I worked all Thanksgiving day. The French don't celebrate Thanksgiving because they didn't murder American Indians and steal their land and shove the whiskey-sotted, small-pox-scarred survivors onto reservations. Oh, I'm sure the French murdered somebody over the last 100 years or so and at least tried to steal their land (after all, it's a country that has been and still is run by white men, so it's an easy bet) and they have their own celebration for that. And in America, I imagine we don't recognize any other country's traditions, either. Other than Cinco de Mayo, but that's just an excuse to get drunk and eat chips and salsa. And if we happen to encounter anyone from another country in a shop or on the street, we say, "Speaky dee Eenglish, wetback?" Or some such thing as that. So much for the "Bring me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free." Oh, I forgot, the Statue of Liberty was a gift from the French. Damn socialists.
But, I digress.
It was a long day - standing up and bloviating in front of students from 9-5. But it was satisfying, since they laughed at at least one of my jokes and I got to say the word "bullshit" in reference to corporate America. Some might call this heaven.
As I trudged wearily but happily home, I stopped off at my local, fittingly named L'Insolent. I used to go to the other local, Desperado's, but they have new owners and a new name, and I don't feel as welcome. I used to tell people that I lived somewhere in between Insolence and Desperation, but now I can't say that any more.
Thomas and Teddy, the Iranian-born, French-raised owners of L'Insolent were in the midst of their shift change but welcomed me to the bar and gave me a Picon Bierre (beer with a dash of orange bitters). I perused the menu and lo and behind, the special was Dinde Normande. "Dinde?" you may ask. So did my former boyfriend when we first arrived in Paris and would spend hours exploring the exotic magic of the local grocery store. "What do you think din-dee is?" He asked. I shook my head, fixated on the fact that I knew he was slaughtering the pronunciation and wondering myself if it was pronounced danduh or dahnduh. You might think you could look at a piece of flesh in the grocery store and know immediately which animal it came from. But you would be mistaken. Well, dinde is turkey in French. And Dinde Normande is turkey in a Normandy-style cream sauce.
The turkey was lovely and tender. I could cut it with a fork. I ate and watched the constant horn-honking, near-death traffic confrontations on the busy corner and all of the people scurrying home in the rain. I had warm apricot tart for dessert and Thomas, who is always trying to make me stay longer so I can keep him company, plied me with some Armagnac. Finally, it was time to go home and I realized I'd forgotten my umbrella, so Thomas gave me his. It was kind of him, and also it was like girls who leave their underpants at a guy's house. It's an excuse to go back. Thomas wants me to come back, and so I will.
Earlier in the week, one of my students asked if she could make a short announcement in the class, and I said yes. She said, "You guys...(such an American phrase)...I'm having an American Thanksgiving dinner at my place Friday night, so please email me or come talk to me at the break and tell me if you're coming, so that I'll know how much food to make." I raised my hand a tiny bit and said, "Um. Can I come?" Ha! Inviting myself! Terrible. Of course she's going to say yes. Poor girl. But I was lonely for a Thanksgiving meal and therefore, had no shame.
She lived right near the Eiffel Tower, so it was a bit of a trek for me. And as usual, I suffer from the always-early disease, and left my apartment an hour ahead of time. I stopped into my local Franprix and bought a bottle of Mercier, a Champagne that I love. There was an "incident" somewhere along line 13 (yawn, tell em something new) and the crowds on the platform and in the train were massive. Me and the Mercier were crushed in between woolly coats, listening to everyone breathe.
Finally, I popped above ground right along the Seine and the Eiffel Tower was sparkling in blue and white lights, as it does every hour on the hour. I walked across the Pont d'Alma and watched the wind stir up waves in the Seine. As I walked past the Quai Branly museum, someone came up behind me and said, "Is that you?" It was one of my students, a handsome Brazilian. We walked the rest of the way and when we got inside the building and into the beautiful glass and wrought-iron-filigreed elevator, we got stuck. It was stopping halfway between floors, so the door wouldn't open. He kept pushing the buttons and we'd go up to the 5th, then down to the 3rd and up to the 4th, but no luck. I started to think that we might just have to sit down and start drinking my Mercier and his beer. But alas, we finally got to the ground floor and escaped. We were relegated to the winding, red-carpeted stairs.
Inside the apartment, a few people had arrived before me (thank you!) and it smelled like heaven. There was a huge roasted turkey on the counter, two roasted chickens, creamy mashed potatoes, au gratin potatoes, lentils with fried onions on top and stuffing. Other students brought dishes from their own countries - Japanese sushi, Moroccan eggplant (incredibly good) and a green vegetable soup with chick peas. In the end, I think there were about 40 students there, et moi. I was honored that they included me.
The coup de gras was dessert. My student announced that she had New York cheesecake and pineapple upside down cake, among other things. Oh my. Now, I've actually had Junior's cheesecake in New York and my mother used to make pineapple upside down cake all the time when we were kids, so I was drooling. And I wasn't disappointed. Both were delicious and authentic. When I complimented my host, she was happy to know that her food was authentic and said, "I just went to Thanksgiving.com and got the recipes. I couldn't get Philadelphia cream cheese, of course, so I used mascarpone." Well, there ya go. Student ingenuity at its best.
The familiar sound of American football was never in the background that evening, like it was when I was growing up. But suddenly there was loud salsa music and a Venezuelan student started teaching the girls to dance salsa. "Madame Wines! Madame Wines! You must dance." They didn't have to twist my arm. I got up and moved my hips as if I still felt sexy, which I don't. So it was a nice change for me. Recently, bad-boy Teddy at L'Insolent told me as I was standing at the bar that he'd be right back and then he'd throw me down onto the bar. He says things like this. Strange, but true. I said, "OK, I'll go home and find my sexy body and be right back, too. I know it's somewhere. In a box probably. But I'll try real hard to find it."
So, I danced and sweated off the huge meal and had a grand time. I talked for a while with one of my students' boyfriends about mortgage-backed securities, debt risk tranches and the worldwide financial crisis. He works at the same bank where they busted that guy for his risky trading. I can't tell you what he told me, but if you were following the case at all, you'd know what he said. Then I spoke to a Chinese student who is from the town where they had the terrible earthquake last year. We laughed about cultural differences - Chinese, French and American. Another student's boyfriend was from College Station, Texas, where I know I've been at some vague point in my corporate life, probably staying in a no-tell motel on my way from somewhere and going to somewhere else. I probably got stuck there on the way to Waco. Who knows. But when I said, "Remind me of where College Station is." he showed me on his face. Houston was his left cheek, Austin his right cheek, and College Station was his nose.
Another student's boyfriend said, "I think it's amazing that you would come to a party thrown by students. French teachers would never do this. They think that they must maintain their distance in order to maintain respect and control." Ah. And they're probably right. But I see my students as fellow human beings, who have as much to teach me as I have to teach them. Unfortunately for me, I've always seen titles - like Professor, Vice President, CEO, etc. - as illusions. Which means that I never gave corporate owners and managers the bloated respect they desired. I have respect for all human beings, because they're human. If I suddenly put on a suit and call myself a Professor, do I instantly require respect just because of the title? If I do, it's a mirage. If I teach them something worthwhile, that they can use in their life and career, then I am a Professor.
I decided around midnight that I'd head home and leave them to their partying. Filled with wonderful food and the graciousness of my students' hospitality, I walked back to the Metro. I'm thankful to have the opportunity to live here, meet and talk to students from all over the world and hopefully give them some useful tools that will serve them well.
This wasn't the only Thanksgiving meal I had. On Saturday night I was invited to a lovely feast, that I'll tell you about soon. Especially the hilarious clusterf*ck of a pumpkin dish that I made. But for now, I'll sign off since I have to prepare for school tomorrow. À Bientôt!
Confessions and observations of an American girl in Paris.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Friday, November 27, 2009
Miracle On Taitbout Street
OK, so...Remember how I told you all about the big bad French post office? Well...
I had a fun little experience courtesy of my young Irish friend who worked at a horrid Paris restaurant called Indiana Cafe this summer. It's a terrible place, so don't go there when you visit Paris. Of course, if you're in Paris, you want to go where the Parisians go, not to some fake-ass supposedly American-style eatery. Right? RIGHT? OK, now that we have that sorted out...
It's an easy place for the Irish girls to get jobs for the summer, since Indiana evidently only hires girls for waitress jobs and only hires boys for management jobs. Another reason to hate it. But the girls need their spending money to buy 1.20E wine bottles and .75E baguettes and go sit on the steps of Sacre Couer at 3AM and celebrate their Irishness. I'm all for this kind of behavior, even though I go to sleep at 9PM and can only dream of being Irish.
At the end of each summer, the girls went back to Ireland, undoubtedly without their virginity intact, and one of them asked me to go over to Indiana and pick up their last paycheck BECAUSE ALL THOSE SMART MANAGER MEN CAN'T FUCKING FIGURE OUT HOW TO PUT A CHECK IN A FUCKING ENVELOPE AND PUT A FUCKING STAMP ON IT AND MAIL IT TO FUCKING IRELAND.
Well, neither can I. And I'm afraid of the post office, also too.
So, I put it off. And the penniless Irish girl had to sustain herself on a diet of Guinness (that's ok, it's like drinking bread) while she waited for me to gather my courage, find the restaurant on my map, figure out the Metro trip, walk completely around Place Clichy looking for the damn place, walk in and ask, in French, for the check. And then, of course, I had to PUT THE FUCKING CHECK IN AN ENVELOPE AND BUY A FUCKING STAMP AND MAIL IT TO IRELAND. In other words, go to the dreaded post office.
My poor little Irish girl was growing faint from months of Guinness and pleaded with me to go get the check. I enlisted the help of my friendly ex-pat G, asking her to go with me on this trek into the wilderness. She said, "We better call them first." This is why we all have friends. She called the "manager." He said, "We have no record of any person named Lisa Wines being given permission by said former girl employee to pick up said check." G had the temerity to ask the "manager" why he couldn't just PUT THE FUCKING CHECK IN AN ENVELOPE AND MAIL IT TO IRELAND." He said, "I know. It isn't me, it's my boss." Weasel. So, I had to ask my Irish girl to write a letter - the manager actually said he would accept a print-out of an email from her to me - giving me permission to pick up the check.
Then I had to print the mother fucker. I don't have a printer. So I went down to G's place and her printer wasn't working. It took me two days to get a printer, plus I had to go enlist the aid of my friend from Kazakhstan, who has a van. Twice. Luckily, she needed a printer, also too. But she doesn't drive. So she got her French pal to drive us to the store. Twice. This is because Madame Kazak called the store before we went, to make sure the printer was in stock. (If you're starting to see a theme here, of always calling first before making the trek, you would be right.) And after cursing our way, in French, English and Russian (OK, don't ask me why Madame Kazak curses in Russian. It's a long story), through Armistice Day holiday traffic, jumping out of the van with horns a honkin' and sending Mr. Van Driver off to park, we found out that there were no printers in stock.
It took our pal longer to park the van than for us to find out there wasn't a printer to be had.
We did get the cashier at the store to make sure there were two printers at their other store waaaaaaaaaaaay across town, but it was too late to make our way over there. So we reconnoitered the next day and bought our printers.
Now I had my printed letter and my passport in hand, because they also told us that I had to show them my ID. SHOW THEM my ID. OK? Just show them. I arrived at the restaurant and walked into the glory of orange plastic booths that instantly brought me back to 1965 and all the Pennsylvania Turnpike roadside Howard Johnson's we stopped at on the way to my grandmother's farm in Canada. Except this time, I didn't have to pee and I wasn't in the mood for fried clams or one of their 28 flavors of ice cream. Just gimmee the freakin' check, K?
"Je suis ici pour la cheque de la Irish Girl." (Fab French, n'est-ce pas?)
I hand the boy manager my passport and the printed letter. He says, "I have to have a COPY of your passport." #@! and furthermore, &*^??!!! He says, "I know. It's not me, it's my manager." Well son, you suck, and so does he. (I didn't have time to look that up in my handy dandy iPhone French translator which I haven't downloaded yet God knows why.)
I walked around the corner and made a copy of my passport and returned with my jowls wobbling angrily about my frownie mouth. This always scares people. I'm not sure why.
So, Lisa, you might be saying, what about the post office? Ahh.
After addressing the envelope with a typical Irish address...
...I was late for work so I shoved the envelope in my purse and ran to the Metro. After work, I realized that there was a post office right down the street from work. So, with trepidation (because I had to BUY A STAMP! OMG!), I walked in the door.
There were no lines. The place was huge and sunny and clean and shiny. A very nice middle-aged man smiled brightly at me and started babbling happily in French. I just stared at him because he was wearing postal employee garb and he was actually OUT FROM BEHIND THE DESK and like, smiling and shit. My mouth was open as I pushed my envelope into his hands. His eyes lit up. "Ah! l'Irlande!" Wow, I thought. He's a Frenchman and he knows where Ireland is even though it's closer than New York is to Philly? Amazing. And then this nice man walked me over to the little machine and put my letter on the little scale and dialed up the postage for Ireland and pointed to the coin slot and smiled at me so I'd put my money in there.
Freaking amazing. I felt so loved and welcome, that I didn't want to leave. For a second, I even thought I'd ask him if I could close my post office bank account and get my 6.95E. But I figured that would be pushing it. I waved goodbye to my new best friend and walked back to the Metro in a daze.
Last week, I had a friend in the states ask me to go buy something (I can't say what. He might kill me.) and ship it to him as fast as possible. I started to gag at the thought of this great feat, until I thought of my nice man at the post office near work. I actually got excited about going back. But my natural pessimism won out and I figured that he was so cheerful that they'd already fired his ass.
I walked in with my package and I had no idea how to send anything big internationally and quickly. I stood in the middle of the huge place and scanned the room. There were all these pretty mailing boxes of different sizes and in pretty colors. A very nice young girl came up to me, "Bonjour Madame!" Then she said something that looked like she wanted to know if she could help me, so I told her, "Je voudrais envoyer ceci aux Etats-Unis." I looked it up ahead of time and repeated it 87.6 times on the way there. I even knew how to say that I wanted it to get there fast, but not cost me too much. She pointed to one of the boxes and its reasonable price, then took me to the desk where the nice man from the other day was standing and helping a lady. I waved goodbye to her and stood waiting. Until a really nice middle-aged woman came up to me smiling and asked if she could help me TOO.
They all got into the act. The women stood on either side of me while I filled out the shipping form, with the guy behind the desk chatting away. They corrected my spelling on my contents description. They had typical French side conversations about whether or not I should get additional insurance or just take the normal 30E. It's like they do in restaurants when they argue about the perfect wine for each course. It can take an hour before they decide, but the right wine is always worth it.
As the man was ringing up my purchase, the other woman showed me these cool gift cards that the post office is selling for the holidays. She showed me all the participating stores and how much money my lucky friends could save using the card. I ohhh'd and ahh'd and said I'd think about it. And she smiled and said, "Certainement!"
So, this wasn't a dream. Because I've been there twice, and both times, everybody was nice as pie. Warm, buttery, apple tartish kind of pie. Here's the address, in case any of my Paris compatriots want to behold the miracle: 78 Rue Taitbout, 75009 Paris
I had a fun little experience courtesy of my young Irish friend who worked at a horrid Paris restaurant called Indiana Cafe this summer. It's a terrible place, so don't go there when you visit Paris. Of course, if you're in Paris, you want to go where the Parisians go, not to some fake-ass supposedly American-style eatery. Right? RIGHT? OK, now that we have that sorted out...
It's an easy place for the Irish girls to get jobs for the summer, since Indiana evidently only hires girls for waitress jobs and only hires boys for management jobs. Another reason to hate it. But the girls need their spending money to buy 1.20E wine bottles and .75E baguettes and go sit on the steps of Sacre Couer at 3AM and celebrate their Irishness. I'm all for this kind of behavior, even though I go to sleep at 9PM and can only dream of being Irish.
At the end of each summer, the girls went back to Ireland, undoubtedly without their virginity intact, and one of them asked me to go over to Indiana and pick up their last paycheck BECAUSE ALL THOSE SMART MANAGER MEN CAN'T FUCKING FIGURE OUT HOW TO PUT A CHECK IN A FUCKING ENVELOPE AND PUT A FUCKING STAMP ON IT AND MAIL IT TO FUCKING IRELAND.
Well, neither can I. And I'm afraid of the post office, also too.
So, I put it off. And the penniless Irish girl had to sustain herself on a diet of Guinness (that's ok, it's like drinking bread) while she waited for me to gather my courage, find the restaurant on my map, figure out the Metro trip, walk completely around Place Clichy looking for the damn place, walk in and ask, in French, for the check. And then, of course, I had to PUT THE FUCKING CHECK IN AN ENVELOPE AND BUY A FUCKING STAMP AND MAIL IT TO IRELAND. In other words, go to the dreaded post office.
My poor little Irish girl was growing faint from months of Guinness and pleaded with me to go get the check. I enlisted the help of my friendly ex-pat G, asking her to go with me on this trek into the wilderness. She said, "We better call them first." This is why we all have friends. She called the "manager." He said, "We have no record of any person named Lisa Wines being given permission by said former girl employee to pick up said check." G had the temerity to ask the "manager" why he couldn't just PUT THE FUCKING CHECK IN AN ENVELOPE AND MAIL IT TO IRELAND." He said, "I know. It isn't me, it's my boss." Weasel. So, I had to ask my Irish girl to write a letter - the manager actually said he would accept a print-out of an email from her to me - giving me permission to pick up the check.
Then I had to print the mother fucker. I don't have a printer. So I went down to G's place and her printer wasn't working. It took me two days to get a printer, plus I had to go enlist the aid of my friend from Kazakhstan, who has a van. Twice. Luckily, she needed a printer, also too. But she doesn't drive. So she got her French pal to drive us to the store. Twice. This is because Madame Kazak called the store before we went, to make sure the printer was in stock. (If you're starting to see a theme here, of always calling first before making the trek, you would be right.) And after cursing our way, in French, English and Russian (OK, don't ask me why Madame Kazak curses in Russian. It's a long story), through Armistice Day holiday traffic, jumping out of the van with horns a honkin' and sending Mr. Van Driver off to park, we found out that there were no printers in stock.
It took our pal longer to park the van than for us to find out there wasn't a printer to be had.
We did get the cashier at the store to make sure there were two printers at their other store waaaaaaaaaaaay across town, but it was too late to make our way over there. So we reconnoitered the next day and bought our printers.
Now I had my printed letter and my passport in hand, because they also told us that I had to show them my ID. SHOW THEM my ID. OK? Just show them. I arrived at the restaurant and walked into the glory of orange plastic booths that instantly brought me back to 1965 and all the Pennsylvania Turnpike roadside Howard Johnson's we stopped at on the way to my grandmother's farm in Canada. Except this time, I didn't have to pee and I wasn't in the mood for fried clams or one of their 28 flavors of ice cream. Just gimmee the freakin' check, K?
"Je suis ici pour la cheque de la Irish Girl." (Fab French, n'est-ce pas?)
I hand the boy manager my passport and the printed letter. He says, "I have to have a COPY of your passport." #@! and furthermore, &*^??!!! He says, "I know. It's not me, it's my manager." Well son, you suck, and so does he. (I didn't have time to look that up in my handy dandy iPhone French translator which I haven't downloaded yet God knows why.)
I walked around the corner and made a copy of my passport and returned with my jowls wobbling angrily about my frownie mouth. This always scares people. I'm not sure why.
So, Lisa, you might be saying, what about the post office? Ahh.
After addressing the envelope with a typical Irish address...
Miss Irish Girl
Just down te rowd, past the big tree and after the leprechaun, up the wee creak and across the mill bridge
Old Cotton Mill, County Doohickey, Ireland
Just down te rowd, past the big tree and after the leprechaun, up the wee creak and across the mill bridge
Old Cotton Mill, County Doohickey, Ireland
...I was late for work so I shoved the envelope in my purse and ran to the Metro. After work, I realized that there was a post office right down the street from work. So, with trepidation (because I had to BUY A STAMP! OMG!), I walked in the door.
There were no lines. The place was huge and sunny and clean and shiny. A very nice middle-aged man smiled brightly at me and started babbling happily in French. I just stared at him because he was wearing postal employee garb and he was actually OUT FROM BEHIND THE DESK and like, smiling and shit. My mouth was open as I pushed my envelope into his hands. His eyes lit up. "Ah! l'Irlande!" Wow, I thought. He's a Frenchman and he knows where Ireland is even though it's closer than New York is to Philly? Amazing. And then this nice man walked me over to the little machine and put my letter on the little scale and dialed up the postage for Ireland and pointed to the coin slot and smiled at me so I'd put my money in there.
Freaking amazing. I felt so loved and welcome, that I didn't want to leave. For a second, I even thought I'd ask him if I could close my post office bank account and get my 6.95E. But I figured that would be pushing it. I waved goodbye to my new best friend and walked back to the Metro in a daze.
Last week, I had a friend in the states ask me to go buy something (I can't say what. He might kill me.) and ship it to him as fast as possible. I started to gag at the thought of this great feat, until I thought of my nice man at the post office near work. I actually got excited about going back. But my natural pessimism won out and I figured that he was so cheerful that they'd already fired his ass.
I walked in with my package and I had no idea how to send anything big internationally and quickly. I stood in the middle of the huge place and scanned the room. There were all these pretty mailing boxes of different sizes and in pretty colors. A very nice young girl came up to me, "Bonjour Madame!" Then she said something that looked like she wanted to know if she could help me, so I told her, "Je voudrais envoyer ceci aux Etats-Unis." I looked it up ahead of time and repeated it 87.6 times on the way there. I even knew how to say that I wanted it to get there fast, but not cost me too much. She pointed to one of the boxes and its reasonable price, then took me to the desk where the nice man from the other day was standing and helping a lady. I waved goodbye to her and stood waiting. Until a really nice middle-aged woman came up to me smiling and asked if she could help me TOO.
They all got into the act. The women stood on either side of me while I filled out the shipping form, with the guy behind the desk chatting away. They corrected my spelling on my contents description. They had typical French side conversations about whether or not I should get additional insurance or just take the normal 30E. It's like they do in restaurants when they argue about the perfect wine for each course. It can take an hour before they decide, but the right wine is always worth it.
As the man was ringing up my purchase, the other woman showed me these cool gift cards that the post office is selling for the holidays. She showed me all the participating stores and how much money my lucky friends could save using the card. I ohhh'd and ahh'd and said I'd think about it. And she smiled and said, "Certainement!"
So, this wasn't a dream. Because I've been there twice, and both times, everybody was nice as pie. Warm, buttery, apple tartish kind of pie. Here's the address, in case any of my Paris compatriots want to behold the miracle: 78 Rue Taitbout, 75009 Paris
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Solitaire
I found this unfinished blog post today, which I started this summer while staying at my brother's place in Arizona. I thought I'd finish it off and post it.
I was sitting in my brother's TV room this morning with my laptop. If my brother had to pay the annual French TV tax, he'd be broke. There are 7 TVs in his house. And yes, you have to pay a TV tax here, whether you're a renter or own your home. Since my TV is my laptop, I can get away with not paying...for now...until the gendarmes get wind of my lawlessness.
My brother was in the nearby office on the desktop computer and my brother visiting from Philly was standing at the kitchen table in front of his laptop. All three of us were silent, while others in the house were chatting and bustling around us. Misc T was probably slaying some bees or driving a rented back hoe into the back yard to dig for a pool. I don't know. I just can't keep up with her. Lovely Reggie was probably doing her hair...again.
I tore myself away from my laptop to make a trip to the bathroom and then get some water in the kitchen, passing both brothers on the way. That's when I realized that all three of us were doing the same thing. Playing solitaire. What a revelation.
I've been playing solitaire on my laptop for years. I play plain old solitaire. I use it in between work sessions to clear my mind. Many, many times when I'm writing, I get stuck. So I just play solitaire until a solution bubbles up to the surface. It always does. Once, when I was still working in corporate America, my boss walked in while I was playing solitaire. I didn't bother to hide it, because it's a productivity tool for me, not a distraction from my work. He burst out laughing, but it was a sardonic laugh. He was really saying, "I can't believe, with all we have to do, that you're playing a game." I said, "You know those 30,000 pages of software specifications that I pumped out in one month while I also tested the software and wrote all the website content and the marketing emails? I did that in between playing thousands of games of solitaire." In other words, shut up.
But, I digress.
My brothers play a more complicated form of solitaire, which requires thought and strategy. I'm not interested in that. Nor do I keep track of my winnings or losses. I just want to click and click and click and I don't care if I win or lose. I need a mindless activity while my subconscious processes my stuckness.
But I suddenly realized, when I saw what the three of us were doing, that my two brothers and I are solitary souls. We keep to ourselves and join others when we're required to do so - out of social or familial or work obligation. Most of the time, we'd like to be left alone. When I used to travel for business and stayed at my brother's home in Philly, I'd wake up at oh-dark-thirty (my Arizona brother's phrase) and find him sitting on the couch in the dark, with a coffee cup in his hand. "Hey," I'd say. "Hey," he'd say. I'd get my own cup of coffee and then go back up to take a shower. I know he was sitting there thinking about his life, hoping his kids didn't have to have a back-breaking job like he had, worrying about paying the bills, regretting his past. Once he said to me, "I'm not a priority in my own home. First there are the kids, then the cats, then the gerbil, then me." Ah.
Staying with my Arizona brother this time, I've gotten up before sunrise to find him downstairs in one of the loungers in the TV room, flipping through channels or watching a movie. Escape. Escape from the worries of his mind. Will his business survive the recession? Will his kids find their way? Will my father fall down in the shower again or what will my mother do when my father is gone? Will that damn sister of his ever get her crap out of his garage? (I just added that because it's one of my early-morning worries.)
Solitaire. It's comforting, mind numbing, necessary. For my brothers and for me. What would our lives be like if we emptied the worry from our minds? Would that new form of silence be deafening? Would we worry that without all of our worrying the world, and all the people we love, would fall down in the shower? Will planes lose their lift and come crashing down into the earth? Is our worrying the only thing left that keeps the world from exploding?
I'm afraid to find out.
I was sitting in my brother's TV room this morning with my laptop. If my brother had to pay the annual French TV tax, he'd be broke. There are 7 TVs in his house. And yes, you have to pay a TV tax here, whether you're a renter or own your home. Since my TV is my laptop, I can get away with not paying...for now...until the gendarmes get wind of my lawlessness.
My brother was in the nearby office on the desktop computer and my brother visiting from Philly was standing at the kitchen table in front of his laptop. All three of us were silent, while others in the house were chatting and bustling around us. Misc T was probably slaying some bees or driving a rented back hoe into the back yard to dig for a pool. I don't know. I just can't keep up with her. Lovely Reggie was probably doing her hair...again.
I tore myself away from my laptop to make a trip to the bathroom and then get some water in the kitchen, passing both brothers on the way. That's when I realized that all three of us were doing the same thing. Playing solitaire. What a revelation.
I've been playing solitaire on my laptop for years. I play plain old solitaire. I use it in between work sessions to clear my mind. Many, many times when I'm writing, I get stuck. So I just play solitaire until a solution bubbles up to the surface. It always does. Once, when I was still working in corporate America, my boss walked in while I was playing solitaire. I didn't bother to hide it, because it's a productivity tool for me, not a distraction from my work. He burst out laughing, but it was a sardonic laugh. He was really saying, "I can't believe, with all we have to do, that you're playing a game." I said, "You know those 30,000 pages of software specifications that I pumped out in one month while I also tested the software and wrote all the website content and the marketing emails? I did that in between playing thousands of games of solitaire." In other words, shut up.
But, I digress.
My brothers play a more complicated form of solitaire, which requires thought and strategy. I'm not interested in that. Nor do I keep track of my winnings or losses. I just want to click and click and click and I don't care if I win or lose. I need a mindless activity while my subconscious processes my stuckness.
But I suddenly realized, when I saw what the three of us were doing, that my two brothers and I are solitary souls. We keep to ourselves and join others when we're required to do so - out of social or familial or work obligation. Most of the time, we'd like to be left alone. When I used to travel for business and stayed at my brother's home in Philly, I'd wake up at oh-dark-thirty (my Arizona brother's phrase) and find him sitting on the couch in the dark, with a coffee cup in his hand. "Hey," I'd say. "Hey," he'd say. I'd get my own cup of coffee and then go back up to take a shower. I know he was sitting there thinking about his life, hoping his kids didn't have to have a back-breaking job like he had, worrying about paying the bills, regretting his past. Once he said to me, "I'm not a priority in my own home. First there are the kids, then the cats, then the gerbil, then me." Ah.
Staying with my Arizona brother this time, I've gotten up before sunrise to find him downstairs in one of the loungers in the TV room, flipping through channels or watching a movie. Escape. Escape from the worries of his mind. Will his business survive the recession? Will his kids find their way? Will my father fall down in the shower again or what will my mother do when my father is gone? Will that damn sister of his ever get her crap out of his garage? (I just added that because it's one of my early-morning worries.)
Solitaire. It's comforting, mind numbing, necessary. For my brothers and for me. What would our lives be like if we emptied the worry from our minds? Would that new form of silence be deafening? Would we worry that without all of our worrying the world, and all the people we love, would fall down in the shower? Will planes lose their lift and come crashing down into the earth? Is our worrying the only thing left that keeps the world from exploding?
I'm afraid to find out.
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