avec la musique vien l'espoire

At the present moment, the scene is too sweet to be real and the elation I feel due to it’s beauty is only vaguely hampered by the fact that it’s surreal nature is reminding me of neon bright moments in a David Lynch film that cause the audience to feel disconcerted and question how quickly the situation will decline, like the yellow tulips in “Blue Velvet”. It’s just after three o’clock on an early fall Sunday afternoon in Marseille. The weekend was rainy, mocking the sunny weather citizens of the city with coat-and-jacket temperatures and wind. But today the sun has come out and all that remains of the rain is a refreshing cool. The sky is clear and bright, but for a few white puffy clouds. I’ve just finished hanging my laundry to dry in the floor-to-ceiling window of my antique fourth story apartment. Standing in the window, I can hear birds chirping, and in the apartment just across the street someone is practicing classical piano with the windows open. The sound is clear and flawless. So flawless that after several minutes listening, I establish that it is actually a recording… Wait a moment… No, in fact it is not a recording. The pianist has switched styles to something more along the lines of jazz and is now joined by a female vocalist. She has a clean, flawless, alto voice carrying with it the passion in the song she’s singing. Whatever is going on over there, I wish I were a part of it.
I am still searching to make music a bigger part of me, to play an instrument, to sing, to be the music and not just stand by and listen to it. Thus far I have only succeeded in becoming a groupie to every solid musician I hear.
I’ve had moments where I felt the honored guest, but still I was nothing but a groupie. I went out for some beers a couple of weeks ago with two of the members of the Clair de Lune Trio at a bar near Place Jean Jaurès. In a somewhat secluded corner of the bar I sat between the guitarist and the violinist as they played a mad rendition of a Django Reinhardt song. This was the conclusion of an anxious day. I was sick with a head cold or an allergy and I was frustrated with flakey restaurant managers who lead me on and never gave me a job. I was just on the border of a decision to leave Marseille and go somewhere more secure when these musicians called me at midnight to join them for a drink. Avec la musique vien l’espoire… And due to the hope that accompanied the music that night, I assertively decided to stay. When I express my desire to be more of a musician, every good musician I meet reminds me what kind of hard work that will take…
I suppose the problem is, it’s difficult to pursue a new activity with the kind of gusto I’d like to dive into music when other necessities of living are not yet in place… Such as job… But over the past week, I’ve failed to be extraordinarily stressed about my tragic financial situation. I’m a young American woman profiting from the present with the Marseille sun and the Mediterranean Sea… In a few days, I’m sure I’ll be hit by another wave of anxiety but for now ça va.
Last night more music. Electronic night at Marsatac, the big out door music festival for the young and hip held each year in Marseille. After two hours of handing out fliers advertising another concert in front of the venue, I went in with a small group of people I’d been working with. I promptly lost them all and walking alone, took in the energy of the evening. When I started to get cold, I went to a tent where musicians were playing, and though I’d never heard of them, I pushed my way to front center and danced.
As late afternoon turns to early evening, the sound of a tap dancer has joined the pianist and the singer. The sun is slowly withdrawing from my window and I’m beginning to feel chilly… Fragments of momentary loneliness, wishing for someone closer to keep me warm, but for now I’ll put on a sweater and keep listening to the music being wrung out of the city through the early autumn night.

chapt 1 in the quest for a visa

First try, I walked to the Castellane neighborhood, big and clean and wealthy, from my apartment near Noaille, wild and dirty and dangerous, in search of the U.S. consulate. There, a security guard behind a huge metal gate told me I had to call for an appointment. He gave me the phone number, and I called from a pay phone around the corner. No answer, so I left a voice message though the recording told me I shouldn’t expect a call back for calls regarding visas. I stopped for a coffee and to read the paper in this new neighborhood before returning home. Second try, I called the Marseille consulate from home, where a woman answered and played dumb. She said they didn’t deal with visas there and that I’d have to call the consulate in Paris. Third try, I called Paris, where another woman played dumb and told me that because I am in Marseille, I should call the consulate in Marseille. Fourth try, I called the consulate in Marseille again with the news that the Paris consulate sent me back to them. After much questioning, the woman on the line told me that in fact, the U.S. consulates in France know nothing about the laws for obtaining a French work visa and that I should go to the Prefecteur. I hung up the phone and put the Prefecteur off for another day. I’d been warned this would be a painful process.
My love for this country is unrequited. My heart has attached itself to memories of moments recently passed, gazing at the cerulean blue of the ocean and jagged mountains in the distance, blending in with the untamed landscape bordering a wild, lazy city. But today I feel this country doesn’t particularly want me here, or simply doesn’t care enough to clarify itself. Rotten really, and typical.
Of all days the weather could choose to be nasty, of course it’s chosen this one. The sky is swollen with the intention of rain and the need to detoxify itself on us below or explode, causing the common question of the faceless dreary day pedestrians concerning when the clouds will shatter under the increasing water pressure to linger in the air.
After reflecting for a while, I’ve changed my mind. This city loves me immensely, the way a teacher loves a student enough to test him and challenge him and push him to the limit to confirm the conviction that he will not quit so easily. But this is far from my limit. I can endure so much more (and will have to if I’m going to pursue this obnoxious quest for a work visa) as long as I abandon that quirk I have of fleeing the moment things get uncomfortable.

looking for my marsian voice

At first it was a place to sit and look at the stars and now it’s come alive with the energy of the people who breath the air that smells of lavender soap, and baking bread, and piss, who sit at the bar next door from morning to night drinking pastis, singing to themselves and avoiding work. For some reason, I feel something for them. They love this city even more than I do and don’t notice they are unemployed but only that they are free. Is it strange that I fell in love… With a city? In truth, I’ve fallen in love before with other cities, but not like this. And for the life of me I can’t figure out what it is about Marseille that’s captured me. Maybe the deep turquoise of the ocean, rocky beaches, the way the ancient forts and cathedrals, houses with red tiled roofs ascend from the ocean creating uneven steps that turn a shade of gold at sundown. Sure it’s beautiful, but I’ve seen so many extraordinary cities, and in truth, this one lives up to its reputation for being filthy… But maybe that’s in part what I love about it. Similar to when we fall in love with a person their quirks, their flaws, imperfections, become our favorite details.