the unlikely francophile

As I linger in giddy thoughts of him it is hard even to know where to begin.

Him is the one that is quiet, focused, his physical body perfect for me, his personality a little too unformed, I suspect.

Babysitting for the kid affords me random hours with nothing to do and nowhere to go but I have to stay in the neighborhood, so naturally I go to the cafe. It was in one of those hours that I was able to speak to him again. He smiled when he bounded up the steps. It was like he knew I'd be there. He said a cheery hello and ordered his coffee. We talked about school, that it was ending, what he still had left to do, etc. His main worry was a twelve page essay on terrorism. He's a political science major, I learned. And then, he said the words I most dreaded. After school was finished, just a few days away, he was going to go home for the six week break.

I told him to stop by when I was working next. I worried the desperation I felt would drown out my words. He left with a distant air.

I didn't expect to see him again for six weeks. I hoped he would come in when I was working. I planned ahead. I got a postcard and wrote him a note with my number on it. I didn't know if I would get a chance to give it to him or not. I didn't know if I should give it to him. It seemed really very dorky.

And then, he came! I was so excited I had to turn away from him and smile at the coffeepots. I turned back to his smiling face and what followed was too much to recount. He stayed for over an hour. We chatted constantly unless a customer was there, and even then he often joined in the conversation. His volume went from a quiet two to a six. He talked about himself a lot more than he ever had. He didn't just nerd talk me, like I was someone he went to school with and had nothing better to talk about.

And I found out the most amazing thing ever. Not only is he a political science major, he's a french major. He's been to France. He speaks French fluently. Fluently! I asked him, really, not like a parlor trick? And he mused, no, not like a parlor trick...

Things were going so well that I didn't want to spoil the mood by giving him the postcard with my number on it. Walter suggested I give it to him before he left, and I'd even decided against that while he was there and we were having such a good conversation. I was hoping he'd be able to do the job on his own.

Finally he began to leave. He made this little speech about how he didn't know when he would see me again, so I gave him the card. A customer came in the interim and we both awkwardly said goodbye.

And even if he doesn't call, if we never go out, if we aren't even friends someday, I just loved that he turned the volume up and seemed more comfortable being himself than he had ever been before. That is what makes me smile about the whole thing.

prospect decipherings

I feel I should preface this with a slight disclaimer that I a) do not go out to bars with the intention of meeting the perfect guy for me, and b) I do not expect to meet a guy at the cafe either. That these things will happen seems likely, since both places are festering with lonely, available guys; and finally c) I'm in no rush to be relationshipped again.

The first time I met him I was drunk. I was mad. I was manic. I had been out all night and arrived at work that morning with no sleep and booze on my breath. It was one of the stupidest things I had ever done. That day the marathon passed by the cafe, my boss was already waiting for me at six a.m. and I had stopped drinking at 5:30 a.m. To say that I was fucked was just putting it lightly. But somehow, my boss did not catch on that I was drunk.

He arrived at an hour before the marathon passed through to do his homework and without his foreknowledge, to laugh at my many hilarious comments which I delivered because he was there. His presence made my shift palatable. His stoic focus on his homework was strange and intriguing. Here were twenty thousand people running by, another few hundred spectators ringing cow bells, yelling and clapping and he was not distracted at all by them. He was distracted by me. But not by them.

After that, it has been a desperate climb on the the sill, my fingers barely able to hold on, his presence is so far and few between and unpredictable and his demeanor toward me different, as if that day had never happened. I adore him but I think there is no way he could love a girl like me. I imagine so many scenarios, but I can't imagine how it will ever get off the ground.

He suits me most as a physical being. His personality is strangled and muffled and too quiet for me, I suspect.

As for the other one, he suits me most personality wise, but his physical being is not my ideal. And yet, where others have failed in this department, he has somehow snuck in with such vitality that it doesn't matter to me at all.

He is a regular everywhere. I have often seen him, noticed him, drank with him. Not long ago, I began to look forward to his visits. I sought him out at the bar. And what I found there was better than I could have imagined. He sat with me a long time after he'd paid his tab and I tried maybe too hard to play it cool. When he finally left the entire bar had invented that he had a crush on me and I was too mean to notice. I countered, it doesn't matter that you think he likes me, because I already like him.

The next time I saw him I surprised him with these revelations and we managed to clumsily meet somewhere in the middle, between chin and nose. He was tender and sweet and loud and wonderful and we spent the morning laying in a bed he made from a box with instructions. And now he says he will call me to discuss a date. Except he hasn't called at all.

I realize that I was not even on his radar a week ago. In fact, his presence on mine was a surprise to me as well. He's the kind of guy I usually avoid because I know his type. I've dated his type. I'm not interested in being that girl who's with That Guy. You know, the loud crazy guy at the bar who buys everyone shots... And yet, he expressed great admiration for someone who'd read the seven volumes of Proust. He actually knew that there were seven volumes. He'd actually tried to read them and only made it through the first two. So I must relent my stereotypes, I must let down my notions and admit that he may not be That Guy.

The fact that he's a know-it-all only makes him all the more enticing.

So I snuck into his life and into his bed with the element of surprise on my side, and I wonder if he's thinking too hard about it all instead of just getting to know me.

It's exciting to have some prospects. I imagined that it would be a slow road in this area, that my heart would be too cold to even let someone near me. I've been accused of doing this all too soon, of setting myself up to be hurt again, but in the end, I know myself better than anyone does. I know that I wouldn't even bat an eye if they weren't something worth seeing. I also know at the end of the day an empty bed awaits me in my apartment by the lake and it doesn't make me yearn for anything but sleep.

je sais tu

The smells alone transported us to France. Hot cheese, baking bread, a mingling of herbs and fresh produce, it was all just so quintessential France. They didn't have to tell us that they imported all their ingredients from France, their flours and sugars, their salts and herbs, we could smell evidence of their locale immediately as the door opened.

The grouchy woman behind the counter made us a baguette sandwich, and it was truly a baguette. It was only puffy in the middle, with a big oval dent where it resisted rising anymore. The ends were pinched in and pointed, the color of the bread was a dirty grey and the crust was thick and dense. Inside though, it was soft and airy, the dough lightly pounded to leave in pockets of air.

Diane was there to do business with the caterer and she came out to speak to us. She spoke decent English, but it was evident that she was new to our language, for it was twisted and gnarled with pauses, wonderings and many miscalculated words. Whenever she fumbled over a word, she quickly smiled and sometimes laughed. She was absolutely enchanting. She wore clothes that I'd never seen on anyone else, down to her shoes and eyeglasses. Her glasses were name brand (of course) but they were a soft raspberry in clunky frames that suited her face perfectly.

Most of the time when I accompany Diane on her many tasks and errands, no one ever speaks to me. No one includes me. No one talks to me. No one wonders who I am. Diane takes charge of them and they pick up on the subtle clues that I have nothing to do with what is actually going on.

This woman, however, was compelled to figure me out and even included me in the conversation, which ran the menu gamut from appetizers to dessert* and never once treated me like I didn't exist. She even wondered if she had met me before today, perhaps we had seen her there before, or perhaps we had met somewhere else. I admitted that I seem familiar to many people. She asked me my name, but that did not ring a bell. As we were leaving she asked, "Can you remember for me your name?"

I remembered my name for her and asked hers. Neither of us had asked her name. As Americans, a name is something private, almost personal, a way of connecting someone to you. Anonymity is the beginning of indifference.

"Elodie," she said, in a deeply happy way, and she gave us her business card and wished us well, and we left feeling delighted by her countenance.

[* le menu: asparagus mousse in martini glasses, vegetable brochettes (French ka-babs), a cheese plate, brazillian paella with shrimp, chicken and coconut milk in clear plastic cones (like ice cream cones but not edible), crepe brochettes with fresh fruit and mini cakes.)

cheers!

The wii fit has informed that I have lost six point six pounds since the last time I ventured on to it about a month ago.

Some part of me has been somewhat aware that I've lost weight, but I just chalked it up to stress and what not and figured since I wasn't eating a ton of meat late at night, a natural by-product would be some inevitable weight loss.

So I was pleasantly surprised when the wii fit was actually polite to me and congratulating me on my improved stats.

Here's to getting back to being myself, weight and all.

the view

a general filling in of the blanks

: I love my new apartment. I sit and look out the window with great pleasure, on a horizon of trees and buildings lower than my vantage (the fifth floor) and an ever changing sky. I leave my blinds up and the southern morning light wakes me every morning, no matter how reluctant I may be. I still have a lot of work to do to make it my home, but it has great potential.

: I still have four jobs. I babysit for the kid, I am a Rent-A-Friend, I work at the cafe and I'm a housekeeper. I quite like the diversity and the varying degrees of "responsibility" I have acquired. Sometimes I don't know how I can keep it all working, but somehow it works. It helps that everyone I work for is excessively delighted by my abilities.

: I am still applying for Iowa. I've begun to craft an entirely new manuscript. It is still early in the process, but my writing partner and I are trying to meet more regularly and I feel good about this new material.

: A random freelance article I wrote for a friend's magazine is going to be published on oprah.com. I wish I was kidding. It's at once exciting and repulsive.

: Of course I've already begun to attract guys to my side. I find that I've been open for novelty's sake, but there's nothing I am rushing into. I have a new crush who drives me work on my least favorite day of the week. Seeing him makes me glad, smile, giddy. I have no reservations, but no worries either.