the day before

Banishing reading had helped. Now I get home from work and if the supper is made, I have nothing else to do. I could go running, but daylight savings time has it pitch-dark outside by 4:40 PM and I hate running in the dark. Tonight, I was thinking of maybe renting a movie. I have also been thinking of working on that scarf I’ve been knitting for the past 3 years. But it seems, when I have nothing to do, I write. Three blogs in fours days, quite contrary to my tempo of these last months.

Tomorrow I start writing my novel. I asked Ben this evening if he thinks I’ll finish it. He answered that he doesn’t doubt that I will. To be completely honest, I doubt it. I know this isn’t the best disposition to start off on, but part of me feels like I am about to step off a ledge. I can see myself doing some fancy footwork, side-stepping the cliff, walking around in circles as I nudge my chin up to tentatively look over the side into the abyss. Like sky diving, some things I’ve always wanted to try but do not because I’m sure to pee my pants. So the fear and humiliation of walking around in a wet and humid seat for the next month has me doubting.

Actually no, just the plunge has me doubting. The plunge and the void. And maybe the landing too.

Montreal, the beautiful

Robert Barsky is the first to have brought it to my attention. At the time I was a Lit student at UQAM, and he a “chargé de cours,” or temp teacher, of a first year Intro to Literary Theory course. He brought it up because of his own work and involvement with Marc Angenot. Back in 1995, these two men thrived on Montreal for its place&time. Mr Barsky described this city as the port of intellectual exchange between American and European, and English and French, a city where cultures collide in a multifarious yet small-town way. Montreal is the community-cosmopolis. In the 90’s, it was the place to be.

Since then, hindsight has added to the city vibe. The spoken-word scene of the late-90’s was in Montreal or nowhere (at least as far as Canada was concerned). With the writers come the musicians, as this article attests. Funny thing is the temporality of the art forms. Spoken word has practically abandoned Montreal stages. As for the music, most of these bands where formed in the 90’s and are just now seeing, via (super-)stardom, the fruits of their labour.

I bring this up because 11 years after my introduction to the place&time of my city, rent is no longer cheap and I am wondering if “it’s over.” Did the expats in Paris between the two World Wars know of their place&time? And for some, by the time they got there, was it already over?

Time might not be so expedient for the intellectual and literary crew. Montreal might still be a great place for the exchange of ideas. Yet my ‘old age’ might have me be a tad blasé, because part of me feels like I was subjected to a show that’s now over. Like candid camera, I was there but didn’t realize it at the time. Now the joke’s on me, and where off to a commercial break.

The Saturday Before The Day of The Dead

Today is a very fall day. I’ve woken up with a headache. And it’s raining outside. It’s the Saturday before Halloween, so there’s a party tonight. But dressing up has finally lost its excitement. Actually, reading an article this morning from the Saturday Gazette on Muslin women and the hijab had me realize that dressing down no longer interests me either. Artifice in general has lost its appeal. Jérôme, while walking up University street last night and talking about something else, put it this way: “le charme discret de la bourgeoisie,” the discreet charm of the middle class. Like a pumpkin with its carved triangle-for-eyes pushed back into place and a web of slimy seeds and fibered filaments that harness the inside, too taut to scrap off.

I have nothing to read. Last Monday I finished a very sweet book: “Ensemble, c’est tout,” by Anna Gavalda. Wednesday, the first of November, I begin my novel. After years of suggestion from Patrick and putting off from myself, I’ve decided to do the Nanowrimo challenge. So Wednesday, after the Running Room meet, I’m off to Caroline’s place, my fellow runner and writer, a sushi supper and my iBook in tow. She has an outline and an idea for a main character. I have nothing of the sort. I have the image of a man and a woman discussing in a dark hospital room. Maybe an image of blindness. And a latent desire to write of sex and love in a loving and sexy way. But I’ve warned Caroline that the fruit of my labour will most likely be a strife-full piece of shit. A jack-o-lantern with an abject face. Because I want to avoid the auto-biography, but am not a mature enough writer to write around it. And I don’t know fiction as a form of writing. The result will most likely be seamless, and afterwards I would be able to call it “experimental” – and tacitly insult several authors I greatly admire.

I say I have nothing to read, but of course that’s a lie. I have plenty to read. My bookshelves are gorged with books bought and never opened. But I grow finicky with age. I want what I want when I want it. And now I want a good, captivating little book that I can be done with in two days time, which is hard to find seeing I’m a slow reader. I don’t want to read while I nanowrite. I don’t want to share my imaginary space with some other person’s novel (already written and published, and bought, at that!). I figure that the best way to keep at it is to become as consumed with the novel I will be writing as I would with a novel I would read. So I’m off reading until Wednesday; I am starving myself to be all the more gluttonous in my creation.

Life of Pi

The first (and only) time I met Yann Martel was a few years ago in a writing workshop. It was led by Andrew Steinmetz, who had invited Yann on one occasion to speak to us. He was not yet YANN MARTEL. Indeed, he was just some other unknown anglo-Montreal writer. I noticed his rise to fame on a trip to New York about 5 years ago. I was walking along, passed by a bookstore and noticed that it had nothing but Life of Pi in its storefront window. I thought to myself, “Good for him! It’s great to see an unknown anglo-Montreal writer receive some attention. More so South of the border!” In the few following months, Life of Pi/Yann Martel became the stellar Canadian writer he now is (until, maybe, his next novel?).

I never read his book. A kid on a boat with a lion never struck me as a particularly enticing story. I did buy his book. I found a copy in a used bookstore on St-Laurent that was in good condition and going for 7$. I figured I’d read it eventually. That time came two weeks ago.

There was a small stir that brought me to reach for that orange-covered novel somewhere in a pile in my bookcase. Her name is Julie and she was in my running clinic. While on a run one day, she talked to me about not only having read the book, but having fallen into the groupie trap. She followed Yann everywhere, which I image limits itself to readings. This book profoundly moved her, and that’s mainly why I decided to give it a try. (Plus, I figured it would follow up nicely Forester’s Passage to India.)

The book is written in three sections. The first section is part narrator/writer speaking of his experience getting to know his subject, part recounting of the subject’s childhood growing up in an Indian zoo held by his father. The second section is long. It recounts the subject’s experience living on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger (and a few other short-lived wild animals) after the boat that is bringing his family to Canada sinks in the Pacific. The third part is the transcript of an interview with officials.

Julie had warned me that many elements of the story are left out. She might have been referring to the book’s last section. (I know she spared the Richard Parker punch.) Do carnivorous algae islands truly exist? Can a tiger be tamed? Can we go blind by hunger? Can we avoid sharks on a raft? The officials don’t believe the story. So Pi obligingly makes up a new story, one without animals. This new story involves people, though some elements in it are quite similar to the original version. These similarities do not go unnoticed by the officials. They prefer the first version, though ultimately they do not decide upon which one to believe. The first version is better; the second is more realistic. The book ends with this duality. And the reader is left asking herself the same question as the novel’s officials: “Do I believe the story I read in the second section of the book? That long story I have invested myself in? That brought me to believe it? Or is the second version true, the one that’s more realistic and at the same time less enchanting and harsher by its humanity?” Was the story we read, the second section–so practically the whole novel–a lie?

The book’s conclusion reminded me of my friend Jerome who, a few years back, spent several months in India. Upon his return, his favorite Indian imitation was smiling, nodding his head sideways and saying, “Yes, yes, the same. But different.” In India, when he would go to a restaurant and ask if the meal was the same that was served the day before, the waiter would invariably reply, “Yes, yes, the same. But different.”

Now either the sense of difference is lost to Indians, or the sense of sameness is lost to Westerners. And that is, I believe, the key to Life of Pi. The two stories are true, because though they are different, they are the same. Likewise is Pi’s faith in Vishnu, Allah and Jesus pushing the idea of holy-trinity beyond the borders of different and differing religions. These religions, their ideologies and rituals are quite dissimilar, but God, who transcends religion, is ultimately the same. Similarly, Pi is the tiger, the cook is the hyena, and his mother is the orangutang. The "who's who" and the "what's what" are unimportant because ultimately they are the same. Though different.

On Running

You may not know this, but running is a world of its own. Case in point, a friend invited me to supper a few weeks back with a bunch of his friends that I had never met. A free seat was to my left and only one guest was missing. Her pals, seated at the other side of the table, pitied their unpunctual pal, thinking she would spend the evening dining next to strangers. Lo and behold, the late-comer was a girl from my running clinic! And so we chatted most of the evening about running, quite an enjoyable conversation for both her and I. Later that evening another girl, my running-buddy’s friend, introduced herself as Catherine “who doesn’t run but is still an interesting girl.” Her introduction somewhat puzzled me. Had Caroline and I been so engulfed to make others feel left out? Maybe so. Or maybe they just couldn’t possible understand…

Training for the Montreal half-marathon made me realize the interesting intimacy runners come to acquire of their city’s streets. We come to recognize the patterns of the pavement. We know the potholes, cracks and patches. We know where to expect a slight slant on the length of a street, something to which car drivers are completely oblivious. Traffic, and the people and cars who compose it, are transitory entities; they pass, while we run, and then re-run. We know our city streets like no other.

I did 1:02:42 at the Montreal half-marathon. I improved my time from the Quebec City half by 2 minutes. I’m proud of that, but a bit disappointed to not have done it under 2 hours. Why, just 1:59 would have satisfied me. Really, I shouldn’t complain. I ran the Montreal race with a cold. The day before I felt like I was entrapped on a boat, walking to the rhythm of uncontrollable waves. I missed our clinic’s pasta supper. I was resting, saving all my energies for the next day.

Only a runner will know the inebriating effect running has on the runner. I once went running with a hang-over. Moaning and complaining all the way to my run (I was meeting up with some friends), I ran our Saturday morning 5 K without any trouble. My body wasn’t tired and my head didn’t ache. The feeling my brain was a dried-up raisin came back once the run over, but while I was running I felt fine! And that is how I ran Montreal: I felt fine!

That is to say, my head did and sinuses felt fine. My quads starting feeling very stiff after the first 5 K. Especially on my left side. I’ve never had such stiffness before. Then my left knee starting hurting. At 17 K, we had a long stretch along PieIX to do. I had never realized before that PieIX is a hill. It’s a very subtle hill, but it’s inclination is constant and long. At this point I was tired. I started having trouble breathing. That’s only ever happened to me while I was doing hills. PieIX shouldn’t have been an obstacle, but it was. I loss pace. By the end of the race I was happy and limping. My left knee was very soar and remained that way for 2 days. My legs were stiff, which was not the case after Quebec. My body ached of a cold and two half-marathons in two weeks. I was due for a little break.

After Montreal, I didn’t run for a week. It felt good. But it felt better to start up again. It felt… natural. My body propelling forward, quads filled with blood and legs speeding up, and the world passing by in my peripheral view. On my first run I started thinking about running and cartilage and everything runners do to preserve their knees: cross-training, work-out breaks, supplements, anti-inflammatory pills, running on asphalt over cement and grass over asphalt, expensive high-tech shoes, knee braces, and so on. Some try to make us believe that running isn’t natural because it uses up our cartilage and damages our bones and ligaments. I’m suspicious of these claims. We are upright mammals equipped with all the bodily material needed to run. What can be more natural than running? Moreover, I am suspicious of them because it is when I run that I feel most natural. So much so that I now what to bring my running to different heights. I want to run in snow and cross-country. I want to run up mountains in the dark with a headlight on my cap. I want to deviate rocks rather than potholes. I want to smell wet autumn leaves rather than exhaust. Because I know, because I can feel that running is very natural. What isn’t natural in the least are asphalt, cement, and cars. No, I will not have a TV-watcher tell me running is unnatural, even if I’m aware that they can’t possible understand… unless they start running themselves! ;-)

This entry began after reading two great articles from the October Runner’s World issue (because running is a world of its own!) that I would like to share:

Running in Extremes: Danger

Running in Extremes: Dedication