Blogmatic

Dev History of the Marshall Art Studio Website

2008-08-02T16:41:00.003-04:00

Once again, technology rocked the entire creative industry. Creating, designing, coding and publishing content — without paper media's distribution constraints — was liberating. (Blogging validates this concept today.) However, I was also following the money. Much like the DTP Revolution of the '80s, clients dumped print assignments while throwing money at anyone said they could code.

A freelance client hired me to design some web graphics. When that work got finished, he offered me HTML assignments. Since I didn't know how to code, they snuck me into their introductory HTML class. Within 8 hours, I wrote my "Hello World" page and never looked back.

I blew off print gigs while teaching myself more advanced HTML. My one-bedroom Brighton apartment was covered in tech manuals, sketches and notes that looked like they were written by a madman.

Some people do well in abstract, institutional educational environments. I seem to only learn with a gun to my head. My goal of getting in on the HTML gravy train could only be reached by building my own website. Below is the site's development history, defined by version number:

Version 1.0: Imagemapped Prime
Version 2.0: Blue Rough Diamond
Version 3.0: Blue Brushy Slick
Version 4.0: Gray White Fade
Version 5.0: Red No Table
Version 6.0: Blue Pinup
Version 7.0: Wide Format

Marshall Art Studio Website, Version 1.0
Imagemapped Prime
July 18, 1997 - November 30, 1998

My first site, written in undeclared HTML. Each page is a giant IMAGE with navigation links in IMAGEMAPs. The minimal text is positioned with BLOCKQUOTEs. There are some UI concepts that can only be described as "odd". Not using HTML element tags or usability testing sure speeded up the development process!

During this 18-months, I was managing an active print media career (mostly illustration, with some page design). As a back-burner project, my HTML skills were strong enough to land interviews. The HTML shortcuts left me unqualified for larger corporate assignments. But living below the radar meant I had lots of time to learn.

Marshall Art Studio Website, Version 2.0
Blue Rough Diamond
December 1, 1998 - December 31, 1999

My first two-column TABLE layout. Based the left-thin navigation column's font treatment on ESPN's, with my own Midnight Oil-inspired, over-rendered background image. IMAGEMAP navigation replaced by linked text. The expandable width wasn't so distracting on 800 x 600 monitors.

I started off by using Adobe PageMill 3.0, tempted by its editable Preview mode, control pallets and drag-and-drop functionality. Working with it for a month proved it an unreliable development tool. The Preview didn't render exactly like real web browsers, causing major positioning discrepancies. The Source mode was equally problematic, destroying any custom line-wraps and interpreting anything it didn't understand as a potential error. Correcting published errors created by working in this buggy application erased any benefit of using the shortcuts.

To avoid these hassles, I went back to coding in SimpleText and previewing with Netscape. As my old HTML teacher explained "that's all a WYSIWYG editor is anyway."

Coding a complex website in pure HTML was very time-consuming. Without color-coded syntax, keeping track of all those embedded FONT tags was a maddening and error-prone process. In the name of "learning experience", my actual working hours easily dwarfed the billable hours. Again.

I was astoundingly ignorant of HTML fundamentals at this time. Take the BODY's background image for example. Instead of stacking a thin 144 x 288 graphic and coloring the BODY white in HTML, the background image is a really wide 1800 x 288 bandwidth hog!

Fortunately, a few factors saved me from paying the price for this markup incompetence. During this version's 14-month shelf life, the internet was still an infant in capabilities and expectations. By the time hiring managers started doing code reviews, I learned enough to correct most of these types of errors. Earning my degree from the School of Hard Knocks, I became a better designer and developer.

Of course, the learning didn't stop there.

Marshall Art Studio Website, Version 3.0
Blue Brushy Slick
January 1, 2000 - July 25, 2002

At this point, the primary marketing purpose was promoting my illustration and graphic design capabilities. Since I had a full time web design job, my freelance web capabilities and training were a back-burner project.

With that in mind, here's another outstanding 2-column TABLE layout. A lot of people said 2.0's navigation column was difficult to read. This version is an overall cleaner, more corporate look. (For some reason the Typewriter font seemed cool), loosely based on v2.0's "Five Step Artist" illustration. The layout TABLE's 532 pixel width looks small now, but was optimized for Y2K's average monitor resolution of 600 x 800 pixels.

This version uses my first Javascript, written for mouseover/preload image effects in the navigation column and index page.

While pushing Javascript through my known limits, I still didn't use the HTML element tags correctly on text. For example, here's an example of correct markup:

<h4>Foo Headline Going Across the Line</h4>
<p>Do FOO sentences go on this long, with no real purpose?</p>
<p>Yup, and another Foo sentence goes like that.</p>

Instead, here's how I would've marked up this same content back then:

<b>Foo Headline Going Across the Line</b><br>
Do FOO sentences go on this long, with no real purpose?<p>
Yup, and another Foo sentence goes like that.<p>

In my defense, I was far from being the sole culprit. This markup was considered standard practice in the work world, and didn't break in Netscape or IE. However, it exposes a lack of fundamentals that would get me laughed out of the business today. Back then? No harm, no foul. In fact, my day job rewarded me with hefty annual bonuses.

Marshall Art Studio Website, Version 4.0
Gray White Fade
July 25, 2002 - June 4, 2004

Possibly my final layout TABLE. Expanded content width to 800 pixels. Introduced CSS and declared my first DOCTYPE. Used element tags without closing them, mostly paragraph tags with "class-itis". Navigation column restored to HTML text, with the current state having a unique class selector.

The visual design was formatted to fade behind the content. The third "striped" column was an attempt to keep the the fixed-width content column looking good on increasingly-wide monitors. Returning to previous interface, the section landing pages have clickable visual elements. It probably would've been a good idea to dump the section descriptions, but they looked so nice under the headline.

Specific examples (illustration, graphic design) got moved to Javascript-dependent popup windows. This misguided attempt at streamlining the interface made sending sample's URLs difficult. In short, a marketing nightmare. The section landing page visual designs were considered a dramatic improvement. The markup of those pages made adding new content a time-draining chore. Content updates with this release were few and far between.

Emulating some of Merrill Lynch workflow practices, I started referring to illdave.com redesigns as "releases".

Since print design and illustration assignments slowed down, each major release was an announcement of my growing capabilities. Gaining expertise through experience, I became known for merging technology with visual design principles to create customized websites.

In a move to market my accomplishments to hiring managers and technicians, I introduced detailed project pages with a "situation/action/results" format. This practice, along with doing better work, gained me the next level of clients and employers.

Marshall Art Studio Website, Version 5.0
Red No Table
June 5, 2004 - October 10, 2006

After testing the waters on developing client websites, this is the site's first TABLE-free, all DIV layout. Applying standards practices, all HTML element tags are open/closed properly. It's even almost WAI-compliant (images have ALT, but links don't have TITLE). By the standards of the time, a technical masterpiece.

The visual design's a bit loud, probably an obnoxious over-reaction to those who felt the previous version was too boring. I sure showed them!

Seeking to correct the popup window UI disaster, I used a Javascript toggle that hid the content in a remote .JS file. This UI works well in standard browsers, long as Javascript is on. Without it, the content is unreachable.

The toggled UI buttons (Illustration, Print + Web) was a bit restrictive as well. The buttons only looked good with complete rows of 3, creating a "tail wagging the dog" dynamic for choosing what content got posted.

On top of an ugly look and questionable UI decisions, adding new content was also a chore. As it turns out, Javascript files aren't the best place to edit text. Remembering to comment-out content single- and double-quotes was torture.

In an effort to create a more "marketing" feeling, I removed the Sketchbook and Personal Stories sections.

Since I had a full time job, the site became my testing ground for developing new XHTML/CSS practices. In two years, I had a better understanding of UI, functional visual design and standards-compliant markup.

Now all I had to do was prove it.

Marshall Art Studio Website, Version 6.0
Blue Pinup
Unpublished

Promotes my web design capabilities more than the print media skills. Shoved current content into a new "skin" based on classic pinup illustrations. While this seems like madness now, others were doing the same thing.

Technically, this version was just as unmaintainable as the last one. The buttons for Illustration, Web and Print were too big. Hiding major content in Javascript was becoming even more of a burden. The round-corner content holder prevented on-the-fly width-expansion.

As the 2-month development process ended, I realized that neither the visual design, UI or coding reflected my current philosophies of good web development. In order to get newer, more lucrative clients, I gotta rebuild from scratch.

Marshall Art Studio Website, Version 7.0
Wide Format
October 11, 2006 - present

Referred to sites that used appropriate UI and visual design. Decided to split the navigation into 2 levels, widen the content area, add a tabbed UI for new features, applied a Javascript toggle that (a) keeps all the content on the page and (b) gives all content a specific URL. For a friendlier feeling, brought back Sketchbook and Personal Stories (as a 'blog). Built 'blogs for non-commercial projects (Illustration Friday, 24-Hour Comics).

So far, this design has been enhanced with rethought elements, new functionality and easily modified content. All without having to touch every page or rebuild overall markup structure.

It's taken a decade, but I think the site's finally decent.

Fourth of July in Boston

2008-07-09T22:39:00.001-04:00

Is it possible to do a Bataan Death March while standing still?

I'm not a fireworks guy. People "oohing-and-awwing" over them always seemed a bit ... dim. It was Sam's idea to go, we were on our own this year and I didn't have a creative alternative.

We started from the Lowes Boston Theatre. After "The Incredible Hulk", we walked through Boston Common, then up Boylston Street. We stopped along the way for a meal and to check out the new Apple store (he's a killer on Lego Star Wars), walked down Massachusetts Avenue to the MIT bridge. Combined walk was just under 2 miles. If you count multiple trips up 3 flights of the Apple Store, the total walk was closer to 7 miles.

We got there near 8:30 PM, just in time for 10:30 PM fireworks. The city closes off the bridge to cars, creating a large open space with a great view of the fireworks. It was about 1/3 full of standing pedestrians when we got there. By 9:00 PM it was shoulder-to-shoulder.

When I lived in Cambridge 15 years ago, that's all the city did. This year they put loudspeakers along the bridge, broadcasting the show from the Hatch Shell.

We’re On a Road to Nowhere

For some strange reason, there was a country music vibe to this year's show. Not classic country, but the watered-down, simple-minded corporate stuff that chased Johnny Cash to his grave. Toby Keith's "An American Soldier" is a perfect example. Instead of inspiring patriotic pride, the song only reminded me of David Cross' response to Lee Greenwood's God Bless the U.S.A.: "Okay, asshole. Here's a gun, there's a plane. Get moving."

There were other classic moments, such as Jack Williams reading "Casey at the Bat", sounding even more robotic than he does at his day job. Various talking heads trying to "rev-up the crowd" getting no response. The overall feeling -- at least on the bridge -- was that the broadcasters spent way too much time amusing each other with no connection to the audience. This is what happens when focus groups are allowed to run wild.

(The 2-hour standing part might be a major source of my negativity. People with lawn chairs and the lucky ones partying in boats on the Charles River below us didn't seem to be that angry.)

I was ready to bolt at any moment, and Sam was getting dopey from lack of sleep. You gotta hand it to the rotten kid; he held onto the dream. He was going to stay if it killed him. If only he'd show the same drive in cleaning his room and three-point perspective.

During the 2-hour stand-off, I chatted with another middle-aged father from Philadelphia. He and his daughter were heading home from up north, but the horrible traffic made them stop in Boston. The most positive thing they said was that it beat being stuck on 93 for hours. He'll never do a Boston 4th again.

We thought the real show was going to start when they played the 1812. This was only a tease, meant to set us up for more lame comedy bits and failed local-celebrity crowd control.

So we all just stood there, like on some Twilight Zone version of Ellis Island, waiting for the windbags to run out oxygen.

Burning Up The Charts

The literal fireworks were spectacular. The new shapes, textures, combinations, colors and progressions made me a convert, shoving my negative memories of fireworks into the same brain storage compartment that holds rotary-dial telephones, 8-track tapes and Digable Planets. In a completely different context, Sam was even more amazed.

Yet even in this space, we weren't free from our power-drunk host. (Dean Martin was a funny drunken host. Joe Hazelwood wasn't.) While everyone else plays the 1812, someone decided the most awesome fireworks display the world's ever seen needed a soundtrack of corporate-country radio songs.

At this point, after being on my feet for two hours, I was holding a 50-pound kid on my neck, watching terrific fireworks get ruined by a shitty iPod. Thankfully the bombs bursting in air eventually drowned out the nonsense.

I’m on a Road Shaped Like a Figure 8; I’m Going Nowhere But I’m Guaranteed to be Late

After the show, the Cambridge-bound crowd walked down Massachusetts Avenue, flooding the bars and roof top parties. Massachusetts Avenue was closed off all the way to Vassar Street, allowing pedestrians to take the street's entire width. I can't tell of my good feelings were from:

being allowed to walk down the middle of a busy street
seeing how happy Sam was
finally getting that broadcast out of my head

The crowd was well-behaved and no one was in a rush. Sam was dead tired by now, but the 83 bus we needed was still a mile away, down Massachusetts Avenue in Central Square. He never complained or whined. We had to do some last-minute running, but made our bus just in time. Poor kid finally got to bed at midnight.

Goodnight, Cow Jumping Over the Moon

I wasn't up too much later. In fact, I might've done something unusual and passed out on the couch. As the darkness pushed the pain in my legs, neck and soul away, two thoughts came to mind on my express train to oblivion:

As a unique display of arrogance and incompetence, this was the best Fourth of July show I've ever seen. (Beating out Salem MA in 1996, when the fireworks were thoughtfully shot behind tall buildings). The other thought?

How will they ruin it next year?

American Gangster Film is Just Plain Dumb

2007-11-14T17:18:00.000-05:00

Watching historical events expressed by Hollywood schtick ain't easy. It's kind of like when someone with a speech impediment tries to tell you something important. Much as they try, you need to get the message from some other source. Sitting through "American Gangster" was like watching a meat-grinder shove actual events into existing holes of cop-movie cliches.

The plot is a collection of sewn-together parts from better movies. Need to highlight the Heroic White Guy's honesty? Take this from "Serpico". Want to show Lucas' conflict on morality versus his job? Take the Michael Corleone baptism scene from "The Godfather". How would Frank Lucas handle family-job stress? Swipe the attempted hit on Michael Corleone from "Godfather 2". Wait, we need a scene where Frank Lucas uses racism to justify his violent, self-serving behavior. Here's a Denzel Washington speech from "Malcolm X". I'm not positive about this last one, but I think some of the action scenes came from "Starsky & Hutch".

From what homeless shelter did they dig up the "look-a-likes" of Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier and Joe Louis? Needing to round up some last-minute negroes, our casting director must've used Denzel's line in Hurricane: any one will do. Seriously, police get in big trouble when they stray this far from "the description". Where's the justice?

The I-Spy Connection

The compelling reason to see the film is the story Frank Lucas, inventor of the "Cadaver Connection". Instead, Hollywood creates another "I-Spy" connection, which turns a black protagonist story into "Adventures of the Heroic White Guy". Similar films include "Cry Freedom" (Steven Biko dies halfway through the movie) and "The Last King of Scotland" (the entire film focused on the white doctor). Following this established tradition, Richie Roberts (our Heroic White Guy) is loaded with character traits that must've come from a focus group. He's in a custody battle; the real Roberts never had kids from his first marriage. Every white broad want to bang him; the real Roberts wasn't a womanizer.

To be fair, the Hollywood Bullshit Machine didn't stop its work on the cops. Among other inaccuracies, Lucas wasn't arrested at church, holding hands with his wife surrounded by cops with Richards posing like Hackman in "The French Connection". The real Lucas was arrested at home alone after the Mafia ratted him out.

Happy Days

During one of the many cliche tsunamis, I wondered if characters from other '70s New York films and shows were in the background. As Russell Crowe drove to save his partner, did Gene Hackman's Popeye Doyle pass him at an intersection? Did Serpico get shot next door to this film's final shootout scene? Is that Jimmy "JJ" Walker shouting "dyn-o-mite" while catching a free turkey from Bumpy Johnson? Was Joe Louis portrayed by Fat Albert?

Frank Lucas

Richie Roberts

Cry Freedom (starring Denzel Washington)

"Some criticized the film for focusing more on (white) newspaper editor Woods, on whose written accounts of Biko the film was based, than on Biko himself, whose life is told in the movie mostly through his interactions with Woods." wiki

Last King of Scotland

"Instead of presenting directly the Ugandan dictator, the movie is focused on a white doctor, who's eyes are the point of view on the story and of the events the movie tells." imdb

Autobiography of Malcolm XHTML

2007-11-13T13:19:00.000-05:00

My first full-time employer Gregory Fosella Associates. Fresh out of art school, I was hired as a production artist and junior graphic designer 1986. Making professional art was a lot more tactile back then. "Camera-ready art" meant building a "mechanical", which was a thick board with multiple layers of acetate, paste-up (typography or art glued to the acetate) and instructions for the offset printer. Sacrificing fingertips to the Exacto blade gods in production was considered a rite of passage, especially after being up for 36 hours on Jolt cola and hermit bars. Ah, the good old days.

The industry's technology hadn't changed in a century. Individual tools got more sophisticated, but the workflow process hadn't. Speculative mockups were hand-drawn (colored pencil or professional magic markers) and mounted on presentation boards. Typography was produced by paying a type house. Artwork was formatted with line screens on stat cameras. These elements were cut out and glued on acetate, which was then positioned by hand with registration marks. Graphic designers and illustrators handled the artistic expression. Proof readers were still considered a valuable asset. Account managers were responsible for client dialogue. Production artists built mechanicals from client-approved mockups.

Sometime around Black Monday, things changed. Computer companies, specifically the three-headed monster of Apple, Adobe and Microsoft, became more important than my killer paste-up skills. Inspired by John Lennon, employers "imagined a world" without production artists, stat cameras, proof readers, type houses and offset printers. This transition meant I was in danger of being washed-up at 26 years old.

Notes from the Underground

I borrowed an old friend's computer, an Apple Mac Plus ("loaded" with System 6). The machine had a ton of software, which allowed me to self-train at nights after work. With no printed manuals, the training moved slowly. At this time, as a broke-ass artsy dreamer, I lived in the Central Square neighborhood of Cambridge Massachusetts. About a mile away was Harvard Square's Wordsworth Books, which had a terrific computer section. Whenever I got stuck with a Photoshop or FreeHand problem at home, I'd:

write the problem on my pocket-sized notebook
bicycle to Wordsworth
research, write the solution
barrel down Massachusetts Avenue at a furious pace, trying to get back home before losing the solution (sometimes my handwriting sucked)

I built a portfolio that eventually landed some temp work. Back then, they were hiring anyone who could turn on a Mac. At this point, however, my desktop publishing skills weren't as strong as other designers. Evidently, some namby-pambies chose to learn in accredited schools, with books and qualified instructors. Feh!

My preference was to get in situations way over my head, learn while trying my best, get fired, repeat. I always knew more leaving an assignment than I did going in. Eventually, the mistakes were smaller and less frequent, while the quality of my work got better. By 1990, I was known as a reliable deadline-hitter.

Didn't We Learn Anything from John Connor?

Like your friendly neighborhood drug dealer, corporations created a global dependency on their product. They correctly guessed that the short-term expense of the new technology would be offset by long-term profits. Several elements aligned to form the new dependency:

Apple Computer sucessfully promoted their "user-friendly" interface
storing data on disk consumed less space than colored file folders
shifting from a Fortune 500 model to individual consumers, hardware companies lowered their pricing

The end result: disguised as smiling servants, computers invaded our world. Somewhere, H.G. Wells and Nat Turner must be laughing.

Internet Explorer: I and E Against The World

2007-11-12T01:12:00.000-05:00

As part of their hit on Netscape, Microsoft installs Internet Explorer as the default Web browser of the Windows operating system. In addition, users can now export Office files as Web pages. Under the hood, this new functionality was embedded with bloatware tags for the sole purpose of breaking in non-IE browsers. See for yourself:

Create a new Excel or Word document
Save your new document as a Web page (File/"Save as Web Page ...")
Open the new .HTML version in a HTML editor (BBEdit, Dreamweaver, .NET, whatever)
Gaze upon the extra tags, as shown in the example below:

Tale of the Tape: Source view of HTML from a Microsoft Word document. On the left, markup generated by Word's "Save as Web Page ..." tool. On the right, the same content with minimal, standards-compliant markup.

The only tags needed for web browsers are TABLE (TH, TD, TR) or HTML elements (BODY, HEAD, H1 - H4, P, UL/OL - LI, B/STRONG, I/EM, etc.) Yet Microsoft decides to add of proprietary tags that only display well in IE. These tags are inserted in a manner that impedes global "find-and-delete" editing.

Thus, saving your content with the Office "Save as Web Page" tool doesn't keep your web development costs down. Instead, save your content as raw text (Note Pad will do), then let the web geeks worry about the HTML tags.

Dave Marshall Completes "24-Hour Comic" for 24-Hour Comics Day 2007

2007-11-09T22:32:00.000-05:00

Me and 17 other cartoonists participated in this year's 24-Hour Comic Day, an international challenge to create an entire 24-page comic -- normally months of work -- in 24 straight hours. Here's Mine.

Building the Perfect Project Page

2007-11-09T22:30:00.000-05:00

Once again, gutted Current Projects in favor of a cleaner UI. Hopefully the new sorting is more useful for new visitors. The 3-or-2 column layout isn't as flexibile as I hoped, but the overall visual organization is the most logical solution in my grasp. The new design lists active projects, as well as ongoing and new releases.

Casino Royale: the Uber Bond

2007-11-09T17:05:00.000-05:00

As someone who read the Ian Fleming novels this summer, I was disappointed by the 2006 film "Casino Royale". Like Microsoft's recent Internet Explorer 7 -- another long-overdue, huge-scale makeover of an international household name -- the film doesn't completely escape the burden of it's legacy elements.

Compared to the past films, this one's a lot more faithful to the overall feeling -- if not exact plot -- of Ian Fleming's novel. That much wouldn't be difficult. Most of the films deviate from the novels completely, only sharing the titles. Throughout my summer reading project, many people thought I was reading novelizations of those shitty movies.

In his first novels (anything before Thunderball), Fleming beat the pulp genre of action/espionage into his own image. His world is a physically violent, uniquely British, emotionally distant place. There are subtle indications that Bond, like most of his real-world contemporaries, didn't leave World War II with his mind intact. James thinks he's held in high regard by his employers. The exact opposite is revealed when Bond leaves the room. The quite moments reveal Bond's unstable state of mind. He wakes up in a cold sweat, can't keep track of his drinking or chain-smoking, and takes uppers to function. On a level beneath the action, there is a quiet, subversive indictment of battle fatigue syndrome.

"I meet more bitches, more 'ho'es. I don't wanna sleep so I keep poppin' No Doze."

-- Ice Cube, "Amerikkka's Most Wanted

Another important element in the books is how he and his contemporaries handle the mundane: they can't. In "Live and Let Die", Bond and Felix Leiter ponder retirement. Considering what happens to Leiter after this talk, retirement would've been a good idea. The thought of settling down with a spouse and day job, however, seemed like a death sentence. It's not so much that they're adrenalin junkies; they're simply incapable of living what we in the real world call normal life.

Like everything else in the novels, the women are also governed by mundane naturalism.

This is my long-winded way of proving how enthusiastic I was about this film. While disappointed, I can't say I was surprised. While they ported a lot of the cool elements from the novels, the film makers ignored some of the more subtle tones.

For instance, the movie Bond is part super-hero. In film's opening chase scene, Bond runs for nearly three miles with no signs of exhaustion. In real life, linebackers who run more than 40 yards on an interception look like they're dying.

Ian Fleming's Bond was never a great fist-fighter. Yet here, he could give Jet Li a thing or two. Maybe this film takes place in The Matrix and Bond's the seventh "One".

The book Bond wasn't a great thinker, detective or strategist. His critical errors have endangered himself and his friends. This year's film model is a computer whiz, breaks into M's home and deduces getting set up by Vesper.

If you've never seen a Bond film or read any of the novels, you'll probably think this is an okay action flick.

Tied to the Fridge at Six Years Old

2006-10-07T15:50:00.000-04:00

It was a Sunday afternoon. Some circus movie, starring Tony Curtis as an escape artist, just finished playing on TV. Using the logic that only makes sense to a six year old, I got inspired to become the next Houdini. “Dave-O, the Great” was the stage name I used in my imaginary circus of the stars. I even had an agent.

Mom had this very long laundry rope she'd use to dry the clothes. I took the rope from the pantry and wrapped it around myself and the refrigerator. This was no ordinary task. I pulled this rope around each limb individually at least twice. When the wrapping was sufficiently complex, I tied the monster knot of all knots. Twelve boy scouts and Ramese II couldn’t’ve pulled this contraption apart. (Can you see this as a bad performance art routine? REFRIGERATOR, ROPE AND A SIX YEAR OLD)

Before you ask, this was not some bondage prodigy in the making. I was inexplicably confident in my ability to squirm out of this self-imposed predicament. To make it even more challenging, I pulled the rope, sliding it around my neck, arms and waist, so that the actual knot would be placed in back of the refrigerator, out of reach. “Only the truly brave would dare walk the high wire without a net ” I thought.

As it turns out, the knot/wrapping combination was more daunting than I thought. Perhaps I should have taken this as an omen to become a terrorist. Instead, after ten long minutes of slithering in vain, I had to admit defeat. There was no way I could get out. Going directly into Plan B, I started pulling on the rope, hoping to slide the knot itself within reach of my now sweaty hands.

Do you remember those clunky 1960’s refrigerators? They had this iron grid-thing in the back. My Gordian Knot got hooked on this. There was no way for the knot to reach me! Disaster! Now I am REALLY trying to pull on this rope, only to receive rope-burn, cutting off all circulation to my extremities and choking myself (like I said, this trap was intricate.) Immediately, I when into Plan C: “MOOOOOOOMMMIE!!!”

Mom jumps out of her bedroom, expecting the house to be on fire (that would happen later; let’s save that self-incriminating gem for another time) only to see her six-year-old son tied to her fridge with this sad, pathetic look on his face. I must take this moment to give the mom-unit credit where it is due: she TRIED not to laugh. Instead, she quickly disappeared into the bathroom, presumably to look for the scissors but I now know better! After freeing me from my Freon Deathtrap, she made sure I was alright. She sang to me and dried my tears and made me promise not to do anything this stupid again. With my tender feelings now assured, she then told every relative within the 413 area code, as well as every parent in the neighborhood.

Adventures in Paris

2006-10-07T15:26:00.000-04:00

Monday, September 4

We left Boston’s Logan Airport at 4:45 p.m. on Sunday. We arrived in Paris’Orly International Airport around 9:00 am (French time) the next day. During the long trip, it occurred to me just how huge this journey would be. After all, I’d be a foreigner who didn't speak the local language. What would I do? How would I get to all the sights, or even know which of those sights would be worth going to? How would I buy Twinkies? Luckily, some local friends gave me a list of fun things to see and do. Of course, I forgot to bring it with me. We’re off to a good start already.

Instead of packing properly -- which I had all of Sunday to do -- I hung out with my old pal, the beautiful Judy White. She’s the red-headed vixen who talked me into buying a camera to document my European Vacation. I’ve never taken photos before. It seemed that stopping whatever fun I would presumably be having, in order to use the camera, would be counterproductive to going on vacation in the first place. My freckled companion countered that by saying that her seeing a bunch of my photos would enable her -- or anyone else -- to “live your adventure vicariously.” That, and her threat to never speak to me again, was the final selling point. Besides, I’ve never even loaded film into a camera before, so who knows how the damn things will come out anyway? Computers I know. But this is the first 3 mm experience I’ve ever had (unless you count those “art” photos, taken back when I really needed the money), so good luck, I say!

Speaking of photography, I should dedicate at least one paragraph to my completely horrible passport photo. This is my first passport, so I didn’t know I’d be stuck with this damnable image for ten years. When it was just taken, I thought this was merely the ugliest photo of me ever taken. Now that a few months have passed, I’m convinced it is the ugliest photo of anyone ever taken since the first camera was built. I’m told that sucky passport photography is nothing new, but even most-traveled and passport-savvy among my crew were amused and shocked at how this image turned out.

Sophie Cohen-Solal
Most men forget
to remove the watch.

As already mentioned, the flight proved to be pretty long and exhausting. Although the graceful Sophie Cohen-Solal-soon-to-be-Gordonized was my pal, I traveled with the groom’s entourage. The cast of characters: Michael (the groom, God help him) Gordon, as well as his brother William and sister Lisa, his parents Peggy and Walter, and his long-time buddies Tom and Walter Carr. Good pal Shohei would join us later on Thursday. The flight from Boston to New York’s JFK was pretty short and we had an hour to kill before heading to France. While still at Logan, we saw the New England Patriots’ come-from-behind victory over the Cleveland Browns, so airport entertainment was not an issue. At JFK, we were stuck between a bar and a Burger King, both of which would close at 7:00 pm. It was 6:30 pm when we arrived. You know, the help gets pretty serious about going home on time. Since we didn’t make up our minds to eat until 7:59:30, this proved to be an issue. We’re lucky to have gotten out alive.

So there we were, on this big-ass plane, heading to Paris. For some reason, we tacitly agreed to avoid talking for most of the trip. In fact, I actually managed to sleep for almost half of the 7-hour flight. This would play a major role in my inability to match my sleeping patterns to Paris time.

Michael Gordon
We call it “Das Boot.”

We all took the Metro to Sophie’s parents’ house. One thing that instantly struck me was the electronics. Sophie bought our Metro tickets through this machine that took her ATM card. This vending system was much more interactive and advanced that any transit system I’ve ever seen. Unlike the one in San Francisco, this one even works! Her father later showed me an on-line service that gives him access to local train schedules, ticket fares, shopping centers and more. The computer geek within me made a thankfully-brief appearance and was utterly amazed.

While traveling along the Metro, I noticed a couple of things. Being in a land where every single word -- both printed and spoken-- is in another language can make mere existence into a surreal experience. As far as direct contact with any native who wasn’t bilingual, we were at the communicative level of 2-year-olds. Where were all those convenient translator devices we saw on Star Trek? To say the least, asking for street directions was bound to be an adventure. Anyway, I now have a new-found appreciation for what foreign pals of mine went through when they entered the United States.

The buildings also caught my attention. Since most of the tracks between Orly and Paris are at least 40 feet above the Parisian suburbs, I could look, through the round-cornered windows of the train, down upon the rooftops. They were a collection of shapes, textures and sizes that I’ve seen in photographs,but never in this context. The buildings, roofs, pipes, chimneys, drains and tiles absolutely drew in all my attention.

The only similar experience I’ve ever had was when I first came to Boston at 17 years old.

It was 1980, my first year at Massachusetts College of Art. I was staying with family in Roxbury’s Dudley Square, which at the time was the last stop on the transit system’s Orange Line. The track was elevated high above Washington Street, between Essex Street and Dudley. In September of that year, my daily commute offered a bird’s eye view of all the tenements, gas stations and record stores. The view was so fascinating that I stared with all my intensity. Every fiber of my being tried to soak in all the details; memorizing every nuance, all the shapes, pipes, skylights, laundry lines and billboards. It seemed like a giant Lego village. Getting any artistic feelings from this new toy seemed like stealing. I ran straight from the station to my Aunt Linda’s house, frantically drawing as much detail as possible before my short-term memory would cause my precious mental snapshots to vanish. These trances would sometimes last for hours. The next morning, on the way back to school, I’d bring my sketches with me to compare them to the actual cityscape. This process went on until Christmas.

For Paris, I didn’t bother; looking was enough.

By the time Sophie and her parents got the tired, smelly, rag-tag lot of us into their home, we’d been up and on-the-road for 19 hours. My plan would have been for us to catch a quick shower and nap, then do the social thing later in the evening. But nooooo ... both parents decided -- no doubt based on their vast experience in international traveling -- that we should all try to stay awake until 10 pm to battle the jet-lag. 12 hours later. So there we all were, staring into space in the Cohen-Solal living room. There were more than a few pockets of silence. We must have come off as boorish Americans, but the truth is we were simply pooped. After comparing notes with the others later, I know now that any one of us could have fallen asleep the instant we thought we could get away with it.

Thank God Sophie’s mom is a great cook, but an even better host! She didn’t just make a terrific meal, she presented it one course at a time. Each dish was more elaborate and involved that the last. The food was wonderful, but I think the actual act of eating somehow gave us our second wind. And Sophie’s mom seemed to relish in the role of presenter, host and savior. She made us feel so comfortable.

Willy Leitt
You did WHAT to my shower?

After brunch, Sophie introduced us to the Metro, bought us week-long transit passes, showed us where and how to exchange our dollars into francs. Sophie and Mike took the rest of the entourage to the hotel to get situated. This left me alone with François, Monsieur and Madame Cohen-Solal. They were nice enough to let me sleep until Sophie could return to drop me off at my temporary residence Willy’s apartment, which is in the Belleville neighborhood (9 Rue Morand,right in between the Belleville, Parmentier and Couronnes Metro stops, the 20e arrondissement). Michael is fond of referring to the apartment (or “flat” as they say here) as “Das Boot”, because of the unique architectural design. The walls are white with thick stained-wood trim. The floorboards are wider than average and creek. Willy’s rafters have ancient-looking runes burned into them, presumably to ward off evil spirits.

This area is neat, but not as pristine as the more tourist-conducive Saint Augustin area where the hotel is. A mosque is just at the end of the block. There are a lot of Arab-looking dudes, so this must be a predominately northern-African ’hood. Having been raised in an American ghetto, and having lived in Boston’s Roxbury twice as an adult, I wondered just how safe this neighborhood was. Did I import American paranoia? Philippe later told me that this neighborhood used to be a red-light district that was full of crack dealers. From what I see tonight, quite a bit of money and a lot of spirit must have been put into rebuilding the area. There are no hoodies with beepers, no cars jacked up on cinder blocks and no winos. And I didn’t see one pregnant teenager. Belleville’s vibe doesn’t have the same unspoken, constant potential threat of danger I’m used to.

Mike and Sophie dropped me off around 9:00 pm. They split, I fed Clementine -- the cat -- and that was that.

Tuesday, September 5

Ahh, my first Parisian shower proved to be an adventure. With no shower curtain I flooded the entire bathroom. “Will I now have the unexpected opportunity to meet Willy’s downstairs neighbors?” I wondered. “Must remember to get a shower curtain. Come to think of it, I should also replace the fading fluorescent bulb in the bathroom as well. That’s blinking so badly it looks like a strobe light. I should either get a new bulb or the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack.” Perhaps I should have remodeled “Das Boot” into “Le Disco.”

Clementine
A very fussy eater.

Clementine didn’t touch her food. Is she sick, or merely finicky? With no way of knowing, I replaced the unappreciated food and took off. It took me 90 minutes to make a 30 minute commute from Willy’s to the hotel. The sudden rain of this day caused such a confusion with the street vendors and the trucks that it was impossible to visually find the damn Metro station. The fact that I misread the Metro map didn’t speed things up. Plus I got diverted when I had to make my first French purchase -- an umbrella from a neighborhood general store -- with no translator. With no way of speaking the local language, I was reduced to using cheap pantomime. This lead to an important discovery: the average Frenchman has no sense of humor. This salesman looked at me as if I needed to be locked up. Perhaps he’s right, but what would they jail me for? Exhibitionism with intent? Sheesh! Anyway, by the time I finally made it to the hotel, the others had already eaten and were just about to go.

The hotel is called “Cercle National des Armées” which is evidently reserved for people who fought for the French military and their relatives. Luckily, Sophie’s immediate family was more than qualified. It’s not listed in any tourist guide that I could find, which cut down the number of goofball American visitors. Obviously they didn’t count on Mike & Company being so well connected.

Peggy & Walter Gordon
We’d’ve killed for an elevator
or wheelchair ramp.

When I finally arrived, Sophie brought us up to Montmartre and Notre Dame. Physically speaking, Peggy Gordon had the hardest time. Days before, she broke her right foot in a boating accident and now had to run around either in a wheelchair or on crutches.It seemed odd that a city so old and sophisticated -- both in art and technology -- would be so behind the times in handicap accessibility. Amazingly, she was and is nothing short of graceful, humorous and strong-spirited.

Emotionally, the strain of hauling an army of loud, clingy Americans up the million-and-a-half stairs of Montmartre was finally getting on Sophie’s petite set of nerves. Who could blame her? We honestly had that “deer caught in the headlights“ awe at everything we saw. By the time we reached the top, ostensibly to eat crêpes, poor Sophie tried to ditch us.

I remember my dad doing something like this in a very similar situation. He was taking care of my brother Gabriel’s huge, hyperactive dogs one summer. They’d run all over the house and smash just about everything. Dad’s solution was to take them up this giant, steep and wooded hill on their walk. San Francisco has a lot of hills like this. By the time Lassie and Fido had finished their ritual of playing, pooping and climbing this monster incline, they were simply too tired to cause anymore havoc. Heck, they were too exhausted to do anything but sleep.

Did Sophie try this on us? If so, I think her little ploy backfired.

Once we got to the top, we made our way past the shops --after a quick crêpe break -- to buy post cards and see all the local artists hard at work. Watching the craftsmen hustle and peddle their portrait skills kinda made me want to draw. After all, I hadn’t sketched a thing in days. Since I was a visitor, I decided to walk around to absorb as much of their techniques as possible. Y'know, it’s quite possible that I forgot that France is one of the leading nations in the world when it comes to documentary realism. Guess I got jaded by all the incompetent portrait con-artists in Harvard Square. These Parisian cats were BAADDDD!! One draftsman-- working in pencils and crayons -- drew this young woman’s face one part at a time without sketching the whole face first.On this blank paper he rendered one eye in great detail. Then the other, more slowly than the first. It was as if he already had a photo of her on the paper, only no one else could see it.The act of drawing was only to translate his vision to the rest of us blind people.

Lisa Gordon I inspire
great art wherever I go.

Another portrait artist --an Italian dude -- even managed to hit on Lisa, who fell for his old-world charm (You are very beautiful ... you must sit down and let me draw you! Your eyes are very beautiful ...) like a ton of bricks. She was beaming for days. [Note: Drawing a really smooth and flattering portrait of a woman can really get to her ... heart.] While Michelangelo was working on the lovely Ms. Gordon, I finally decided to whip out my sketchbook and get into the act my own bad self. Trouble was that I felt a bit intimidated by the raw talent that was already up there. This feeling was all too familiar.

Back in high school, I was the best artist they’d ever seen. I could do no wrong. But when I got to art school in the big city, I was surrounded by other kids who’d been the best artists in their home towns. Suddenly, I wasn’t unique, the best or even cute anymore. The days of me effortlessly amazing the multitudes had come to a crashing halt. From then on I had to work at it. At worst, I felt like a charlatan, a fraud that finally got caught, a sham.

This is how I felt in Paris.

Perhaps this is why my attempt to draw Sophie didn’t quite work out like I’d planned. She hated it. Then again, she couldn’t sit still and was a terrible model. But I couldn’t help noticing how much better the professional portrait artists work was. However, a really attractive waitress named Caroline seemed to think my little sketches were worth noticing. Her every spare moment was spent looking over my shoulder. Since my confidence was not at its best, however, I simply let that opportunity slip away. Much like Sophie’s portrait.

Walter Carr Determined to
find Scottish culture in Paris.

This was a very long day,especially for Mike, Bill and Walter. They carried Peggy’s wheelchair up and down every flight of stairs we encountered. The rain returned, postcards were bought and Sophie -- with Mike -- finally ditched us. The rest of went back to the hotel, where I napped with the others. A few hours later, we all split in different directions. Bill and Lisa, along with their parents went off to dinner. Walter "If it’s not Scottish, it’s crap" Carr waited for a friend of his, a woman named Terry, to arrive. This left Tom and I to fend for ourselves.

I decided to leave my backpack at the hotel. It was so heavy with my books, camera, film and art supplies. I was sure I’d be around the next morning to pick it up, so why not leave it for the night? Once that monumental decision was made, Tom and I hung out until 10 pm, when Sophie and Mike would join her old pals Philippe and Laetitia at a pizzeria somewhere around Bastille. Did I mention how beautiful most of the women around here are? Somehow I imagine all the ugly folk being marched out to their deaths somewhere outside of Paris, perhaps in the east. (Are there concentration camps for cosmetically-impaired? This would explain the continued existence of Brighton and Somerville.)

Phillippe
Take my bicycle down
this steep, wet cobbled
road tonight. Please.

The six of us had a lovely time. It is at this moment when I realize just how difficult it must be for anyone to speak English as a second language. Sophie is pretty fluent, but all my attention was focused on Sophie’s pal Laetitia, who’s English was a bit more of a struggle. Her conversations in French -- with Sophie-- was rapid-fire. Although flattered whenever she spoke with me, it hurt to have the discussion come to a momentum-crashing halt when she had to use English to communicate with us, Tom or I, the lazy or arrogant foreigners who didn’t come prepared.

After dinner -- my second one that night -- Philippe took us to this fashionable, nearby bar where a White Russian cost around 65 francs. I even got a beer spilled on me by a clumsy waiter. Sophie told me the others were planning a trip to the Georges Pompidou Art Center, and if I wanted to be part of it I should meet them at a designated spot at 2:45 pm. “Sounds like fun, count me in” I said. We wrapped up around 2:00 am, when all the bars in Paris close. For commuting reasons, Philippe stayed with me at Willy’s place. I asked him to wake me before he took off first. “Sure” he said. Oh, the damn cat was still not eating.

Wednesday, September 6

Of course Phil didn’t wake me. When I arose from my coma around 1:30 pm, this note was on the front desk:

“The cat didn’t touch her food. I think she decided to start a diet. Anyway, she’s too fat. I did not wake you up because you were sleeping like a baby.”

--Phip

Thanks pal. One quick shower/shave/dressing session plus another manic Metro ride later and I was there, right on time. The Art Center is a huge, ugly building that is designed to look like a ship. It houses a library, replicas of boats and one of the Modern Art Museums. There are a few courtyards around the building, and I was supposed to meet the gang in one of them. A detail or two might have escaped me, for the old crew was nowhere to be found. "“Great, my reputation for punctuality and dependability is showing itself once again.” In comparing notes later, it was deduced that I was standing in the wrong courtyard. Not only did I miss my fellow Americans and my dear pal Pascale, I had to put up with these annoyingly inept bongo drummers, portrait artists (not as good as yesterday’s crop) and other Parisian slackers. It was like any day in Harvard Square. I waited in vain for 30 minutes. Then thinking they must have gone inside, I did too.

While my American contingent was outside in another courtyard wondering where the heck I was, I was lost in a world of Picasso, Miro, Matisse and DeKooning. Time, punctuality and anything outside each painting was rendered meaningless. The museum was well-designed, huge and there were a lot of paintings to absorb. In Earth terms,I was in there for a good three hours. After that, I stopped at the hardware store to get the stuff for Willy’s apartment.

With all the sensory and cultural overload, it was a relief to be inside a Parisian hardware store. Somehow, being surrounded by power tools, light switches, cables, replacement doorknobs,wire cutters, electric drills and plumbing supplies made me feel right at home. “Arr! Arr! Arr! Arr! Arrrrrrrrrrr!” Buying things without knowing how to speak the language was tough, but somehow I managed.

Bill Gordon
Dave, you just don’t
work well in groups.

By the time I got to the hotel, it was around 7:30 pm. The American crowd was amused,but not amazed at my latest screw-up in missing them. Bill even told me, in a tone usually spoken by teachers scolding a child, said “Dave, you just don’t work well with groups. ” Lucky for him, I decided to take that as a compliment. Once again we all went on separate supper plans. The immediate family --Sophie, her brother and parents; Mike, Bill, Lisa and their parents -- had their own dinner. Walter had another date with Terry, so it was Tom and I again. After retrieving my backpack, we hit the road. I felt far too dorky with all my stuff, so we decided to stop off at Willy’s first to unload my stuff. Then we’d find a restaurant, a bar and hit on French babes!

I forget that some people are not used to seeing a neighborhood dominated by dark-skinned folks. Our approach to Willy’s house was admittedly indirect, since I got lost from using an unfamiliar Metro station to start from. The walk from Belleville to Willy’s was more confusing than I thought. During the entire process of finding the house, Tom was getting more and more nervous. Ordinarily a cheerful and witty fellow, he got quiet and was wondering aloud about our safety. We finally got to 9 Rue Morand around 8:45 pm. Tom wanted to get out of this area as quickly as possible, so we ended up heading for Bastille again.

Shohei Purchasing Power!

Only in the name of soothing Tom’s nerves did we eat at the Tex Mex place. That’s right: two four-eyed swinging single men eating at the same kind of place we could have found anywhere in America. Maria, a polish woman who knows many languages, was our spunky waitress. Imagine my surprise to find she spoke no Spanish. Considering her place of employment, this was rather odd. Nevertheless, she made an otherwise dull meal into a flirty -- if futile -- occasion.

We were still keyed up, so we found a bar just down the street. The blaring house music made this place a must for Tom. It was called “The American Cafe.” The Guinness was all right, but my attention was captured by this woman’s face. Her name is Jael, a waitress from Holland. The direction of my thinking must seem a bit obsessive, but this is Paris, dammit! Besides,I have it on good authority that women of Paris are used to getting approached by strange men. We managed to get her attention. Heck, she was leaving anyway, but she decided to spend a few minutes with us before leaving. We told jokes to each other, laughed and had a good time. I even managed to talk her into giving me her phone number. Oh, the intrigue! Mission accomplished, it was time to go home.

Thursday, September 7

At 10 am, Willy’s flat was hit by a “home invasion.“ Actually, it was only Mike and Sophie bringing Shohei from the airport. Having no warning, I was still soundly asleep when they arrived. I knew Shohei would share Willy’s apartment with me, and was due to arrive today. But no one told me what time he’d get here. While they were all perky and dressed, I carried on my part of the conversation in the bedroom under the sheets. Somehow I managed to put on some clothes to properly greet them, but I'll get Sophie back for this!

After dropping off his stuff, Shohei left with Mike and Sophie. I recovered, cleaned up and headed for Sophie’s. Before leaving, I managed to install the shower curtain (yay!) and accidentally break the bathroom fluorescent light fixture (boo!) Willy is gonna be pissed!

Deciding to move quickly, I made it to Sophie’s flat in record time. Shohei and I went to the Eiffle Tower, which is way over-rated. The weather was gray and windy, so they didn’t let anybody up to the top. It was also crowded by far too many tourists. Nonetheless we were determined to display our “purchasing power” by getting a lot of junk, presumably to pass off onto our friends.

We hung around at some cafe in Bastille before heading back to the hotel. The entire group got together for the so-called bachelor/ette party. I say “so-called” because we didn’t do the traditional rites, which usually involve each gender gathering and sinning separately. To fully realize the last night of single life for our soon-to-be-newlyweds, we went to a huge bar/cafe. In attendance were: Mike/Bill/Lisa Gordon, Sophie with her cousins Delphine & Laetitia (who has the same name as Sophie’s friend Laetitia), Shohei, Tom and I. Walter and Terry joined us much later. I spent much of the night asking Delphine to suggest a restaurant for me to take Jael. After a long session of goofiness,the royal couple left us to our own indecisive devices. We eventually wound up in -- you guessed it -- The America Cafe! My dutch Goddess was not working this night, dammit! We drank until the place closed, and that was that. Shohei and I split a cab to Willy’s. Oh yes, the cat is still not eating. Boy is this bathroom dark...

Friday, September 8

The big wedding is today! Shohei and I woke up around 1:15 pm and had to join the others -- at the hotel -- at 2:30. Two lightning-quick showers and a brisk Metro ride later and we make it exactly on time! Phillius Fogg would have been so proud.

Streaking to and through the Metro with Shohei perfectly illustrated our different methods of being strangers in a strange land. Where I would tend to wander, improvise and depend on memory, he studies with a deep concentration. I glance at the map and move; he never stops consulting the Japanese/English/French phrase book or the map. I wanted to make mistakes and then learn from the process; he never wanted to make a mistake. Which way of dealing was better? It’s truly hard to say. Shohei had half as many days as I did in Paris, but by Thursday I started Metroing around without the map; he couldn’t. Then again, he got much better in speaking French. My process method seems to be much more time-consuming. Check back with me in a year, OK?

We all Metroed to the city hall. Lisa Gordon points out that she never saw all the guys dressed up in suits at the same time, and that we looked like hit men from Quinten Tarantino’s “Reservoir Dogs.” Whatta wit on that babe. The ceremony was short, secular, but reverent. We in the back (Pascale, Philippe, Willy and I) felt kinda sorry for Mike when we saw that there was no English interpreter. The poor guy probably vowed to drink Sophie’s bath water on a daily basis.

Tom Kenney I need an
American burger.

After a long outdoor photo session, we were abandoned once again until the 7:00 pm reception. Bill, Lisa, Walter, Tom, Shohei and I walked around and wound up walking down Ave. des Champs-Elysées. This is the spot the Newbury Street in Boston desperately tries to be. The sidewalks are huge and spotless. There is a monster record store across the street from the cafe we eventually settled on. It’s called the Virgin Megastore. While we sat, we were spotted by a family of pan-handling gypsies. Momma gypsy weighed around 300 pounds of goo and wanted us to finance her eating habit. She had one infant in her right arm and a gang of 5- to 10-year old children with her. Unlike American beggars, this team would not take “no” for an answer. Why, they even thought your favorite Daveman handsome extra cash in his pockets! If only they knew.

It’s times like this when I remember the late, great Robin Harris saying “What the F*** is SPARE CHANGE? Have you thought of getting yourself a spare JOB? Then you would have some of your own spare change. Get out my face with that, or I’m'a give you a spare ass-whipping.” Unfortunately, I couldn’t deliver any of these precious views in French. Now learning this damn language is my top priority! Then I could tell Moms that her laying off the bon-bons for a day would’ve fed all of her humiliated brats for a week. As it was, my snappiest comeback was several shouts of “no” How witty.

The others made it back to the hotel on time. I, of course, had to stick around Ave. des Champs-Elysées and walk down to the Arc de Triomphe. It’s a magnificent looking building from the outside. I wanted to go inside, but the perpetual traffic, circling around the monument like a swarm of four-wheeled hornets, prevented me from crossing the street. The only way to get inside was to use one of the clearly-labeled underground entrances that somehow escaped my notice at the time; I wasn’t due to discover that fact for another 24 hours.

Speaking of the driving around these parts, I’ve noticed that the white lines on the roads are only suggestions. As such, they-- apparently -- are not intended to be followed strictly, or even at all. The same interpretive policy also conveniently applies to the use of turn-signals.

The reception itself was a lot of fun. The food and the vibes were so good I didn’t mind the music being too terrible. The French have a love/hate relationship with American culture. On one hand, it is very chic to trash crappy action movies, tourists, political theories or anything else coming from the good old U.S. of A. You should see the glee in their eyes when they talk about our crime-riddled, litigation crazy, Elvis/UFO-sighting society. Yet they deified Jerry Lewis, John Wayne and most recently Jim Carrey. The art of black Americans -- from Jazz to Hip-hop-- is very popular here. (The French don’t seem to be as enamored with black people from Africa. Black Africans get harassed by police and are blamed for the nation’s increased unemployment and crime. Kinda sounds like America.) Why then, was I surprised that the dance music of the reception was almost exclusively 1950’s Rock and 1970’s Disco? One ethnic stereotype was confirmed: the French can’t dance to save their lives.

One American tradition that won’t be making it to Paris anytime soon is the tabloid newspaper and talk shows. Pascale chatted about this just after the wedding, and we both noted that UFOs are always landing in the stupid parts of America. They are usually spotted by semi-literate hillbillies that live in swamps and trailer parks. According to Pascale, France has a few alien-abductees also. However, since they live somewhere east of Paris, they are not invited to talk shows and are easily ignored.

Ines Bravo
Friend of the bride.

As mentioned earlier, the food was terrific! No, I can’t recall the name of anything I ate, so you'll just have to trust me. There was this wedding game where the bride, my pal Sophie, was up on a pedestal in front of the entire party. To say that she merely like being under the spotlight would be an understatement. The point of the game, as explained to me by the lovely and talented Ines Bravo, involved money. Ines is the daughter of a close friend of Sophie’s parents, so maybe she knew what this bizarre display was all about. The men would put francs into a hat to get Sophie to reveal a bit of her leg. The women would pay up to keep that wedding gown down. I didn’t figure out the object of the game until after I put up an apparently small pile of change in the hat. Since the number of men and women were about equal, Sophie escaped with her honor intact.

The party went on and on. I was getting a bit sleepy by 2 am, the Royal Couple disappeared and the group of Americans wanted to keep the flow going in their adjoining hotel rooms. Shohei stayed with the gang and this Daveman cabbed it to Willy’s.

At the wedding, Pascale invited us all to her birthday party on Saturday, the next night. Having no other plans, I saw no reason not to go. In retrospect, perhaps I should have stuck to that plan.

Saturday, September 9

I woke up around 1 pm. The game plan was:
1. Hang out with Jael (Miss Holland) from 2:00 pm until 4:00 pm
2. See the Marc Chagall show at the Musée D' Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris
3. Sketch
4. Get back to the hotel around 7:00 pm to join the others ingoing to Pascale’s.

Joining the others was important, since they had the address to the party. This gave me a little time to kill, so I decided to stake out the neighborhood that Delphine suggested I take Jael to. However, by the time I got her on the phone to confirm, she was too sick to move. Come to think of it, she didn’t invite me to come up to her place. Hmmm ... strike ONE! I called the lovely and talented Ines, but she was too busy studying linguistics and couldn’t come out. Strike TWO. My reputation as an American Gigolo was fading quickly. Oh well, I still had Chagall and Pascale. Off to the Musée!

It took at least 45 minutes to get into the museum. Part of this was the huge draw Chagall has for the popular art world. After all, this show covered his more obscure Russian period(Les Années Russes 1907-1922). The viewer really got to see the young Marc struggle, experiment and explore. The day he discovered Cubism (1910-1914, "Lumière-Liberté")was like a bomb, or a bookmark. The fact that security was searching every bag upon arrival didn’t exactly speed things up either.Considering the current bombing crisis, this was the only rational response.

Emmanuelle One long night.

Her name is Emmanuelle; I met her at the museum. She stood around 5' 6", had long wavy dark brown hair that gives her a Pre-Raphealite look. While standing in line, I noticed her. She wore an ankle-length black dress with a pink sweater over it, standing behind me unescorted. This would be around 3:30 pm. “Maybe she’s waiting for someone,” I thought. So it didn’t occur to me to bother her until 5:30 pm, which was about 30 minutes before closing time. After removing my watch, I sat next to her and said “Excusé moi,parlez-vous English? Oui? What time is it?” Not very original, but it worked. Sophie told me later how much she admired my attention to detail, since most men using that line often forget to takeoff the watch. When the security folks eventually kicked us out, I accepted her offer to walk her around outside.

Her English was a bit rough, but light-years beyond my French. We chatted about how over-crowed the museum became, exchanged second-language slang, art and life in general. Daveman is thinking “Hey, there’s a chance,” but the lovely Emmanuelle was giving off some verrrry mixed signals. She had a boyfriend, yet spending an open-ended amount of time with me -- presumably blowing off the fella while I blew off Pascale. She was very affectionate, but was also biting her fingernails whenever we got close. By midnight the poor lass had nothing left to gnaw.We were locked in a sustained, forever-present state of indecision and intrigue that lasted six hours.

During that time we walked up and down Ave. des Champs-Elysées,successfully got to the roof of the Arc de Triomphe, which had a lot of stairs. The view, much like the hike to get up there, was breath taking; much better than that of the Eiffel Tower. After taking some photos from the roof, we came back down and strolled over the Seine, around Notre Dame and the Louvre. She even sprung for dinner.

As we left the restaurant, I began to feel ashamed, misleading and mislead. Why would she neglect her boyfriend so blatantly? It was pretty clear to me why I chose to forget about the party, but was I premature in expecting a physical -- oops, I mean romantic-- encounter? Back around 7:00 pm, it did occur to me to call the hotel, in order to get the directions to Pascale’s party.Deep within me, I knew we were destined to part that night; denial can be so loud sometimes.

When I first arrived in Paris, all the cute couples walked about hand-in-hand, smooching and otherwise Publicly Displaying Affection. “They must really be in love” I thought. After spending the night walking around with Emmanuelle, I now know the truth: a woman who doesn’t have a guy holding her every second they're in public is fair game. Every horny guy in the city was boldly checking her out, with no fear or even acknowledgment of me. It was as if I were only a figment, or a bodyguard. Furthermore, the women don’t necessarily have to actively hold the guy. The definitive question is whether or not she lets him hold her. Men here don’t hold hands with their girlfriends purely because of deep love; it also keeps the wolves at bay.

We got to somewhere near her flat around 1:30 am. At 1:35 am I was looking for a cab. It had started to rain heavily and the Metro stopped running. Just my luck, I found the one cabdriver in Paris who didn’t know the way to Parmentier or Couronnes. He brings me to Republique instead. It was only one Metro stop away, but I didn’t know which direction to walk. I wasted 10 minutes waiting in the rain for another cab. Evidently, there are not a lot of cabs here.

Just one block down from the Republique Metro station was a taxi stand in the middle of the street. I joined the collective of other single travelers, all boxing each other out for the same cabs. The many bars in the neighborhood were closing, so the crowd was deep. A gorgeous young woman tried hailing a cabby herself, but was completely ignored. A man rushed right by her and got into the back seat of the taxi. She even tried negotiating a fare-splitting treaty, but the dude was not interested. After a few more minutes of failed diplomacy, the taxi took off. The woman sighed, smiled in the rain and threw up her hands as if to say “what are you going to do?” Her example helped calmed me down a lot.

Once walking seemed to be the only option, I stormed off in the wrong direction for 15 minutes. After spotting a Metro station that was nowhere near my destination, I corrected my trajectory and made it home in by 2:30 am. What a great way to cap off one of the most confusing nights of my life. The only message for me on Willy’s answering machine was Shohei saying he crashed at the hotel. I had no way of knowing where the big party was,or even if it was still going on. Therefore, I slept.

Oh yes, the cat finally started eating. The poor thing only had the half can of food I gave her the night before. It was still full when I split in the morning, so why continue trashing and replacing the food? Looks like she finally got the idea.

Monday, September 11

Our plane was already in the field at boarding time,so we had to climb up a portable staircase just like folks did in the 1960’s. This is important, because after we were all buckled up and ready to go, we couldn’t go. The pilot told us some oil filter had to be changed and that it would take at least one hour to change. The plane couldn’t even be moved back to the gate, so we had to wait inside the plane. The filter change ended up taking two hours, which really screwed up our connection from NYC to Boston. Thank God the flight attendants were so terrific! A pretty young woman named Kat chatted with all of us, and then only me. She was small-framed, perfectly tanned and wore bright blue mascara. She even gave me two bottles of wine from first class. If only she didn’t live in Florida ... Another stewardess spoke, in Japanese, with Shohei for a very long time. Double hmmmmm ...

Kat Airline food was never
served so well.

While listening to Kat, I got the idea that Paris is pretty much hated by the rest of France. Outside of Paris, everyone is friendlier, more humorous, rural and generally more pleasant. Can you tell that Kat is from the south of France? If I’m gonna kick it to the south next year, I’ll HAVE to learn this damnable language!

From this chat and others, I also have to review my stance on the social rules around here. Although the city is crowed,I was first amazed that every exchange between people -- strangers or not -- always included a “please” and “thank you.” While I first though this was fantastic. After being here a while, I’m now inclined to think this layer of manners is really thin. Lurking underneath that layer is an intense yearning to avoid being bothered. No one talks on the Metro. Folks around here seem just as antisocial as New Yorkers or Bostonians, only they engage in these rituals of surface-level niceties that are about as sincere as those used by high-society women who, when in public, kiss loudly without touching or smearing their carefully-layered makeup.

Before we finally took off, I took a brief stroll around the aircraft just to see how the different classes were handling the crisis. The first class people looked like they were drunk before boarding the plane, so they were in various forms of stupors.The business class people were either sleeping or working feverously on their laptops, trying very hard to turn this 2-hour delay into an opportunity. Such career dedication is an awesome thing to behold. The rest of us deadbeats in coach were chatting it up with the help.

Once we finally landed in New York, the connecting flight to Boston had to be determined. The kind folks at Delta (We Love To Fly, And It Shows) put us on some twin-engine Cessna that somehow got us to Boston in one piece. We said our good-byes, promised to attend the wedding after party in Jamestown R.I. later on in October, and that was that.

THE END

Book Report: The Bell Jar

2006-10-07T15:24:00.000-04:00

Sylvia Plath's novel was standard issue in art schools across America. When I was an art student, just about every brat with thrift-shop black clothes, messed-up hair and snotty attitudes had a copy of that book wherever they went. I used to heckle them for their uniform individuality.

It finally dawned on me that I spent years making fun of a book I never read. Just days after this embarrassing insight, I found an old paperback edition for two bucks. Actually reading THE BELL JAR was a pleasant surprise. Here are some random observations from a man who swears never to talk about things he doesn’t know about. Well, not until it’s time to start teaching again.

Life's a Beach: The moody
young artist.

Believe It

This is the most chilling, convincing account of a nervous breakdown I have ever read. Maybe because I knew the book’s reputation before knowing the book itself, but I expected the prose to be “expressive” and sloppy. Instead, the actual storytelling mechanics are surprisingly conservative and easily understood. Hell, it’s the most sympathy I’ve ever had for a well-off white chick with no real problems.

What the Hell is a Bell Jar?

Never hearing of this term before, I had to look it up. According to Random House, it is “a bell-shaped glass vessel or cover for protecting delicate instruments, or for holding gases in chemical experiments.” Since Ms. Plath was born in Winthrop in 1932, she probably saw a lot of bell jars. The novel was first printed in 1963.

She described her 1953 nervous breakdown by saying it was like an invisible glass dome descended upon her for no reason. Once trapped within this metaphorical barrier she could see, but not touch or be touched by the outside. “... with its stifling distortions” , the bell jar also warped her ability to perceive of reality. “To the person in the bell jar ... the world itself is the bad dream.”

From page 196-97:

“I knew I should be grateful to Mrs. Guinea, only I couldn’t feel a thing. If Mrs. Guinea had given me a ticket to Europe, or a round-the-world cruise, it wouldn’t have made one scrap of difference to me, because wherever I sat - on the deck of a ship or at a street cafe in Paris or Bangkok - I would be sitting under the same glass bell jar, stewing in my own sour air...I sank back in the grey, plush seat and closed my eyes. The air of the bell jar wadded round me and I couldn’t stir.”

More from page 227, the beginning of Chapter 18:

“All the heat and fear had purged itself. I felt surprisingly at peace. The bell jar hung, suspended, a few feet above my head. I was open to the circulating air.”

A Bell Jar in Action: Max tries again.

I was born only a year before the book was published. The closest thing to a bell jar I ever saw was on the 1960’s sitcom GET SMART. Whenever secret agent hero Maxwell Smart thought his office was bugged by the enemy, he told his boss to use the “Cones of Silence.” Giant glass domes would come down from the ceiling and encase each man individually. Then they would try to have a conversation, but the intercom system never worked. Cracked me up every time.

A Swell Drawing Babe

The edition I found also printed some of Ms. Plath's drawings. Whenever the drawings of a famous crazy person is “discovered”, they usually suck. Sylvia’s black-and-white line drawings of simple cottage and seaport scenes were clear and crisp. She could have made it as an illustrator.

Cherry Bomb

Ms. Plath presents a most ... clinical approach to losing her virginity.

Amway Tales

2006-10-07T11:26:00.000-04:00

Back in the summer of 1995, a lovely representative of AMWAY came by my apartment . Years ago a good friend of mine fell into their clutches and never come back. Once upon a time -- sophomore year 1982 -- my old buddy Mike was a really fun guy. We’d joke about how everyone else were somehow not as cool as we were. We both had mutual sour grapes about not getting into the right cliques, I suppose. After graduation, we lost touch. Fast forward to 1988, when I see Mike as a janitor at a really small graphic design outfit. Eager to reconnect, we quickly exchanged phone numbers. When he came by, I was expecting a return of the good old days. Laughs, comedic/delusional superiority over the crowd and picking up/annoying women were all I cared about, and Madman Mike was the perfect partner in crime. Or so I thought. Instead, I was in for 30 minutes of sociopathic ranting, thinly disguised as friendly chatter.

Mike: Are you happy with your life right now? Is there something you would like to have, but is financially out of your reach?

Dave: Mike, this is ME your talking to, remember?

Mike: Yeah, but just bear with me. I have to tell you about this wonderful business opportunity that changed my life. This company I work for makes these great products, and it really changed my life around. Remember how lost I was in the past?

Dave: You mean when you were fun?

Needless to say, this did not go over very well. Formerly Madman Mike left and I never saw him again. What struck me hardest was Mike’s apparent inability to break out of the shtick and tell me what's up? He and his organization wanted more than just my time. They wanted access to my very personal realm. Anyone who knows me realizes just how rare a commodity that is. I don’t just put-out for ANYONE y’know!

I later found out that AMWAY is a right-wing organization that uses its drones to raise money for a whole political agenda I want nothing to do with. If the foot soldiers were a bunch of morally bankrupt con artists who wanted to push a lot of inferior products on the unsuspecting public to make a fast buck, I would understand. The organization, however, wants its soldiers to be completely brainwashed, obedient and absolutely unable to think on their own or stray from the company line. They ain’t crooks; they be ROBOTS.

Which brings me to 1995. Kathy, a co-worker of my sister, managed to get my phone number. She called last night, wanting to share “a unique business opportunity” with me. Hmmm. Always needing a fast buck myself, I agreed to have her come over tonight. “If it doesn’t work out, she may be a babe” I thought. My darling sister Lisa was unavailable for confirmation on Kathy’s looks.

BING BONG! Kathy is no babe. In fact, I think I have discovered the Anti-Babe. “Strictly business, then” the Don Juan of Graphics thinks to himself. Good thing, too. After sitting down and refusing to drink anything I offered -- which was nothing but fruit juice or water -- the conversation went as follows:

Kathy: Are you going to be an artist for the rest of your life? Is this something that you enjoy?

Dave: Whaaa?

Kathy: Are you happy with your life right now? Is there something you would like to have, but is financially out of your reach?

Dave: Listen, you said this was a business proposal. I draw pictures for a living. Is there something specific that I can do for you?

Kathy: I am trying to tell you about the business, but I need to find out a few things about you first.

Dave (beginning to smell a rat with an AMWAY logo tattooed on its ass): You are asking personal questions that are, frankly, none of your business. I draw pictures for a living. Is there something specific that I can do for you?

Kathy (beginning to burst into tears): I’m sorry to get you all nervous.

Dave: No, you are not making me nervous. You’re annoying me; there is a difference. Hey, if you’re looking for a professional artist, I’m your man. I will listen to you all night. Can you tell me about the organization you are representing?

Kathy (still crying. What a trooper): No, I can’t. Not until I find out a few things about you.

Dave: That ain’t gonna happen.

I tried to address her obviously hurt feelings without spending all night listening to them. She refused my feeble attempts at small talk and left. Total time: 10 minutes. Was I out of line? What would YOU have done in my place? For myself, I wonder if an AMWAY-specific restraining order is possible.