I keep going back and reading this post just because … because I like this guy’s style, and he conveys in such an accessible, honest and real way just the process of two friends hanging around, which of course reminds me of my all-time favourite Kurt Vonnegut quote …
"We are put on earth to fart around," said Vonnegut, "don’t let anyone tell you any different."
Thanks, Brian (aka bmo or the repurpussing coach). He, Vonnegut and a few other special oddballs in my life (and of course Raman, who is not odd at all) help keep me on purpuss.
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Montreal:Notes
Sunday, September 30, 2007Jon Husband has written a lovely account of a few hours spent together in Montreal last weekend. It was a hoot. Increasingly, I am seeing Montreal as the place I would like to live. When I was much younger I dated a young Swiss woman who lived in Montreal. I adored the place then, and do so now. It was at a time of great crises in my life. Montreal was sweet comfort. Odd to say that now, though, as within a day, I will be moving to Toronto with my son. We have found a very very very small apartment in a house in the old city’s east end. But it’s lovely. It’s just about perfect, all things considered. BUT, I really would rather be moving to Montreal. So would my son. He is mesmerized by the architecture, for sure. I’m not sure what other things have him smote. I’m not sure the quality of life can be measured here. Montreal cannot be quantified. Jon often quotes aptly Leonard Cohen on measurement. Outremont is stunning. We sat in the evening for a small glass of white wine in roughly the same spot we would sit the next morning for latte in a bowl. And stared at the beauty of these grand four and five story apartment buildings. I did. Jon was staring at other things. Like the cars. But the walk on Sunday to Marche Jean Talon, a market unlike any I’d visited before, was a treat. Leisurely, relaxed. Transported me out of my head, where I have been spending too much time recently. Stopping to examine a poster on a wall or a coffee maker in a shop window. Nice. It’s still a small city Montreal but on foot with the details up close the place becomes huge. Sick. Hanging with Jon means spending time on an abstract plane. Things – objects, spaces, ways, avenues, dress, mess – have meaning. Patterns are recognized, acknowledged. A new sort of language is awkwardly crafted. Needs to be discovered. With a strong laugh along the way. Because it’s all about the unseen. Which is the way artists see the world. I think. They translate the unseen and make it real. See a piece of art and you see the world in a new way. That’s kinda the line, anyway. Which is the point of all this, isn’t it. If you can’t be transformed – get jazzed, engaged, involved – then why do you exist? Which sounds like the prelude to a midlife crisis. Stay tuned. Ultimately though, the thing with montreal is the way people engage with one another. Life trumps work. The corporate exodus of thirty years ago was huge.
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