Quote of the Day: Guns Germs Steal

Fall Paris: Audrey

There's a sense to me that all the prettiest words are written about women.  Maybe they're just the most written about, because come to think of it, the words aren't always pretty.  Sometimes they're trite and callous and cliche, starved for imagination, recycled, reused, revised, revisited, not always different, but one thing I can't deny is that there's always a passion behind them.  So that the good ones are the most beautiful things to hear.  Or to read. Or to see.  They make the best songs. The best poems. The best movies.  The best novels, because there's always a story to a woman.  


From first sight, she's beautiful.  It's blatantly obvious.  She's too beautiful.  To an unapproachable extent.  Her's is the kind of beauty one remembers all day after passing in a second's time on the street.  She's striking.  And she's a bit older.  But so is Mircea, even more so.  As they walk towards us, side by side, he almost makes her look my age.  She looks to mature for her early twenties though.  Too womanly.  She's taller than him.  And tanner.  And her hair's dark brown, almost black, while his head's all but bald.  She carries herself like a woman of Paris would for the most part, except there's less of a chip on her shoulder.  She looks almost lackadaisical.  Maturely so, in dark tight designer jeans and expensive-looking boots and a drabbly slim down overcoat that's furry in the hood and looks all too comfortable.  It's not quite poshy.  More sophisticated.  Less gaudy, more strong.  There's something not purely French about her.  Something exotic.  Something passingly seductive that maybe I'm just imagining.

Either way, as they get close I deftly flick my cigarette towards the curb, straighten up and pull my shoulders back, discreetly blowing all the smoke out of my lungs.  Lili holds onto hers.  She just taps the little bit of ash off the tip and rolls what's left up and down between her fingers.

"This is Audrey," Mircea says, presenting her.  "And this is Lili and - and..." He looks to the sky with a furrowed brow and snaps his fingers twice slowly.

"Brian," I say.  "Je m'apelle Brian."  My attempt at cordial French.  I don't quite butcher the accent, but it's without doubt sufficiently lacking because she glancing down for a half second, smiling before she shakes my outstretched hand.

"So nice to meet you," she says, and she puts her cheek to mine with two quick pecks.

"Enchanté." My French sounds less French than her English does.

Lili's is better, even if it's only one word.  "Bonjour." And as they kiss each other, Lili hold her cigarette hand out and away, and like that we're back in the car.  Mircea and Audrey up front, Lili and I in the back.  The traffic's not too bad in Paris.  Not like LA anyways.  But there's a lot of traffic signals.  A gaggle of them, and they're never too far apart, so Mircea drives slow, or at least not fast enough to have to roll the windows up just yet.  Not until the highway.

Mircea opens up the throttle by the Seine.  He takes one last deep drag from his Marlboro Red as the wind begins whipping, and he flick it, and Lili flicks hers too before the windows sneak up, and we zoom smoothly along at a man's pace under old bridges and out into the countryside.

[stop]

The ride is super smooth.  Mircea and Audrey aren't quiet souls.  They thrive on the thoughts that come from conversation.  On the stimulation of the psyche.  We're talking lively.  About everything, which will commonly happen when a forum starts in a cigarette's half-life.  And as France flies by on the highway, and all the speed limit and distance signs blink quick in kilometers, I ask Mircea how much farther we have to go.  

"About an hour and a half," he says after some thought.  The radio's been on.  Although there's a song here and a song there in French, the fact never ceases to amuse me that France loves English music.  American music (if it's not from the South) that you can dance to.  They just hate our general linguistics.  And our sense of entitlement, especially when it's coupled with stupidity.  But alas, none of us are French (Mircea is Romanian, and it turns out Audrey is Israeli), and none of us are stupid.  A commercial comes on the radio and Mircea turns to it and raises a question.  "How would you like to listen to some old traditional Romanian music," he says with a fast glance at Audrey and a into the rear-view mirror at me and Lili.

I'll listen to anything in France, so why not.  "Hit me," I say.  Lili nods agreement.

Audrey's enamored.  "Yes, please.  That sounds like it would be so lovely."

"Oh! But it is!" says Mircea, and he breathes in deep and closes his eyes for the shortest of seconds.  But still, it takes him back, and he puts the CD in.  "It is so lovely.  I grew up to this.  This is what raised me.  And what's more, after all these years, it still sounds so grand."  It's not long before I have to agree.  For it's certainly grand.  An amalgamation of high strung violins and fiddles and strings and accordions and Balkans anguish.  There are many minor chords sprinkled throughout, and they aren't happy songs necessarily, but they're good and many of them droll slowly like a blues song.  Like Billie Holiday.  And the recording crackles so I know it's old.  Something not of this century, from decades ago, and I listen hard enough to make my eyes blur the passing green countryside, and my mind runs towards the cold Balkan mountains.  To old wooden beer halls surrounding a fireplace in the cold that comes just before the snow.  With no ocean around except for a sea of high trees almost drowning a small village.  I like it.

It's strange how often sad music gives me comfort.  Is that an old person thing?  To smile at depressing nostalgia?  Maybe it's just a catchy rhythm.  It's not super fast gypsy music.  It's something else.  Something slower and more refined.  Something an old man like Mircea probably drink nice vodka to.  Or whiskey.  Or just something stiff while he sits in his favorite chair.  I ask him who's singing, and he tells me.  I forget, of course.  I'm not good with names, unless they're written down, which Mircea can't do, obviously, because he's driving.  So the band just floats through my ear and rattles around and gets lost somewhere up there.  The conversation comes in spurts now.  No one minds.  Mircea's in the fast lane, and we're making good time.  In front of me, Audrey flicks her head to the right towards the window, and takes a deep breath that i can almost hear over the music.  But I don't hear it, I just see her shoulders move up and hold for a second and come back down.  "I like this music," she says.  "When I close my eyes I see snow and hot coco."

"I see old brandy," says Mircea.

Lili looks at me confused and whispers, "What are they talking about?"

I shrug and show a stupid face. "I don't know.  Close your eyes."  She does.  "What do you see?"

"I don't know.  Black.  And light.  And squigglies."

"Look harder," I say, so she furrows her brow.

Audrey's rummaging through her purse, and she suddenly jumps.  "Aye! I forgot to bring the weed!"

"The what's that?" I ask.  Lili opens her eyes.  We've turned off the highway.  Mircea's takes his BMW over the bumps in the old country roads lightly.  Slowly.  He knows what he's doing.  But he's a little disheartened too.

"You left it?" he asks turning to Audrey.

"Ah! I think so." She's still rummaging.

Lili rolls her eyes at me, and I smile.  Audrey loves her weed apparently.  I think I'm in love with her.  She's older, and she's Israeli.  "Well, that sucks," I say.


Mircea looks at me in the rear view mirror, smiling.  "You enjoy the marijuana then, do you?"

"I dabble."

To which Lili retorts, "He dabbles like you dabble in stiff vodka drinks and plastic surgery, Mircea."  He laughs.

"You're a plastic surgeon?" I ask.

"I am."

"Wow. That's cool."

"It's not a bad way to live," says Mircea patting the dashboard.  For five minutes he takes us through the life of a Romanian plastic surgeon living in Paris.  The procedures (He does mostly facial reconstructive surgery).  The money.  The late night clubs.  The drinks.  The girls.  The trips to Greece.  It sounds like a hell of a way to live.  And it'd be lying to say that I'm not just a little bit envious.  Audrey's siting back, her hand pacing through her hair, and she's eyeing him up head-to-toe.

[stop]

Then like that, we're there.  There being here, and here being a small cozy town off the highway, and everything's green in the sinking sun.  We pull down a dirt gravel driveway.  Not a nice one, mind you, but a country one with little plant greens bursting through the seams.  There's a separate fenced off property on either side.  The house at the end is yellow stucco with stained wood trusses and stained wood doors and window covers.  It's a one story place with a high sloping roof, and there's already a number of cars pulled up to it.  We're the last ones to get there.  There being here, and here being some French heavenside where even at sunset it's not quite so cold yet.

It's Halloween weekend back over in the states, and a part of me feels lonesome and left out.  But that part's small and muttering like an old grumpy man.  The rest of me's yelping with childish adventure yearning and unknown soil beneath my feet.  The country air's cool crisp in my lungs when we get out.  I instinctively stretch my legs, spreading them wide and leaning from side to side.  There's a crowd gathered around a fire-pit and grill and the crackling and laughter is all I hear.

I whisper to Lili, "Looks like we're meeting the whole family then."  And she elbows me in the side as we walk up to greet them.  Intros.  Bonjour.  Enchante.  Je m'apelle Brian.  Everyone's a little bit older.  Lili and I are the young blood.  Even Andre and his brother and Boris are older than us.  If that seems awkward, it isn't because after handshakes and formalities comes beer and cigarettes and beer.  And beer and a heavy meat dinner and beer and more cigarettes before those crazy Romanians bring out the whiskey and the vodka.

If there's one thing I learned, it's that you should never think or even dream to go shot for shot with Romanians or Russians (turns out Boris is from Russia).  They drink their fucking faces off.  And it's chill.  Well, coherent anyways.  It is a celebration though.  It's another Andre's birthday (not Lili's Andre).  This Andre is in his early thirties with a kid and his wife is French and friends with Audrey.

[stop]

It's a wild rambunctious riot.  But we're all adults here.  We drink more because we're stuffing our faces with steaks and Romanian sausage and bread and dip all night.  We sing loud to the music and yell and howl and dance through our stumbles and take more shots and more shots and shots and shots and "Prost!" and "Salute!" Birthday Andre's baby daughter wakes up and blows out the candles on the cake with a fart and a smile, but she gives it her all.  She thinks our stumbling's funny.  She giggles and squeaks and makes me play toy cars with her on the couch.  The Romanian contingent's up dancing with beers and stiff drinks in hand Audrey comes over and plays with little Leah and me.

[stop]

Days of Heaven

There are two kinds of people in this world.  People who find something they want and are content, they're the nice ones.  The most of the lot, I'm guessing.  The lucky ones.  Then there are those, you see, like me.  The cursed.  The ones with an insatiable burn to never stand still.  That find a love only to tire and yearn for another.  That are full of life and energy and gusto and yet, always have that empty feeling inside.  They're incomplete and they're wild and crazy.  And everyone sees a little aura about them maybe.  Or maybe I'm just crazy.

I feel crazy.  My mind's always racing whether I want it to or not, and for the life of me I haven't a clue as to where it's headed.  My fingers twirl and pull at my hair constantly like some chronic disease.  There's no cure because how harmful could hair-pulling possibly be?  It's a tick. It's nothing. A bad habit at most. Nut I will say this; it's maddening.  It makes me think that maybe that's why I love watching old movies so.  Perhaps the beauty in simple imagery gives me peace. Puts my finger to rest if only for a pair of hours.

It's the raw reality, I think.  Why nothing was faked except a gunshot wound and a car ride, and computer animation was some futuristic guise.  Richard Gere was still a young man back then, maybe my age, which is weird to see so clear in HD.  It just goes to show that certain things save you immortal. 

I wonder is Sam Shepard ever felt this mad.
Was he afraid of death?  I feel like I should be much more so than I believe I am, but then again fear of death is reserved for those who have something to live for.