi.

I felt very existential. Deep underground in a rattling train filled with other insignificant creatures, on my way to an empty apartment, over-charged, under appreciated, contemplating my own obscurity, doomed, diseased, barely sentient.

As I exited the St. Paul metro I saw that “Aux Desirs de Manon”, the local, spectacular boulangerie, was opened and I stood in line for a baguette. While waiting among the well behaved patrons, examining the colorful, delicious pastries, inhaling the aroma of fresh bread, I remembered that I might have cancer but, miraculously, it was no longer troubling me. While climbing the stairs to the apartment I recalled that, for thirty years, I've had a chronic back problem and once or twice a week it gives me some discomfort. It comes upon me, and it goes away. It always has. My first thought, even after all these years, is catastrophic. Cancer. Cirrhosis. Emphysema, Aneurysm, Kidney Stones, Ebola.

I know that chronic back pain affects the majority of adults. Most times, there is no definite cause. It starts, it stops. Following a lazy day of indolence and morbid self-reflection, it is no surprise that it manifested after a long walk in a busy city and being overcharged by an unattractive, disrespectful clerk. The cure was a short ride on a crowded yet efficient transport system and the purchase of fresh bread.

I spend a lot of time alone and I've been told I think too much, which is bullshit. I'm just glad I don't have cancer, today, and I'm really looking forward to digging deeper into existentialism. I've got the book and the baguette. What could go wrong?

Never, Ever, Quit Smoking

People sure enjoy their cigarettes in Paris. Lots of grim smokers. My late friend Barry Lenhart had a theory that people should keep smoking in order to increase their offspring’s lung health and their ability to resist pollution, toxic waste, greenhouse gasses and other airborne poisons. In future, we will be overwhelmed by terribly tainted, thick, impossible air, so we should all be busy smoking cigarettes, right now, in order to weed out the weak. Those with stronger lungs will survive and metamorphose, and, Darwin-like, breed a stronger race of humans with the organs to resist cancer and emphysema and other terminal diseases. It was funny then, but by the number of fuckers who are smoking here in Paris, I can only hope that there is some validity to his sarcasm.

If you care about your children’s future, you selfish dimwits, smoke, and strengthen the evolutionary strain.

On the other hand, there are too goddamn many people everywhere. There are times when the Paris metro is a crushing nightmare, the buses are crammed, even the big comfortable trains are too full and it doesn’t look as though it’s going to improve.

Keep having children, breeders, go ahead, it’s your right, cough out those brats while you fight and vote and argue about when the fuck life starts, when a fetus becomes viable, God, the bible. Keep busy and distracted. Remember, though, that little bundle of desire is going to be drinking beer in about 16 years, and he’ll need a car. He’s going to want more food and his sister is going to be taking a shower every morning. Look outside. Is there enough room for a few more cars in your driveway? How’s the grocery bill? Food prices are going up, and so will the next gen’s need for high fructose corn syrup.

H2O? Easy as pie. It’s renewable, right? Rain replenishes the lakes, reservoirs, and aquifers. So, we get a choice: plants or hygiene. Want to be clean? OK, dig up the lawn, cut down the trees, pull out all the flowers. I don’t much give a crap for yard maintenance anyway, but I’ve always found a park a good place to hang out, get some sun, rest up, chill, draw, read, visit with friends, but we are going to need parking lots and, I guess, clothing stores. Have to keep the economy chugging along and the marketing of dumbass fashion to tasteless illiterates seems to be a fairly efficient way of stacking up the cheddar.

Last week I was on a metro that was Blade Runner-crowded. It was what I imagined the fall of Saigon was like. Or Lawrence of Arabia. Refugees escaping a civil war. Except they were just people from the suburbs trying to get into the city at 3 p.m. in order to do some necessary and satisfying shopping for the latest frigging shoes, shirts, and scarves. 

I knew there wouldn’t be anyplace to sit on the train. Seats go to the people who get on at the first station. If you’re waiting at the second stop, tough luck. I stood. OK, I'm used to it; I stand on public transportation. We had 13 more stops until I reached my destination and that would take about a half hour. Otherwise it was a two or three hour walk. Fine, The metro is fast. And full. At the next platform more people got on and that was it. The End. Topped off. We were fully stocked, layered in, pressed together. No more room. At each successive station more people pushed into the flesh wall. By the fifth stop I was face to face with some guy whose hand was loosely cupped around my crotch and there was nothing I could do. He didn’t appear to be too upset by our intimacy, but man, I’m just not used to strangers touching me like that. Not since I quit drinking.  There was no place to go, couldn’t move, couldn’t even shift my weight to my other foot, since someone else was using it to stand on. It was pretty goddamn uncomfortable with a low level claustro-panic coming on. I held my breath and eventually, as we got closer to the city center, people began spurt out.

Too many people. Too many children. What happened to the healthy idea of birth control, family planning, abortion on demand, Planned Parenthood? Jesus Christ, is everyone asleep or just waiting for the neighbors to tie their own goddamn tubes? 

But they smoke. Lots of smoking. Their kids will begin to mutate, their genes will scar in favor of future air quality and great shoe sales.

Or there may be a decent balance. Have a kid, die of cancer. Makes sense. Not terribly scientific, but somewhat satisfying to consider that every dogwipe who still smokes is maximizing their chances for an early death. They know, by now, that they will in all probability expire painfully, choking and gasping for breath, sucking air through the holes in their throats, clawing at the bedclothes, feeling their organs shutting down, begging for relief but glad they kept on smoking and proud that they were rebels.

They didn’t take any shit from the nannies that legislated against them and eyed them in restaurants and bars as though they were mass murderers instead of simpleminded, ignorant suicides.

Never quit smoking. The benefits to society are too important.

Feng Shui with Marie Antoinette

Marie Antoinette and I share the same birthday. November 2. Her’s was in 1755, which placed her in an unfortunate political, social, and eventually fatal, historical situation.

Yesterday we went to Versailles; got an early train, and spent the entire day there. Up at seven, which is very, very early in Paris, where the sun doesn’t appear until eight-ish. At home, in New Mexico, we get bright sunlight all day, sometimes as early as 5:15 a.m.  The winter days are clear and light, too. I didn’t realize I had seasonally affected disorder until it went away.

There are very few things I believe in. Not God, not UFOs, not Bigfoot or Astrology, Past Lives, Karma or most cases of Lupus. Sorry to all my Sagittarius, Lupus, and Yeti friends.

But I know that some seemingly strange things are real, observable and quantifiable. 

Feng Shui.

Not the traditional old-school religious Feng Shui, but the new age, architectural form which claims that the arrangement of structures and windows and furniture influence the people who use built environments. It’s real. I can walk into an apartment and immediately feel good and at home. Sanctuary. Comfort. The way light enters the room through the windows is important as well as the placement of the furniture, colors, and airflow. I appreciate clean surfaces. I used to think all a room needed was an open bar, but I was wrong. Once I sobered up, I realized that angular furniture, ugly wallpaper, and shag carpet were contributing to my hangovers.

Aromatherapy.

Snicker if you will, but the smells of pine, lavender, cinnamon, garlic and fresh bread change my mood as quickly as a shot of brandy and a line of coke. Several years ago I received a good deal on a terrific room on the 68^th floor of the Swissotel in Singapore. It cost a load of dough even with the discount, but it came with an Aromatherapist. I laughed it off for a few nights and then I began going through the aroma menu and choosing lemon, rose, or musk. When the nice aroma lady dropped in, around 8 p.m., she’d note my selection and set up a little oil lamp. I enjoyed it immensely and found that I relaxed and was calmer, even though, with the discount, I was still paying around $400 a day for the room. It totally works.

And sunlight.

After living in New Mexico for six months, I wondered if it was the right move. Lots of busted 12-packs on the roadside, crazy goddamned dogs, and a broad cross section of whacked out people contributed to my unease. I was a long way from my California comfort zone. Alcoholism and drug addiction, which I hoped I’d put behind me, were prevalent, and there was no Italian food.

 

The natural beauty was abundant, though, and I could achieve silence and relaxation and solitude with little effort. I have a quiet home with terrific views and the pine forests are about 20 minutes away by car. I like a little snow and it never gets too hot. Plenty to like, plenty to dislike, same as everywhere. Even with the litter and the dysfunctional government and limited medical services, I felt good almost all of the time; much better than I thought I would. 

I was seeing a doctor for some reason, a knee problem, blood pressure, flu, and I told him that I wasn’t all that secure in my move to New Mexico, but I felt great, healthy, happier. 

“It’s the sun. We get lots of sunshine here. You probably have seasonally affected disorder, depressed in fog and rain and overcast. We don’t have much of that, and you’re experiencing the benefits of vitamin D and long hours of sunlight.”

It has rained in Paris for most of the past three weeks. I was beginning to become depressed with the low, darkgray skies and though Paris is architecturally incredible, it’s a 19^th century city and crowded, so Feng Shui and private space are impossible considerations. For the past week, however, the weather’s been phenomenal. Bright blue skies over the Seine, a few pink clouds behind Notre Dame in the evening and the trees are changing color.  It’s picturesque as hell, and I like walking around the city without an umbrella. 

A few years ago we went to Versailles on a sunny, warm September Sunday and it was so mobbed that I took one look at the outside of the chateau, turned around, got on the train and went back to the city. I gave it another try yesterday and, though it was foggy, it remained dry, and cool, and the palace was oddly uncrowded. We bought tickets and explored the overdone rooms, incredibly painted ceilings and gilded staircases. We could wander around without being crushed, shoulder-to-shoulder in small spaces with thousands of other visitors. Nice. The Versailles Chateau is a world heritage site and it should be. It’s also and accurate indictment of the monarchy and what can happen when a few people have too much power and money. I don’t approve of the brutality that followed the Revolution, but I completely understand it. As we walked through chambers of riches I initially found myself getting bored. In my mind I was chanting, “Seen it, don’t care, more crap, seen it, familiar, waste of time, don’t care, crap.” 

Then I got pissed. 

“How could these dipshits have so much? I mean, they were born into it, it’s not like they ever goddamned worked. Concentration of wealth is dangerous and deadly. I’m glad they were murdered and guillotined. Fuck em, I’d have been in the front lines dragging them out of their beds with their wives and children, this crazy shit has to stop!”

Unfortunately, I wasn’t just saying this in my mind.

It was time to explore the Gardens of Versailles. 

The more than three square miles of forests on the grounds of Versailles are landscaped and aromatic and perfect. Entry is free during the off-season. It’s like an insane saint’s image of heaven or a desperate attempt to recreate John Milton’s lost Paradise. There is still plenty to hate out in the rolling gardens, such as the nice little pink marble palace that Josephine got in her divorce settlement from Napoleon and Marie Antoinette’s estate, where the soon-to-be-headless fruitcake built a little hamlet with a mill and inns and towers. She used to get done up like a shepherdess tending pre-washed sheep and milking hand-picked cows. I am not kidding when I say I walked around for five hours, breathing in the sweet aromas of grasses and flowers, feeling the light as the sun broke through the fog. Don’t tell me about Feng Shui, either. These thieves had it down with the winding pathways, mazes, ponds and trees, even a meadow for Marie Antoinette’s flock. It was like being inside of a Monet or Cézanne. And it was almost real; real enough for me, anyway, after the expanding rage motivated by the opulence and undeserved wealth and power that the chateau represented. I know that the grounds were just the front yard of the ruling morons, but there were lovely places where I could gratefully forget the politics of the past and present.

I can’t completely understand why I keep coming back to Paris. It’s one of the personal mysteries that I have given up trying to figure out. I love it here; the size, history, culture, art, food, all of it, even the sometimes disgusting smells and the dark rain and the crowded, unaesthetic metro. There is no reason why I should feel so at home here, but I do. 

I also know, absolutely and without question, that I must get outdoors once in a while, away from the palaces and mansions. If I don’t, I begin thinking about spoiled, over-privileged Marie Antoinette (a Scorpio), the oh-so-goofy queen of France, all dressed up like Little Bo-Peep, scolding her sheep, sniffing the clover, delightfully unaware that she is about to have her empty head hacked off by an angry nation engaged in a bit of Political Feng Shui.

Why I Miss The Seventeenth Century

     The “O” key on my computer seems to be sticking. That’s not cool at all. I really have to be able to use the “OoOo” key. Too many words require the use of the letter “O”. I wonder if I can write a thousand words without it? An Oulipian experiment? Crap. My usual approach to repairs, household, automotive, technological, is to wait and hope that the problem will solve itself and become magically fixed. I don’t think that I am capable of repairing it myself; I’m full of self-doubt and my inner voice tells false tales of the harshness and greed of the world and inhibits me from asking for assistance. I will fail, they will rob me, take advantage of me, steal, destroy, make it worse, humiliate me in some way. Pricks. I must be ready, at all times, for attack.

     I just took a small business card-sized piece of paper and ran it around the “o” key and it is now working perfectly. That is, in fact, a much more common method for fixing problems. A simple tool, an instinctual thought, a deft and economic motion and, et voila, il est repare. You just have to shake your head.

     On the way about my business I noted that there is still construction going on at Eglise Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis. It’s the landmark building in our quartier. They have cleaned it since last we were here in 2010. Then, it was a huge dark threatening slab of religious stone looming over the St. Paul area of the Marais. If I lean out of my living room window and look to the left, I can see the church at the end of the block and it fills the sky. In the past year or so they’ve cleaned it, ground off the accumulated centuries of weather, coal and exhaust that blackened it. Now, it’s creamy white, the natural color of the limestone blocks that have been in place for 400 years. It’s the church where the kings were baptized as infants, before assuming the mantel of monarchy and before the revolution.

     The tall wooden doors have been repainted a blood red, the massive columns are smooth and all the detail of the carved capitals is visible. The giant clock above the entrance has been reconditioned; it is colorful and a bit disorienting. I’d expect it to be on the front of a bank and not a church. Another Christian reminder that “time is running out?” Goddamned busybodies.

     Paris, like everywhere else, is changing, getting in line with the superficiality of the 21st century. The bar where we used to hang out, Le Dome, has been renamed Le Favorite and the prices have doubled. The tangerines, which we ate by the dozen, are harder to peel, larger; they’re probably from another country, cheaper to import. Also, there is the noticeable disappearance of booksellers, both French and English language.

     On our block there was the Librairie Charlemagne, a cluttered Parisian stationary and bookstore. Now, it’s Maje, an upscale boring clothing outlet. The Village Voice, a great English language bookstore in the fifth arrondissement has closed and The Red Wheelbarrow, with a good selection and a friendly owner, is selling their stock and closing. Will all bookstores eventually become clothing stores? Another great city becomes a mall. It diminishes the culture. The external life, “how do I look”, becomes more important than the internal, intellectual world.  I don’t much care about fashion. I’m not so poor that my self-esteem is tied up with how close to the wealthy and privileged I can make myself look, which costume to wear. I’m not rich and detached enough to waste money setting myself apart from the subspecies of poor, middle class, and working people.

     I like bookstores more than clothing stores. I like grocery stores more than clothing stores. I like hardware stores more than clothing stores. Pretty soon, I guess, everything will be coming to us via online shopping, which is convenient and cheap. Everything except clothes, because we are all still built differently and you pretty much have to try on a pair of pants before you buy them. I guess, if I was rich and insulated from the real world, I’d hire a personal shopper who would come by the house every week, take my measurements, adjust for diet, and go off with my account numbers to top off my ego. For now, I hit Target or Penny’s once a year and stock up.

     Paris seems to be changing from a literary, political, artistically rich culture into a shallow, badly lit shopping center.

     You are what you think other people think you look like.

As I laps into bitterness I’m walking by Eglise Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis. There is a group of workers struggling with a huge stone section of one of the main columns that holds up the front of the church. A drunk, crouched in a small alcove, laughs at them as they struggle to slide the giant block into place. It’s a thick section of limestone, very heavy, perhaps close to a thousand pounds, and cumbersome. A hook is attached to the top of the stone and nine men are maneuvering a block and tackle system into place so that they can move the piece.

     They must look like the same guys who built the cathedral centuries ago. Lean, serious men, dressed in canvas pants, covered in dust, each in his position, making eye contact, muttering directions. They’ve got the stone halfway in place and then a big guy steps up with a long-handled, heavy rubber mallet, much bigger than a sledgehammer, and pounds hard on the front of the curved surface of the section, moving it into place, millimeter by millimeter. One of the workers is wearing a dirty beret, another has a rag wrapped around his head, turban-like. The rest are wearing toques and bandanas and could have modeled for a painting by Millet or Caillebotte.

     I’m not alone. A lot of people have stopped to watch the work. A woman smiles at me as she walks away, as delighted with the scene as I am. There is something important about a group of people watching others doing a difficult job, a job that can only be done by hand, delicately and with purpose. It’s genuine and ageless in a rapidly changing and frivolous world. The stupid clothing store across the street, which has taken the place of the Librairie Charlemagne, looks thin and dull. I’m sure that I’m romanticizing the event; the church, the stone, the drunk, the authenticity of the work, the domination of modern culture by the artificial and synthetic.

     So what? It’s why I’m here, in Paris, again. I’m a romantic, and what better place to practice romanticism? I’m glad that I saw those guys working on the church, otherwise I’d just drift around looking for trouble.

     Also, and I know it’s not the same as moving a thousand pound stone into place while being ridiculed by a drunk, I fixed my “O” key.

Butter for Health: A Doctor's Advice

Our guest editor, Dr. Rado Gjalpe, is an internationally acclaimed scientist and highly respected expert on the subjects of Art, Music, Literature, Diet, and Sex. Today, Dr. Gjalpe responds to inquiries from an American traveler, Joseph, who is living in Paris and has some concerns about his increasing use of butter.

Doctor Gjalpe, how much Butter should I eat?

There is really no limit. I recommend eating butter three times a day. Studies have been inconclusive about how much butter the human body really needs. Let’s just assume that we are not getting enough and take every opportunity to enjoy this wonderful food.

Isn’t butter supposed to be bad for you?

My God, this old fairy tale keeps coming up every few years. No, emphatically, butter is not “bad” for you. Butter is excellent for the circulation, the immune system and hair growth, and is one of the healthiest foods every produced. I wish the fundamentalists would do their homework and study some science before making these “faith-based”, uneducated claims.

I’ve heard that butter can raise cholesterol levels. True?

If it did, wouldn’t cows have high cholesterol? Cows are second only to dolphins as the healthiest mammals in the animal kingdom.

Dr. Gjalpe, what is your favorite way to eat butter?

Naked. If I can’t be naked while eating my butter, if, for instance, I am in a public place in broad daylight and there are children present, then I prefer it slathered on a large piece of crusty bread.

Does the human body build up a tolerance for butter as we age?

Yes, of course. Our bodies require more of everything as we grow older and we must increase the amount we use in order to maintain optimum satisfaction and health. It’s similar to the actions of certain prescription drugs. There is nothing wrong with keeping up a healthy level of both.

Is it a myth that butter increases the sex drive?

It's not a myth. Native Americans and the tribal peoples of Tibet considered butter an aphrodisiac for centuries. In 1947, researchers from Johns Hopkins University, in cooperation with scientists at the University of Basel in Switzerland, discovered that butter did, in fact, increase sexual vitality in both men and women to a significant and measurable degree. Further studies have proven, beyond a doubt, that people who eat large quantities of butter produce a certain pheromone-like secretion that makes them much more attractive to potential sex partners. They generally live 5 to 15 years longer than the average and remain sexually active, vigorously so, to a ripe old age. Many die in their late 90s during the act of coitus.

Thank you, Doctor Gjalpe. You’ve certainly put my mind to rest.

You are very welcome, Joseph, and thank you for asking these important questions. I find it sad that more people are not interested in the healthy consumption of quality butter. You are to be commended. Please, before accepting the advice of religious zealots and so-called “health” experts, always consult with a doctor such as myself. Reject religion and embrace science and enjoy your butter.

The Secret Behind the Bookcase

A week has passed already. Paris has been great, with a few problems, nothing severe. We’re settling into our odd apartment. The furniture is tattered but fairly comfortable. There are two three-quarter-sized sofas that can support us for an evening of reading, writing, laughing. One is rose red, the other a canvas-gray.  A lumpy queen-sized bed, a luxury, fills the small pink bedroom. The unfathomable telephone is on a tiny table near the kitchen door and underneath is a tangle of French wiring and cables for the TV, Internet, phone and DVD. Every year that we stay here I hope nothing goes wrong with that crap, or that it ignites. Four floors up a narrow 16th century staircase, we’d be done for. The sisal floor covering smells sour on humid days and every day is humid, but it’s tolerable. There are no goddamn closets and the oven is a complete mystery.

The toilet is always a laugh. I’ll bet a lot of people can’t say that. The big bathtub, sink, mirrors and shelves full of towels and bedding are in a well lit tiled space connected to the bedroom. The toilet, or WC, itself, is right off the living room behind a bookshelf. Over the years tenants have left behind paperback books, everything from Kerouac and LeCarre to Danielle Steel and Agatha Christie. A couple hundred abandoned books. Ours are here from the past five years, my copy of Les Miserables, a couple of pulpfiction airplane books and some Graham Greene. Three walls of shelving have been built to accommodate all of this literature and behind one section is the toilet. The thick, cork-lined wall swings out and, voila, there is le toilet, discretely stationed in a closet that sticks out into the living room, two feet from the red sofa. For some reason there’s a full-length mirror on the wall, facing the user, which is a bit daunting. To watch one’s form? To see oneself at one’s most vulnerable. It sort of works. The first time we saw the positioning of this most intimate of appliances, we were surprised. It’s like something left over from the pre-revolution days of intrigue and romance. A secret passageway/toilet for discrete liaisons.

We Americans have a great need for privacy, particularly when it comes to personal sanitary functions. The French, I think, are much more open about bodies and how they operate, and now, so are we. There is no way to use the loo, which for all intents and purposes is located in the living room behind a thin layer of cheap paperbacks, without acknowledging the existence of anyone else in the room. We grow more intimate with each passing jour.

I promise I’m not going to write too much about the bathroom. I am not fascinated by what happens there. Sure, I like a bath from time to time, but the rest of it is just the confidential detritus of the day, so to speak.

I’m a self conscious American and have spent much of my life trying to understand the world or how it operates. It wasn’t until I began traveling extensively that I found I was a part of a really big picture and I didn’t matter all that much. It was a revelation and an interesting feeling, that of insignificance and anonymity. I travel and learn from those around me.

Paris is full of hip, skinny, well coiffed overdressed youngsters, barking and gawking and hopping up and down. It’s too late for that and I’m grateful.

But there’s an old dude who I’ve seen several times as he wanders back and forth on the Rue de Rivoli. He’s anywhere from seventy to ninety years old, short and bent. His shoes are scuffed but serviceable and he wears an old tweed suit with a yellowing shirt, wrinkled and stained, unlaundered, I’m afraid, for years. The green overcoat falls below his knees almost to his ankles and his brown cap sits squarely on his head, like a roof. He has thick hair in his ears, is unshaven with bushy eyebrows. He moves slowly, much more slowly than the rest of the foot-traffic on the busy street. Everyone passes him. He keeps his hands in his pockets, an unlit cigarette hanging off his lower lip and he strolls.

That’s it. The image is one of absolute unconcern and blankness. He has given up hygiene, style, and companionship. He is self-assured and confident. I may be inventing a lot of these traits for him, but what convinces me is that his zipper is always down. His fly is perpetually opened.

I don’t think he’s purposely exposing himself; it’s not a perversion. He’s not an animal, for Christ’s sake. He ambles and when the need strikes him, he steps into an alcove and relieves himself against a wall, modestly engulfed in his shapeless green coat. His life has been reduced to a slow walk and necessary functions. Other people, culture, politics, history and philosophy are of no concern. I am curious about what goes on in his mind, if anything. I haven’t given him a name; it would be unfair.

He’s either a demented old Frenchman who has completely given up or else he is self-contained and living in the absolute moment, admirably indifferent about the complications and enigma of the modern world. He may be drunk.

I don’t know what to believe. It doesn’t matter, I guess. I can only make up stories about the old guy, watch him and wonder if I could live that way, totally insane or totally free.

I have a long way to go; I admit it. I am concerned that the sleeves of my sport coat are an inch too long and I try to keep up with traffic as I barge along with the rest of the pedestrians, dodging buses and bicycles. I’m embarrassed when a native laughs at my pronunciation of French words and I’m a little claustrophobic on the metro. Suppose I order the wrong thing for lunch? Should I buy a hat or use an umbrella when it rains? Am I eating too much butter?

And I’m still getting used to the toilet behind the bookcase.