Photo Addendum

Some photos from the wedding (in case you were curious), taken by the great Tami Turnbull, my tender lil' buddy.
How lovely is my grandmother?
Big-booty Jordan and cousin Abby
Candle-lighters for the Lord!
Sisters
Leif and I

Full Circle

The first thing I did once back in Montreal was order a poutine decked out with sauteed vegetables. This is the first poutine I've had/craved since the infamous(?) first bite I enjoyed with Leif. It seemed natural, my "welcome back" handshake with the city and the language. Somehow two and a half months in Montreal was not enough time to root me, and my return to the great nation of 'Merica seemed to stretch me a little thin, disorient me. I walked home from Montreal's central bus station and tried to decipher whether I engaged the city differently this time around, whether the place had shifted in my absence, whether my love of the bakeries and the cafés au lait had been lost somewhere over the Great Lakes or in Lincoln's historic district or in the buffet at my grandmother's wedding reception. Needless to say, both leaving and returning is odd. Although my visit to Nebraska seems like nothing more than a slight blip in time (I'm startled at how quickly it all fades), Montreal too suffered a bit of neglect while I was away. Are we only capable of living in one place at a time, devoting all energies to that approachable landscape? And if that's the case, how does one explain that persistent longing for the next major change or significant move? Oh transient soul!

But I'm hyper aware of the throb of time, the repetitions and cycles. My ordering a fancy-pants poutine recalls my earliest days in Montreal, all the while demonstrating a certain city savvy that I lacked before (knowing this time that it would be best to order it at Patati Patata on St. Laurent, and that the vegetable addition was a nice revamping of the classic). My return confirmed that life is chock-full of circles, and not just of the Montrealan variety. My grandma was a widow for fifteen years, and last week, later in life, she walked down the aisle--sophisticated in her silver chiffon. And she pulled out ALL the stops--corsages, candlelighters (imagine yours truly in a glitzy dress, hoping not to burn down the church), a too-cute ringbearer, polka bands and dancing. Obviously I was not alive when she married my grandfather, but I was around when he died. As shocking as death may seem, it's delightfully shocking when marriage can arrive AFTER death. And somehow this cycle, grand-scale with regards to the poutine I ordered yesterday, assures me that although one can relish the small things, sometimes the unexpected delivery of big surprises or significant repetitions of life's cycles remind us that we shouldn't always take comfort in the small, but rather we should expect grand things. On that note, I wait for your comments on how cheezy I've become. But listen, folks. It's the holidays, and hammy Jordan is here until at least mid-January.

Turmoil before Turkey

Things are happening. Things. Arguments and insults are flying around work, and one hears phrases like "We're losing our liberated edge!" "No, we're advancing." "No, this is a movement, but lately we only seem interested in creating appealing products. PRODUCTS! It's become elitist, disinterested in experimentation." As an intern, I take notes, if only because I'm intrigued by the politics and problems involved when movements become cultural organizations (at the moment, Kino is both, I think). This is probably worthy of a blog of its own, but in the end, I'm going to talk (for once) about practical things. Because things are happening.

Like flights, or flights not happening--a specialty of Chicago O'Hare. If all goes well, I'll arrive in Omaha, Nebraska tomorrow at 9:33 in the morning. I'm returning for my grandmother's wedding (people at work thought I was joking, coming up with an excuse to get a week's worth of vacation). But Chicago is a hellhole. And I already have dark visions of delays and squatters and screaming children and comments noting the irony of such misery over a holiday when one is supposed to give thanks.

So, I'll go to a wedding, and I'll eat lots of mashed potatoes, and drink too much coffee, and enjoy the 30 degree weather shift, and frolic about with old friends and family, and decorate Christmas trees. And clearly, I won't be blogging. But I should have some stunning pictures to post upon my return.

This is a blog of convenient information.

Daytime T.V. as inspiration

As usual, I went home for lunch today. I sit down with my burrito and turn on the television to watch some schlocky daytime soap opera. Kevin Trudeau is there, instead--a daytime infomercial. Trudeau fascinates me, mostly because I can't decide whether he's an advocate or a cinematic personality or a parody of a person. Once, suffering from artist's block in a dark room, I caught his infomercial, my first introduction. 5:23; a small minute timer in the corner of the screen counts down to his conclusion. The Natural Cures They Don't Want You to Know About. This "they" has since intrigued me. At the time, I wrote a half-page film scenario about this watching and this wondering. That was two years ago. Primetime. But today, it is daytime, and I've found him, or he's found me. No quest, no search; the t.v. landed immediately on his familiar ranting.

He talks about acid reflux. "A non-disease," he says. And I like this phrasing, because it plays into the theory I've read and irritated people with. He talks about doctors imprisoned for curing cancer patients without chemo therapy. He talks about the FDA and the drug companies--"they have guns," he warns the viewer, any person lucky enough to stumble upon his fireside chat [probably scoring an orange on the Terror Alert chart].

And I buy the book. Because unlike other infomercials where you buy one knife that slices effortlessly through pop cans and you get a second pocket-size dagger for free, the book was free (or at the price of shipping and handling). And I call the 1-800 number, perhaps because I can't escape the way this action would look in a screenplay (it's necessary, after all). And the southern-accented woman on the other line tries to bundle the free book with gift certificates to walmart and Trudeau-themed newsletters and expedited shipping, and I listen to the entire schpeel, even though I'm already late for work. I let it play out as Tarkovsky would.

And why do I share, and why do you care? Well, you probably don't care. You probably have no bloody idea what I'm talking about. But this was a huge development, sent me skipping into the streets ready to write something. And for some reason Trudeau is that something, has been for two years.

And with that landscape paved, all it takes now is characterization and image. Something like Jules leaving his wet umbrella in the bathtub, or the two Italian men conspiring in front of Schwartz's charcuterie.

And on that note, I'm off to frolick about the village.

Voyeur Digest #3, November 2006

A lot of me wants to tell you about dinner tonight--eating Indian food with Susanne and Naomi and Jon. I'd probably talk about the pinot noir we got upon Jon's bidding, and how he dramatically swirled it, let it roll slowly off the back of his tongue, and pushed the tester glass toward me while saying "I know we're not supposed to do this" to the waiter. But I think I've already said what should be said. In the end, I really want to talk about things that trouble me.

Our apartment boasts high ceilings. And though this permits the bathroom to air off despite its lack of a ventilation fan, I've noticed mold patches, like a bad case of the pox, spreading across the corners of the room. Last night in the bath I traced out the evolving patterns, the mold shifting into new cartoon formations like clouds in the wind. It was not the new patches that disturbed; something more Hitchcockian, something less expected, startled me: a smiley face sketched into the dirt accumulated on the skylight, just above the shower.
Susanne thinks it looks like Elmo; Stephanie claims it's Kermit, and after staring intently, waiting for it to move or blink, it began to morph into a whole host of early morning friendly television faces. But whatever it resembles, it is mostly definitely a pair of steady eyes. And that smile, so fixed, so unchanging, takes on an ominous character. This is not some moment of uncomfortable eye contact in the park (the kind the Parole officer always told you to avoid with strangers); this is the all-seeing eye (and it's just been released after serving ten years in a Medium Security facility). It's unquestionably more terrifying than actually being seen; it's the trace of absence and the reminder of constant presence.

In the context of this public writing, I'd like to draw some sort of clever analysis or moral from this image and this scene. But most of me, despite my prior terror, finds it to be just another part of city life. And in a way, I think it will take a small militia of "smileys" to upset my faith in Montreal. I risk sounding effusive by saying such a thing, but I'm quickly coming to believe that I could make a life here. On Thursday I got a call from Geraldine who works at Vues d'Afrique, the second largest African film festival in the world. Possible career opportunity? One never knows. But you know I'll exploit any opportunity I have. Clearly Mr. Smiley is making the most of his time. And in the end, that must be the moral: we have a lot to learn from him.

gula ac acedia

Hands down, gluttony and sloth are my two favorite cardinal sins, the vices I most enjoy indulging. But it's come to my attention (thanks for the email, sloth) that perhaps I've been giving precedence to gula over acedia. Nonetheless, in f(l)avoring temptations like cheese platters and chili over lounging while watching "Dancing with the Stars," I'm still forced into a de facto sloth, unwilling, unaware. I write all this in reference to my recent blog laziness. Know that if it takes me a few days to update, it can probably be blamed on sticky fingers or kitchen fires, and not intentional avoidance.

I only share about these sins because in a way, there's not much else to share. And maybe that's problematic. Moving to a new place has a certain ebb and flow of energy. I've hit one of those plateaus where life is good but quotidien. That means, I know the neighborhood, I've learned the systems, and life normalizes. Now the goal is to shake that up. But in order to shake, one needs ingredients, and so here is a list of some of the (culinary) ingredients I've been throwing into life's martini (and yes, this will be a listing of food I'm eating!):

*Susanne and I continue to make weekly dates at the nameless bakery, where one can purchase the most marvelous chocolate-almond croissants I've ever had. I can usually only handle half of this before begging for a cafe au lait, made to stunning perfection with the milky froth swirled about the middle. Here if one asks for cream for their tea, as Susanne does, they froth the milk and bring it to our corner table in a little saucer. I stopped in on my own tonight after work for a blueberry danish. Three Arab women, including the owner, gossip between bites of chocolate mousse.

*Last Friday Stephanie, Nazhi, and I indulge overpriced chevre and brie in a Paris bistro environment at the Alexandre. It's the type of place where you have to ask for the bill, alert them to fill your water. They thrive on that Parisian evasion, these waiters, who dress better than the clientele.

*Last night I whipped up my first batch of chili for the season. Using that tried and true recipe of my mother's, I remember to allow a habanero pepper to simmer in the mix. If you think I've fallen prey to food pretensions, last night, in freezing half of the soup, I proved that I'm just like all those middle-aged divorcees out there!

Writing blogs like this makes me wonder whether it's better to pick up another vice, like lust or anger, in order to make these blogs a little more interesting. At the very least, with a few Hail Marys, I hope to find enough virtue to reconcile this blog sloth.

**photo props go to my good friend Zane who has a nice collection of Jordan Mid-munch Shots.

Blue Screen Avoidance

I refer to the internet as something inherently pornographic; this speaks volumes about my technical savvy. And yet, tonight at the Horror Film Kabaret, I found myself, with François at my side, a technical director for the evening's screening. This involved pushing play and stop, ejecting tapes, avoiding the blue screen (very important to my favorite Belgian), and drinking a little Molson Dry. I was a bit terrified of the task. If one makes an error, there are 250 spirited spectators to run at you with torches and boos. But the task was hands down better than selling t-shirts in the lobby or checking coats. And I sat there with the line-up, and tapes cued up, and I thought, I could really do this for life. In addition to my experience at the Telluride Film Festival and the Wisconsin Film Festival, tonight provided me with a new side of event planning, and I wasn't suprised one bit at how much I enjoyed myself (especially when the night ended with me giving a Belgian high-fives!).

In other news, in eighteen days I will be in Nebraska, and in two and a half months, my dear friends Julia and Zoe, fellow camarades from my Masters program, will move to Montreal for internships. Both countdowns have me thinking a bit. Have I been here long enough to make the adjusting strange? When I return for my grandmther's wedding over Thanksgiving, will I order "un café" at Starbucks? Will I say "excusez-moi" when I run into the old woman in the toilet paper aisle at Russ's? Most of me hopes that I've been immersed enough that the transition back home is strange, and perhaps not just on a linguistic level. Part of me finds myself territorial about my space and my solitude my experiences and my new city. As marvelous as it will inevitably be to see Z and J, I'm wondering, strangely, if I'll exhibit territorial tendencies in an attempt to protect what I've discovered, carved out, and created for myself. All these changes do get one thinking about where one wants to be and who one wants to be with and how solitary one is, etc. All this to say that life has been pretty grand, especially these past two weeks. The job, though not always pleasant, has gotten increasingly better. François has made a series of films about a character named Jordy Jordan who has little adventures with pilots in Laos. This is but a small reminder that I'm doing better than I had initially imagined. And I hope you're all well too!