Time to return to the aesthetically competitive Parisiennes. Time to leave the middle of the Med, it's month's end, time to travel to another country.
Time to bid 'ciaociao' to the isle nation of malte, dining with Maltese friends, working side by side during office hours, listening to their indefatigable desire to celebrate several saints w/grand festas and fireworks every weekend; au revoir to those bronzed youth with their fine lines and flat stomachs & reckless ways sans sunscreen, scattered along the limestone beaches of sliema. My shoulder blades carved their own palimpsest into my favorite crater on many a day, observing other much younger souls so exhausted from partying the night before, albeit safe and secure, certo, and still very un-Palinesque, for Malta is the safest and least hypocritical place on the planet.
Why so safe?
Maybe it's the 'gemgems'; elderly ladies leering from their balconies like Gladys Cravitz, making sure neither mischief nor mayhem trespass their blessed watch. Malta is made up of zillions of these little balconies, like this one, where the trained eye, like mine, can detect the gemgem. Can you?
All 400,000 residents, including moi, need not fear danger, however, the Maltese do fear and fuel their own xenophobia; immigration issue centers around North Africans, at least those that aim for Sicily and just miss, scooped up within the Maltese archipelago. They land in 'humane' detention centers, able to eventually enter society, with 'illiterate' job status, irrespective of whether they are or not. And many are not.
Daily I would carry my groceries back from the market and sometimes see the North African garbage guys driving their trucks, missing me and thuh muffins by about an inch, wondering, sure they're grateful to have escaped...at the end of the day, wouldn't we all rather be in Italy.
For now....auf wiedersehen to Malta and mio marito. Why, I'd no idea how how prescient his comments per previous posts would prove to be; just beneath the tranquil August environs tumultuous business aspects of which I don't dare type for now, live and continue to breathe.....
So, after trying to sleep through air-conditioning, apres sailing, swimming and spitting out warm seawater and taking too many excursions aboard funky buses without proper ventilation, to the office, towards the consulate to pay homage, to the shengan visa office for more bureaucratic nonsense, I'd managed to move paperwork forward, but it was time to head north, away from the white heat.
For proper perspective, here's a pic we've taken on a bus illustrating both the Maltese religiosity and their sense of humour:
Two saints alongside two babes. Not sure how my beloved Muv would find the photo but I kinda pined for the possibility to share it with her....after all, it was taken on her birthday, Aug 16th, the day after the most assumptive days of the catholic calendar, Muv would have laughed,or, at the very least, indulged my own assumption.
Other assumptions proved less facile. My own exodus proved implausible while walking through Maltese airport security. A little midget whose chip just about met my hip requested I step aside and provide additional documents. Drama ensued as he'd managed to convince himself that dogs couldn't possibly board a plane, so much fuss was made and more assumptions, as I too assumed, accurately, that he was an idiot.
I've taken the muffins to 22 countries, and only in Malta is the effort a hassle. On board I could look forward to more tedious drama as they'd assigned me the wrong seat. Finally, after the last tired teenager boarded the flight, they put us next to the most terrified italian teenager who's fear of flying forced him to play with his barf bag for the entire two hour flight to Milan. We fell asleep only to wake up to this kid hyperventilating into the barf bad for the lengthy and bumpy landing. I finally rubbed his back, he was grateful.
Arriving in Italy's most inconvenient airport we nab our luggage gratefully, grab the keys to the rental and press the pedal to the medal. I managed to condense the two hour drive from Milano to Torino into one; only one Merc passed me the entire time. I love driving through Italy. It is sublime.
Torino, the old capital of Italy, a place I know well. Le Meridien Lingotto is recommended but I say nay to known dining joints, opting for room service. For reasons that would later become known, I've been upgraded to a swell suite, well, why not.
I take a cool, long bath, wrap myself in the plush terri cloth robe, plop down on the plump cotton duvet and crash while CNN anticipates Obama's closing dream speech at the convention. Room service arrives, I answer the bell and open the door to greet a young Italian girl, nondescript, dutiful and ready to push the trolley into my room.
Suddenly, improvisemente, a young, striking, long haired Italian jumps into my view, pointing a pistol at me, like they do in the movies, arms extended, hunched down, weaving dramatically from left to right, keeping me very much as the main subject, screaming some nonsense, confusing the hell out of me. I'm so tired I can't quite compute even though under normal circumstance I do 'get' Italian.
This is not normal, it's actually pretty fucked up. I look to the girl for signs, rationale, anything, nada, rien, she just giggles nervously, standing still making me more confused.
After several minutes she decides we're not really in a reality TV show and begins to push the linen covered cart into my room and he jumps away enthusiastically to terrorize someone else. I follow her into the room inquiring as to what has just happened. She tells me a film is being shot at the hotel that night and he is in the film. Maybe, for she too, is confused. She just wants my signature. She is uncomfortable, with me, him, everything.
My delayed reaction inspires me to channel the guy from Fault Towers who can't get his precious Waldorf salad. I am mad. I dial the reception and alert them to the stupid Italian actor. I go into the hallway, bathrobe barely on and start walking toward the Italian punk who's still playing with his gun near the elevators, he sees me, realizing the table has been turned completely around, and now he's scared cuz i've become the crazy American he's trying to imitate, he falls into the elevator, arms flailing as i'm stating for everyone to hear, "What. thuh. fuck, WHAT THE FUCK!" I can think of a couple of Italian swear words but I want to yell expletives in my own language.
You're finally getting the gist of what a truly fine ambassador I can be, si?
Suffice it to say, the officials arrive, I ask them if their future italian film stars can afford to be that stupid...after all, crazy americans and russians luv guns, and they'll use' em. The real kind.
Later that night I'm kept awake by the movie set that feels as if it's located directly underneath my bed; helicopters whooshing every 5 minutes, the whole world is shaking, conspiring to keep me from getting any sleep. I haven't had a good night's sleep in two weeks. I am tired of the heat, other people's drama and for the first time I can't wait to say arrivederci to Italy.
Well, free parking and room service for me. Glee. I'm off to Lyon.
Driving, cruising, through Italy. It's so smooth and kind and unfussed, it slows my heart rate, clears the mind, soothes the soul...I am driving through those tunnels that mio marito's family helped carve out, digging through those mountains, allowing the countryside to stay just that way....and then, as if a photograph is taken from my travels with Muv while driving from Italy to France, she is there, all around, so much love and stillness and quietude and calm that I just silently take it in, smile, brush my face with my finger, for an instant as she would, so softly, slightly, I haven't felt muv like that since she died, once or twice in my dreams, but it's distant and different that way. I am so grateful to whomever for the gift, whatever games my mind chooses to play, it is to my advantage, and then, 30 minutes later she quickly disappears as we enter france, just like that.....
I pay another million dollars to the last toll booth, land in Lyon, park the car at Avis and taxi it to the hotel metropole...past the river rhone, to the river saone.
The place is perfect, the heat manageable, the pool's cool, and I can read until labor day without guilt, extending my holiday one day longer than the french cuz I'm a crazy American after all.
Lots of topless sunbathing, female couples roaming in the shallow end, arms intertwined, gossiping. Chaise after chaise full of french women sunning the front side, then rotating their bored breaststs, so the back side becomes just as brown. Lot's of middle aged french men in their speedos, posing, kiss/kissing their birds then swimming a lap before passing out for more strenuous bronzing exercise.
By the beginning of my first day I've become deeply intrigued with an exotic creature who has to have the deepest, bronzed copper tan I've even seen. She's very much alone, with an invisible shield to remind anyone that dares to get near, don't. I'm fascinated. She reminds me of the kind Muv liked to illustrate, rail thin sinewy models she could paint in layers of colorful, african like motifs, though this one is very french, indeed. She snarls at me once or twice as I stare through my sunglasses. She's absolutely beautiful, pencil thin, late 20's maybe, smoking skinny cigarettes when she's not applying lotion around her small well toned tummy or petite and upturned champagne glass breasts, or maybe she's playing gracefully with her large multi colored cotton scarf that acts as head gear when she's sunning, or body gear when she goes to the bar for yet another bottle of Evian.
I'm like Dudley Moore in 10, feeling slightly overdressed in my black one piece, secretly obsessed with my exotic neighbor. She reminds me of Kelly Klein, Calvin's 'beard', only far more beautiful, tanned, and much more petite, indeed. Not one bead of sweat slips near her body. She is almost always in slow motion, she checks her cell, sitting up, crossing her thin, shapely legs, wrapping her free hand about her neck, folding onto herself, protection from me and everyone else, then unfolds her long limbs, winding her fine, long, brown hair gracefully into her fingers so that the large black comb clip can capture just as many find strands whilst the rest fall away, just so, creating the perfect silhouette, everything about her just shimmers. I adore this little girl. So much wiser than I.
She never gets into the pool like the rest of us and there are no sunglasses, anywhere, she is simply there to make sure her entire body becomes darker by the hour.
I, on the other hand, must give her space as I've had enough sun, and prepare for my 2 star Michelin experience at L'Auberge L'lle. Lyon is, after all, the gastronomic capitol of the world. I walk the dogs along the Saone with their new french made elegant carrier on my back. Like everything else French, long on style, short on function, but it does allow me to sit in the garden outside the restaurant, sip my champagne and open the lower flap so Colette and Godot can lay comfortably with their heads outside and be served cold water by the staff. In a sterling silver bowl, atop a large linen napkin, upon the serving dish. This is France, after all. We enter the restaurant, located on this tiny island, and it's all quite as you might imagine; magical. The waiter is pleased I note the second dish is made to resemble a forest, pointing out every single bit I'm supposed to, whew! I think. I serve Colette and Godot little bits and pieces throughout the meal, we then take the 20 minute walk back to the hotel and fall blissfully asleep, finally, sleep is imminent and kind and long.
The next day I find myself next to the 'exotic one', or as near as one can be, of course, she doesn't mind, she's on a mission and it has little to do with me.
On my other side I note an older woman wearing the same chapeau i keep seeing on the wealthy women having lunch at the other end of the pool. I ask her about the hat and she gets up and stands next to my chaise, it's called a 'casquette' and we start chatting. Her name is Nicola, she's Jewish, married to an investment banker, didn't vote for Sarko though her husband did. She tells me of her daughter, a 26 year old who has formed a theatre company designed for the deaf but is currently on holiday in Canada, apparently in pursuit of a husband because she's already 26 and desperate to get married and begin breeding babies. The mother is worried that time is running out as well. She asks for my impression of american politics and I tell her, we're not comfortable arguing like you, I say, it's a problem, we can't quite agree to disagree. I go on a bit and she suggest that she's never heard an Amercian talk the way I do.
Because of, or in spite of, who knows, she gives me her contact info and address and encourages me to look them up this time or next. She has been coming to the Hotel Metropole for years and she appears to know everyone so I ask her about the exotic one.
Awkward silence. She purses her lips, looks at me, then decides to indulge. She's rather cryptic but I get it, the exotic one is a call girl. Nicola bids adieu after a while and i try and engage with Evelyn Waugh's The Loved One but it can't possibly compete, it's so much more fun to lay on my stomach, twiddle my toes in the air, cup my cheek in my hands and fantasize about my neighbor.
I watch the other women, finally noticing them taking notice of my exotic one, before they enter the pool, fortified, like twins, they glare at my girl, just for a second, saying a word or two, then descend, I adore my girl even more...she knows this, maybe, as I smile her way, maybe not, she is blissfully oblivious to the rest of our ways, i suppose...
The clouds come in, it's the last day of August, so it's about time....my gorgeous whore wraps up her things, slips into her glittery slippers noir, leaves me, as does the summer, and the sun...good-bye I sigh...
C'est la vie....
