Category Archives: writing

Paris, this new home-I

I have started a new online writing course with Cynthia Morris. In it, we explore our Paris, write, and complete a short story in a moth’s time. There is a small online community, a host of images, and prompts. My Paris is very small, steeped in a memory of a trip taken in 1991 to visit my French publisher and meet the French translator of my first novel. That novel will have a brand new life as an e-book from my American publisher.

I spent three nights, four days in Paris, and I can recall nearly every hour, from the rough crossing on the hovercraft( where my seat-mate grimaced and efficiently handed me the bag provided for such occurrences when I mentioned I felt a little sick. The concierge or the hover hostess then quickly came by to take away the contents of my lunch, bagged and warm in my hands.

In Dover or Calais, I boarded a train bound for Paris, headed for Hotel du Dragon, on rue du Dragon. My new seat-mate, shocked on discovering I did not yet have my metro tickets, immediately opened her purse to give me some. My love-affair with France began.

Sleeplessness comes uncalled

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Indira Ganesan, Dreamflower, 2013

Sleeplessness comes when you least expect it, and yet, perhaps you consciously court it. Why else eat popcorn laced with your aunt’s special Sesame-cumin-dal powder, followed by spoonfuls of hazelnut chocolate? What matter it isn’t Nutella but organic, as is the popcorn and powder? Sunday before Monday, and you eat, in full knowledge, yet are still surprised to find it is half-past twelve, and in four hours –less, really–the alarm will go off, and you must get in a car and drive. You have disturbed the cats who were quietly slumbering as you tossed in bed to get comfortable, finally getting up to microwave a mug full of milk with saffron and honey, leading them to foolheartedly follow you to the kitchen, thinking they will be fed. You wonder why on earth isn’t the milk working, and you read an article about yet another person who has given up dairy, knowing you should not reach for the computer, but you really do want to know when the nasturtiums will bloom at the Gardner. It will be in April, but as long as you are there, in cyberspace, why not check what is happening at the MFA, the ICA, only you type in CIA-Boston, and get the wrong information, leading you to wonder if you are now on a list. You spent the morning having brunch with a table of interesting, vibrant women, and you came home to get caught up on work. You finished reading an article on Arundhati Roy, which leaves you feeling exhilarated and happy to be involved in novels, although you suspect she would disapprove of your work, although you hope she and a host of other South Asian writers, as well as the rest of the world, frankly, approve and exclaim over everything thing you do, for is that not why you secretly write to begin with? You drift off to sleep, having tired out your mind, knowing that the alarm will ring too soon, and of course, without fail, it does.

A Round of Robins

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In searching for the term to describe a collection of robins in the sky, I discovered the word “time-slice.” A slice of time is the time assigned for a procedure scheduled to run its course. Wikipedia suggests it is interchangeable with “quantum,” a word that seems as mysterious as a black hole, but not as mysterious as slicing time on a wooden block, with a sharp knife. This is when I regret dropping high-school physics for Mythology, though the few classes in Physics are clearer in retrospective memory. A flock of robins is called a round, and I was surprised by one as I drove by the beach early this morning, the streets covered with snow a few hours old. Spring and snow, robbins, and that term of Keats, not the double negative, but the negative capability, to understand two opposing entities at once.

This is what the outside and inside of the Cutler Majestic Theatre looks like, first from back in 1882 in a print from the Library of Congress, and from some iPhotos I snapped after yesterday’s performance of “Man in a Case” with the inimitable Baryshnikov. A difficult, intriguing, and ultimately provocative and memorable performance, it held the negative capabilities of the worlds of drama and modern dance; of Chekhov and Baryshnikov, and the intricacies of love.

All in a beaux-arts theater in the 21st century.