Paris
I noticed that the teacher was wearing new glasses today. This led to an explanation of the difference between nouveau and neuf. The former is apparently new to you, while the latter is factory-fresh. I did some homework on the train but still have to type up a paper on the differences between New York and Paris. We’re learning to compare things, to say that someone is less tall than her neighbor, more intelligent than her brother, as ugly as her father. I no longer dread school the way I did a month ago but am really going to have to work if I want to keep up while in America for my tour.
October 22, 1998
Paris
Yesterday, there were more student demonstrations. Because the high schoolers want more teachers, they sometimes need to overturn cars and destroy phone booths. After class I sat in the Luxembourg Gardens for a while, reading Mama Black Widow, a novel by Iceberg Slim. I’m all for any book that uses the words pulchritudinous and hungry pooh hole on the same page.
October 23, 1998
Paris
One nice thing about school is that it’s made Friday meaningful again. I now feel that, having gotten through five days of homework, I have something to celebrate. Last night’s assignment was to write something about a movie. I chose Robert Altman’s Nashville and spent six hours on my one-page paper. It’s the articles that kill me, that and words like drifter, which translates to “one who travels without a goal.”
Meanwhile, today we took a test that involved multiple choice and an audio exam. It was hard and made all the harder by the teacher, who wandered around the room with a lit cigarette that smelled so good, I found it nearly impossible to concentrate. The audio test was discouraging in that a French twelve-year-old could have passed it with no problem. Then, too, I hadn’t taken one since Kent State twenty years ago. After we finished, the teacher invited us all to the cafeteria for coffees. Everyone smoked, and it was nice to sit together outside of class.
November 23, 1998
San Luis Obispo, California
At five thirty this morning, the SuperShuttle came to take me from Ronnie’s apartment to the San Francisco airport. There were three other passengers on board, but the only ones awake were me and the driver, who was listening to talk radio. The theme was alien abduction, and the guest, a man named Dr. Reed, claimed to have been taken at a picnic ground. He was not at liberty to discuss its location; this, he said, on the advice of his lawyer, who told him it might hurt his case.
“I don’t get it,” I said. “Is he suing the aliens or the campground?”
“Most likely the campground,” the driver said. “Chances are this isn’t the first time a thing like this has happened. They should have posted signs.”
This is not what you want to hear from a man responsible for four lives.
“The reason this show comes on at five a.m. is that they don’t want regular people listening to it,” he said. “They don’t want us to know.”
Alcohol and telephones do not mix. On Saturday night I called Paris from the Heathman Hotel in Portland. I’d figured it might cost $30, but I hadn’t spoken to Hugh in weeks. It was late, and I was drunk and feeling lonely. I had only vague memories of the call the following morning when I was presented with a bill for $156. I’m still trying to remember what we talked about, but I can’t recollect much aside from the news that Dennis (the cat) is eating a lot.
November 27, 1998
Phoenix
Ted’s boyfriend James loaned me a cookbook called Imperial Dishes of China, and I found myself reading it as though it were a collection of beautifully titled short stories. “A Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix” stood out, but nothing compared to “Monkey Heads on a Pine Tree.” In France I often leaf through recipes in search of words I think might come in handy. It’s how I learned the verbs for “to simmer” and “to chop.” Imperial Dishes was in English, but still I feel I came away with something. Here were instructions such as “Rinse the lips twice in cold water” and “Remove the penis and carve it into bite-sized pieces.” Mental pictures aside, it was disturbing to read such things in the form of a direct order. “Scald the vagina and remove any remaining hairs,” for example.
As literature, Imperial Dishes was outstanding, but as an actual working cookbook, I think it left a few too many holes. A homosexual’s notion of bite-sized penis is no doubt dramatically different than that of, say, an Orthodox rabbi’s. It’s just not specific enough. When told to “arrange the camel paw attractively,” my first question was “How?” Camel paws don’t even look attractive on camels. Where do you buy these ingredients in the first place? If you can’t find a camel paw, can you use a donkey paw instead? Do donkeys even have paws? And what’s an acceptable substitute for a vagina? It’s frustrating, but that’s what I liked about Imperial Dishes of China. It made me think.
December 4, 1998
Paris
I returned to French class after five weeks away and the teacher kissed me.
December 10, 1998
Paris
As a homework assignment I need to write a letter from a man to his wife. The two are on the brink of divorce—the teacher’s idea, and a good one, I think.
Today in class we read an essay about social change in France. The teacher is outraged over a new program that will allow friends and roommates to enjoy the same tax rates as married couples. Single people pay a lot here, as the government wants to promote marriage and childbirth. The new program was designed to give gay couples the same rights as married people, but instead, the government, afraid it might appear to be condoning homosexuality, has opened it up to any two people living under the same roof: roommates, a mother and her middle-aged daughter. It’s cowardice, the teacher says.
December 12, 1998
Paris
The unemployed have gone on strike—at least that’s how I understood it from listening to the radio. The teacher explained that, seeing as they have no jobs, they can’t actually walk off them. Instead, they’re holding a protest and insisting on a Christmas bonus with their unemployment check. She’s in their corner and said it’s unfair to punish children just because their parents were thrown out of work.
The information desk at the Louvre is also on strike, demanding better working conditions. By this, do they mean a public so well informed, they won’t have to pester the employees with questions?
December 13, 1998