Correspondances

I was wondering some days ago in Paris, facing the deep emotions of childhood memories of the one, and on the other hand the natural, almost since ever, attraction and belonging of the second to that place, that precise place related to the said childhood memories, whether I would indefinitely success to reject my own, if they would someday strike back as hard as they'd been rejected, if I had a past, or if I would remain rootless, the word strikingly fits, rootless, without identity, without past, wanderer and homeless, profoundly without home. This is about both time values and space values, the same actually, if you think about it.

As the journey began, a night before taking off, I was alone in my now empty and thus own flat, trying desperately to avoid packing and preparing by cooking frenetically and pinning Christmas lights on the walls. I gave away almost everything to the people that stayed. There was one of the most terrible messes I had seen there. So much to do that I decided, for the second time in three days, just not to sleep - thirty-two on, twelve off, another thirty-four on, a strange experience of sensing irreality, brutal slow-downs and offbeat heartbeat, listening to the devastating Concertos of Ligeti in the early morning and getting auditory hallucinations induced by a bit too much of the music running permanently when I'm home. As stupid as it can sound, in spite of the large amout of time gained, I was again in a hurry in the morning. The letter for the perhaps arriving flatmates still had to be written ; I got it done, and thought about how to handle it, people moving in an apartment where others had already defined their place, and maintained in spirit people that had left and that they did not know. Hopefully it won't be as difficult as it can have been and be expected.

I closed a door on four months of cohabitation. The bolt knocked in the lock and I felt strange. I took the bus and slept into it ; I bought the usual stuff at the airport and managed to read some pages of a study on Nietsche and Europe, even after one day of waking. The woman sitting besides me in the plane happened to be some high civil servant in a cultural center, and somehow tightly related to the Nederlands embassy in Helsinki ; we discussed volubily for the whole flight before the astonished eye of nearby passengers. I promised to help her to get for some weeks in Lille to improve her French and she invited me to introduce me to her family in Helsinki, for a weekend or so. This unexpected meeting smoothed over the usual feeling of disorientation and alterity that hits me so strong in this frightening airport of Schiphol... I witnessed a sunset from the incongruous deckchairs set in my following departure hall. This was maybe as unreal as the rest - sunset as deckchairs.

Brussels was beautiful in the night. The luxurious Christmas market with its peket, hot wine and waffles, the mosaic of Art Nouveau houses overlaying functional architecture, this calm absence of strong identity and the even loss of one's after some time spent there, smooth internationalism. The protection of Law spreading over the city. Foreign businessmen with attaché cases. The slow pace of the city and kind politeness of people. The trees of the park in the fog, the poor and desert shopping center where you still feel at home wherever you're coming from. In every, really every street at least one or two Belgian flags were hanging from the windows... I thought about this meaningless idea of splitting the state in two, that we had discussed with so much passion with Diego. Beyond the actual and undeniable unbalance at most scales overfavouring the French-speaking part of the country in the Flemish opinion, I still don't get the point of this burning will to put state borders splitting the land in the middle. In the nowadays Europe that emphasizes so much regions and regional identity, in a country whose border with France never truly existed for me - I was as a young child frolicking very often in the dunes on this other side of... what ? - creating a state separation when it is already applied a two states, one administration system ? What about the German-speaking part, would it be given to Luxembourg ? And what about Brussels ? International UN status for a European Jerusalem ? That is nonsense...

I left this Brussels it is so easy to get used to for Paris on the day of equinox. All the way long, frozen fields and stunning visions of white cristal trees against the white-blue sky. Paris was as unlikeable as usual, loud and rude people, dirty streets and bursts of violence in the overcrowded cultural stores ; but Max was there, his nice hat, the rapid changes in his attitude and accent after moving there six months ago, his deep, genuine and touching commitment towards oldschool indus and more recent one, but still in a strict sense, and music, very good music generally ; his vivid intelligence and devouring curiosity and ignorance of things of life. I felt naive and ingenue, almost out-of-place following him blindly through the metro. We dropped by the Kabinet des Kuriosités, so comically small, the size of my Tampere bedroom, and discussed with Laurent about familiar people of Finland, about the country that always leaves, I could witness it once again, a so deep imprint on the people that get there. Max offered me a copy of the Satanic Fragments and an ancient book about Taoism, especially recommended for me by Laurent. We drank beers. We listened to music, and I'll never listen in the same way to Death in June again... Flies have their house, and it had all been pretty nicely done.   

Next day arrived some totally different friends, from the early morning at nine to the latest that joined us in the venue of the concert we were gathering for. Out of the whole group, I was the only one to come for the supporting band, The Vision Bleak, and do not give a damn to the point of total ignorance of the headline. I was agreably surprised to identify some familiar hairy head behind the drums, a minute before their set begins : T. Thelemnar from Secrets of the Moon, that is not TVB's usual session drummer. This could be heard during the set, for some drum parts, although rather easy, were played with much effort. All in all, I was however terribly glad to see the boys again, even in a so short set. And they played Kutulu. Funny to notice that they succeeded to instill much more atmosphere on one song, the whole audience invoking all together and hands raised The Thing That Should Not Be, than Therion managed to do in two and a half (sic) boring and lousy hours of set. I couldn't see from my position if Konstanz had spurs on his boots as in Zeltingen-Rachtig, but nevermind. He was still as german-crypto-sexy, well-dressed and tattoed.
As for the Therion set, it was only a two and a half hours reunion of total absence of talents, that is not worth mentioning - even here. Perhaps maybe for the sake of humor... I'll think about it.

We came back, played then Citadelles till the heart of the night, in a delirium atmosphere, went to sleep, they left, I left, saw before a sunset over an arch - astonishing how days are full of light here, but dusks are slow and depressed. My train headed deeper and deeper down to my personal Helvete, as I identified more and more distinctively the disgusting accent of the place I used, years back, to live in. D. was wrapped in its usual bad and wet fog. My childhood house changed as much as I changed : all appeared surprisingly small, and I was harder and rougher than I'd ever been. I barely felt any emotion finding people that certainly love me, felt like crying instead. The TV was on and loud as ever, in spite of the fact that nobody really watches or even listens to it. It needed less than a day for me to become sick, with trouble to breathe. No wonder why. Not even truly the mean moisture of my former bedroom. This is not my home... No good place to listen to music, no room I would be at ease, and alienated people I have more and more scorn towards. I don't belong here either.

This is tonight Christmas Eve dinner, and I'm thinking about the role of this place... I banned myself from returning here - for a while, I mean - returning here, ever. But this place has certainly a central role. This house is a black hole, the reference point of my journeys - the very point which I have to remain the further I can from, for my own sake. Sometimes, as I try to tidy or rummage through old stuff, some parts of my past come up to the surface. All this said stuff is packed here, most of it in this precise room I had, much to my own disgust, to find refuge in, in order to avoid the permanent noise of alienating broadcast. Can you now heard through ? Two more days in this doomed place will be far enough.

This is tonight Chistmas Eve dinner... as usual, getting drunk with champagne, getting peace in falling into a black hole.

Comments

[dissertation]

I thing you are going to go right way.your post is very good and helping us lot thanks for share this useful information.

[Maxime]

Heu..Ben..*sourire*