Innocents Abroad

So I’m driving up Buckshot Creek Road, trying to avoid all the potholes in the dirt and not slip off and go plunging down a deep ravine, and near the bridge that passes over the creek I see Marcel Proost on his backhoe. He’s replacing a culvert that got damaged during the winter storms. He should be wearing a hardhat for this kind of work, but today he’s sporting his favorite Oakland Raiders cap.

Marcel waves, and I can see that he’s got earphones on and is listening to music while working.

“Yo John. Ain’t seen you in over a month. Hear you been in Paris.”

“Yeah, Marcel. I just got back and I’m really happy to be home, although I did enjoy my days off in the City of Light.”

“So, is it true that they don’t wear pants on the other side of France?”

“Oh, Marcel, jeeze that joke is so lame it went out of fashion forty years ago. And furthermore, I didn’t make it to the other side of France. Except for a day in Chartres, I was in Paris the whole time.”

Marcel has that mischievous look on his face and I know he’s getting ready to rib me hard about something. Maybe there’s a dead tree crashed into my gate that is waiting for me when I reach the house.

But he takes off his earphones and hands them to me.

“Here, John. Take a listen.”

“What is it, Marcel? The Vinteuil Sonata? The latest Massive Attack album?” I put on the earphones and hear fast, nervous, atonal tinkling music, a lot of pizzicato and mallets and what sounds like someone riffing on a guitar. I recognize it, though.

“So, Marcel, in my absence you’ve become a fan of Le Marteau sans Maitre? That’s gotta be a first: Boulez up here on Buckshot Creek Road.”

“Yo, John. This is sweet stuff, the logical extension of Pierrot and Les Noces.” Marcel aims one of his laser-precise projectiles of brown tobacco juice onto the embankment and smiles that famous dental-emergency grin at me.

“I read on the Internet where you did yer concerts at Cité de la Musique, the House Pierre Built. I hear that place is in La Villette, built on the site of what used to be the slaughterhouses for Paris. How come they let you in?”

“Well it’s true that every time I go to Paris there is at least one article in the papers there saying something to the effect that extending me an invitation is a way of demonstrating how “open-minded” the administration is, even if American music makes some of the hardcore composers there choke on their tete de veau. And it’s true it’s been ten years since I had anything substantial done there. But this time the atmosphere seemed emphatically warmer, and I didn’t feel like a panda from a visiting zoo. And, truth to tell, the people running Cité were exceptionally friendly and generous. We ate every night after a concert at Au Boeuf Couronné.”

Marcel pulls out a bag of Redman and stuffs another wad in his cheek.

“You mean that the Ensemble Intercontemporain”—Marcel makes a bad imitation of French accent—“played yer stuff?”

“Well, whoa baby…let’s not get outta hand here. No, I had THAT experience about fifteen years ago and am not anxious to repeat it. My stuff is definitely not their cuppa tea. No, I brought my own guys this time—the ASKO/Schoenbergs from Amsterdam, the LSO and my favorite of all groups, the wild over-the-top Saint Lawrence String Quartet, who burnt the place down with the concert of Haydn, Ravel and Angry Neighbor.”

“Plus them folks from Lisbon, huh?”

“Yeah, Joana Carneiro and the Gulbenkians—terrific. So, what’s up for you, Marcel? You written any reviews for the Independent Coast Observer in my absence?”

“Naw. Been reading Jean-Paul Sartre’s “The Reprieve” and Stendhal’s “The Red and the Black.” Good stuff, ‘specially the Stendahl. That Julian Sorel guy, Bonapartist and bedroom adventurer—gotta like him.”

So I leave Marcel to his task and head up the steep, muddy road to see whether there’s been a power outage in my absence. In my rear window I see Marcel waving to me and I notice he’s put a tricolore flag on the back of his backhoe.