Toujours, Philadelphie
Departed Paris at noon Friday destined for home. 31 hours later I am currently begging spare change at gate C25 of Philadelphia airport, thanks to a stiff breeze in Chicago and the world-class competence of US Airways. I am led to believe I actually might make it home before 1 am Sunday.
Oh, well. At least Paris was a hoot. Thursday I met up with two Iowahawk readers for an evening of sophisticated imbibing in the neighborhood of Montparnasse. Our host and sherpa: Prof. Jonathan, an American ex-pat who has taught university English in Paris for 30 years. Joining us was Dr. Carlos, an Australian medico currently enjoying a half-year sabbatical in France.
What Montmartre was to the Bohemian age, Montparnasse was to the early 20th century: a cafe-saturated neighborhood of famous auteurs and artists like Jean Cocteau, Ernest Hemingway, Salvador Dali, Henry Miller, Joan Miro, Man Ray, et al.
Mmm, smell the tragic artistic brilliance...
We'll see if that reputation survives my visit there. First stop: La Select, a restaurant favored by manyof Parisian literary set in the 1920s. Bordeaux for Jonathan and Carlos, tequila for me, and we toast Hemingway.
From there, across the avenue to La Coupole, another Montparnasse Jazz Age institution with an amazing interior dominated by a large cupola (hence La Coupole) and pillars decorated by many of the 20th Century's most notable artists. Bordeaux all around.
Last stop of the evening: La Something Something de Lilas (sorry, I had my swerve on by this point). Like the other stops Prof Jonathan is greeted with great deference by the wait-staff, who set us up at a heated outdoor table. Another round of drinks and Americanly-illegal Cuban cigars courtesy the fine Professor. Ha ha! Come and get me coppers! The joint is quite swank, and each table features a brass plate commemorating one of their famous regulars. Sorta like the Broadway Deli, for suicidal artistes.
You know what to do whenever somebody says the artist of the day, don't you? Scream real loud! Aaaaah!
In short order the heater at our table has attracted three comely jeune filles, with whom the resourceful Dr. Carlos strikes up a conversation en Francais. Fille un is a wisecracking Russian-French-Turkish Kung Fu expert / art gallery owner (I am not making this up); Fille deux is her accountant, an expatriate Welshwoman; Fille trois is a something or other. All seem quite infatuated with the good Doctor.
"So vhat are you doink here? Are you artist or writers or zomesink?" laughs Fille un.
The Doctor and the Professor point at me. "He's a writer."
"Really?" they ask, enthusiastically. "Novels? Screenplays? Have we heard of you?"
I'm still looking around trying to figure out who they were pointing at.
"He's a blogger," offers Professor Jonathan. "He's.. well, sort of known."
The three filles react to this as if they had learned I wrote school lunch menus or lawnmower warning stickers. Despite his revealed association with blogospheric scum, the filles continue their flirtation with Dr. Carlos, who deftly extracts a party invite for Saturday night. It's getting late, so I head for the Metro and bid my drinking companions a bien tot, and Carlos bon chance with scoring that rare & elusive menage a quatre.
Arrivederci, Paris!
Hello from Paris, Dave! Yes, it's me, 'Da Prof, logged in as 'ryannon' (don't ask me why, you don't want to know).
Unlike W.C. Fields, I'm certain that on the whole, you'd rather not be in Philadelphia. But air travel just isn't what it used to be, n'est pas? With the price of jet fuel what it is these days, you should be thankful that they managed to get you off the ground and in the general direction of the States. I'll bet you're the kind of guy who always asks the flight attendants for a second bag of salted peanuts, right? Never content, always finding fault.
Philadelphia: Mmmm, Cheese Steaks!
It's Saturday Night Dead here, and I'm wondering how Dr. Carlos is making out with the Three Graces (or should I say 'Garces' - meaning bitches - from the Closerie. By the way, the joint is called "La Closerie des Lilas"....
I'm still miffed that they pointedly avoided inviting us to their sex and drug orgy, but given your wedding ring and my general decrepitude, I'm amazed they even deigned to talk to us. Well, fuck them.
Unfortunately, I won't be the guy who does, but you can't win them all.
I'm back in my little unheated garret, listening to some fantastic Lounge mixes interspersed with amazing crap like Meathead and Bonnie Tyler singing 'Loving You's A Dirty Job' (But Somebody's Got To Do It), staring at my ingrown toenails and wishing that I could be riding shotgun in Jay Leno's Tank Car as we wooosh! down the Santa Monica Freeway.
Do you hear me, Edvaaaard Munchkins?
To hell with it: I've seen so many better days that I no longer need to sleep at night.
Music is the only thing that gets me through: things like Dylan's 'Working Man's Blues:'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9HPt2Vb91g
and Cliff Martinez's sublime theme from Steven Soderbergh's film, 'Solaris':
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxofXahX1DQ
Which very logically brings me to the subject of cinema.
Dave ol' friend, when I scanned your neurons as you were emerging from the Edgar Quinet Metro station with Dr. Carlos, I immediately noticed huge holes in the film area of your brain. Now that you've got a home theater system and a corn popper and some of that good Iowa-made crank, you owe it to yourself to learn how to steal flicks from the Net and settle down into a few days and nights of viewing pleasure. Here's the dirty little secret of how to bankrupt Hollywood:
http://www.utorrent.com/
If you can do things as complicated as turning a doorknob or flushing a toilet, you'll soon understand how to grab just about any film you've ever heard about off the Net.
In terms of the lacunes in the cinema-neuron part of your head, why not start with one of the ten best (of a thousand other ten best) films of all time: a great Francois Truffaut film called 'Shoot the Piano Player'.
If you've ever contemplated capping yourself just for the beauty of it, this is the film to be watching when you do it: a marvellous New Wave vision of Paris in the late 50s with Charles Aznavour in the role of a once-celebrated concert pianist hiding from his past in a miserable piano-bar in a seedy neighborhood of Paris.
It is one of the most beautiful stories you will ever see coming out of your video projector, and there's even more: the next time you're out getting sloshed with your Mexican low-rider pals in Juarez and some fool pulls a gun and shoves the muzzle up your right nostril, just look him in the eye and say: 'Hey amigo, don't shoot the piano player, ok?" This internationally recognized phrase will instantly cause the said fool to remove his piece from your nostril while shedding hot tears of contrition as he takes you in his arms like a long lost Honorary Mexican Brother!
As the Indian mechanic dude in Fargo would say, 'I can vouch for this.'
Your wife will love it, your kids will love it, The Coupe of Justice will love it, and you will love me for turning you onto it.
No, don't thank me - as you already know, that's just the kind of guy I am.
So keep on truckin' bro, and just remember to check in the next time you come through these here parts....
Hasta Luego, Luigi....
Da Prof.
Posted by: ryannon | April 27, 2008 at 07:19 AM
Kind Monsieur Professeur:
I WILL thank you, and quite effusively, because that's just the kind of guy I am. And I will check in with the good doctor today to learn the vicarious details of Saturday night. Who knows? The streets of Montparnasse might soon be teeming with diminutive freckled Austro-Spanish-French-Turkish-Russian urchin beggars, so keep your eyes peeled.
And also a big Merci for that cinema info. Piracy ho!
Hope to see you in Paris later this year,
Yr Fthfl Svt, etc
iowahawk
Posted by: iowahawk | April 28, 2008 at 06:47 AM