Christmas glee

Each year I take pains wrapping all my presents in a chosen style, and this Christmas was no exception. I went for recycled paper, yellow ribbon, and an individualized Sukie sticker. It almost made up for the fact that I cannot for the life of me wrap items in a neat way – especially if their shape is anything but square – so that I need to distract whichever family member is being honoured from the parcel’s quasimodesque aspect. Gifts are, in turn, a way of distracting said family members from the various issues they take from their daily lives to the Christmas tree, and I believe that in spite of their aesthetic ambiguities, mine did a pretty good job.

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ère Montet

You don’t always realize that things are old until they break, and it may take time before you even notice that they are no longer there. A few weeks ago, as I was getting ready to move to Geneva, I saw through the window of my parents’ house that a piece of our street sign was lying on the ground. I went out under the morning rain and casually took it home, hoping that the neighbours would fail to notice my illicit act of uncivility. I enjoy looking at it, although I’m not sure what “Derri” might signify on its own. One night, my brother and I subrepticiously attempted to steal the remaining part, but the screws were too old and rusty to give in to our efforts. The stubborn sign still stands there, in the street corner, proudly proclaiming: “ère Montet” – the Montet era.

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Celtic escape

Over the last few months I visited a number of exhibitions and sites related to Celtic culture in the three lakes region. Though I haven’t yet acquired my own dagger and sickle, I’m considering building a mud hut with thatched roof under the trees somewhere. You know it’s time to move on when 1) there still isn’t space for you in the fridge after two months and you have to smuggle your stuff into a corner 2) your host keeps things in your room that she regularly has to come and get 3) she tends to forget you live there so you have to lock the door 4) her contractors use your toilet and you’re asked to clean it 5) in fact she doesn’t even share her own bathroom with her boyfriend, so yours is open to the whole community 6) when you’re away for the week-end she has guests sleep in your bed 7) she thinks she knows what you want or need much better than you ever will 8.) you find her crying over her journal in the kitchen 9) she uses you as an audience for her biased monologues 10) you told yourself: “well, at least I love the garden” but then she had trees cut down and you can’t even build your mud house close to the pond anymore.

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Oak grove

A few weeks ago I went to the woods and dug up young oaks before transfering them into pots. Many died but ten are still alive, and one of them’s even got fresh new leaves! I don’t have a clue what I’m hoping to do with them though it would be cool to have a potted oak in town when I finally find a place of my own. My attempts at planting things have never been fully convincing but I’m determined to get better at it. So now that mum has started to remember watering them when I’m away from home, there’s a chance for me to become an expert gardener in local varieties and, who knows, I might inspire others to desecrate forests in order to replace the exotic with the local.

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Camels gone wild

Admittedly, this picture was easy for me. Just another excuse to use polka-dot-patterned adhesive tape, really. The ad shows how countercultural elements are appropriated by companies in order to sell products. And the problem is that I really like it – these things never fail to work for me. I remember many of Camel’s ads from years past – so influential were they – even though I never became a regular smoker. Spray cans represent customers’ power to participate in the brand’s image by designing packaging, thus supposedly making it more DIY and empowering. There is something fishy about the idea of selling freedom in the form of addiction that still does not hinder it from being appealing. I believe the illusion is achieved here by a call for liberatory creativity which, unfortunately, happens to serve the purpose of glorifying a brand that solely has its own interests in mind. And yet, as health is increasingly invested with ideology, I wonder whether smoking cigarettes isn’t becoming an act of resistance again.

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A crash course in teaching

After being unemployed for four months, during which I worked quietly for myself at my own rythm, the recent change of pace came as a bit of a shock. Suddenly my PhD proposal deadline arrived, I started having job interviews, and after the Berlitz school of languages selected me for their initial training I only had a few days to find a new place to live. This means that after six weeks here in Prêles, I’m leaving again and will (temporarily?) take a room in a posh village named Coppet, by the lake near Geneva. Even though it all seems sorted now – I am a PhD student at the university of Geneva, I teach French at Berlitz, I live in Coppet during the week – I have yet to become comfortable with my new situation before I can feel settled. After all, in one year, I have lived in Canterbury, Yverdon, Bienne, Prêles, and Coppet. No wonder it’s a little distabilizing.

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Yin Yang poetry

By clicking on the tags from my latest post, some of you may have noticed that there are regrettably few blog posts about the hermit lifestyle. I am proud to have found my niche, and will try my best to live up to it. Thanks to having moved back to my parents’ house in a charming village, I know I will have much to contribute to the trend I intend to set. For those who choose to follow me, here is step one: walk in the fresh night air with a Moleskine sketchbook and a pencil until you find a beautiful tree. Then draw it as well as you can, though of course you won’t be able to see the lines on the page. And then, ask yourself, isn’t this what life is like? Hopefully, there will some coherence to your drawing in the end.

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Light in the dark

What can I write about when I live on my own, go days without seeing or talking to anyone, and spend much of my time agonizing over the same PhD proposal I was already working on a year ago? As a precocious hermit, all I can do is talk about the candles I like to light at night in the depths of my cave. It’s not that I cannot afford the electricity bill anymore – though of course every little helps – rather, I am a little ashamed to admit that as I’ve got used to going to bed very early (I refuse to say how early), I tend to wake up during the night, usually at 1 or 2 am. At first I tried to force myself back to sleep by beating myself up over it, which strangely enough didn’t work very well. Then I tried candles, and nights became more enjoyable. And yes, I will be careful not to burn down the house…

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Yeasts are fungi; sea horses are animals.

I got rid of Herman, poor thing. It was developing an unhealthy ammount of alcohol, and I became tired of not knowing what to do. Perhaps one day I’ll get a bread book in order to find out what went wrong. In the meantime, I believe that buying a ready-made loaf of leaven bread is actually cheaper than making my own. Not to speak of the fact that I don’t even have a proper oven to work with… So Herman is dead, and I’m alone again, waiting to find out what my next passion will be. Sea horses perhaps? To begin with, I’d like to know what defines male vs. female when the female inserts eggs into the male who later gives birth himself. Then I’ll decide whether they’re worth giving up leaven for.

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Leaven trials

Over a year ago, someone offered me a voucher for a class on leaven and bread-making. I finally decided to use it, and now flour, dough, and old village ovens shouldn’t have any secrets for me. Except that (perhaps predictably), things never work out in my life as written matters say they should. That’s fine with me as far as the esoteric narrative used during the class – about the search for authenticity, the boiling life present in the dough, or the convergence of the four elements within bread – is concerned, but when it comes to my own cooking, I would expect it to be, at the very least, edible. Unfortunately, the leaven I have brought to life has failed to be thankful so far, and as we are both turning out to be very stubborn, it’s hard to tell at this point who will finally take the upper hand.

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