JOURNAL NO.13

I couldn’t really tell you why, but reading this Henry Miller passage reminds me of my first week in Paris. I remember that the first few days and nights I spent in my apartment, seemed to be a dream. 

I have never moved before. Well, I moved from a house in Brooklyn to an apartment in Brooklyn, but that doesn’t count. I’ve never packed up and left my home to make a new place home. 

Until I came to Paris. 

The first week in my apartment felt dreamlike. It was strange to me that this place was my home. It didn’t really register that I would be living here for months. That I would be calling this apartment home. 

Now, though, it’s hard to imagine life before this was my home. Its hard to remember what it felt like not having 31 Rue Duret as a part of me. The creeks of the floor, the sound of the heater, the way our fridge doesn’t close all the way unless you really slam it. 

When I read the article about sexual geography, a whole new perspective and view on Hemingway and other expatriates came to mind. I never really read Hemingway with the idea of sexuality in mind. Even when I read the chapter about the girl he saw in the cafe, I didn’t really think about sex. 

When he wrote that writing a story was like making love, I never really compared it to him making love to the girl he saw in the cafe. Not until I read this article, that is. 

Something else that this article opened my eyes to was in regards to Gertrude Stein. I have written this previously, but I’ve never been a huge fan of Stein. Granted, I only read parts of Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, but the parts that I did read didn’t really resonate with me on a positive note. 

That being said, when Pizer began to discuss Stein’s book and relationship to Alice Toklas, I definitely came upon a new found appreciation for her work. He was right when he said that many casual readers sometimes find her work to be egotistical. I sure thought it was. But looking at her writing as a way to show her appreciation for Toklas’ ability to give Stein confidence in her “creative powers”, makes it seem a lot less egotistical and a lot more appreciative. 

I mean, I must have been blind reading this book because how could it not come off as appreciative when rather than writing her own autobiography, she writes one in the voice of her lover. At least now I know. 

This is something I love so much about reading. I love gaining a whole new perspective on things. On life. On the world. 

I honestly spend hours just talking to my friends about what they think about this or that rather than discussing my own opinions. Obviously I spend time talking about my own, but I find it so much more interesting to hear what others have to say. 

By hearing what other people think or feel, it helps me to truly shape my own thoughts. And I don’t mean to sound unoriginal, or too caught up with what other people think. That’s not it. 

It’s just that by listening to and understanding other people’s thoughts, feelings, opinions, I am able to decipher between what I agree with and what I disagree with. What I resonate with and what doesn’t resonate with me. What I can sympathize with and what I can’t. 

The world is made up of billions of people for a reason, why push their minds aside? 

The little passage that Pizer included from a piece of Miller’s writing is another great example of this. 

I think that for most of my life I have been waiting for something to happen. I can’t put my finger on exactly what that is. But something tells me it’s love. Love to me is something that will fill a void of emptiness and loneliness. But this is just an idea. I don’t necessarily think it’s true, but it’s still something that sit inside of my stomach and doesn’t really want to go away. 

Anyways, when Miller writes, “…now suddenly, inspired by the absolute hopelessness of everything, I felt relieved, I felt as though a great burden had been lifted from my shoulders…”, I can’t help but to yearn for this feeling. 

This feeling of relief. 

I don’t want that relief to come from realizing that there’s hopelessness in everything. That I don’t agree with. I think there’s hope in everything. There’s even hope in writing this blogpost. 

But the fact that he was able to find relief from something that had been daunting at him for his entire life is inspiring. It gives me hope that I will find relief from whatever is daunting at me. Whatever the hell it is. 

Anyways, enough of my personal banter and back to sexual geography and Henry Miller. 

Miller’s style is difficult for me. I know I understood a majority of what he was saying in “Walking Up and Down in China”, but for some reason it’s hard to completely and utterly grasp it. I can’t resonate with it. Maybe it’s because I don’t know enough about buddhism? I don’t even know if many of these ideas are in fact buddhist, but that’s what comes to mind. 

He seems so sure of what he’s writing and as if it comes to him in an instant. I like that. I like that confidence and that easiness. Its strange, though, because the writing itself isn’t what I would call, easy. 

I have yet to read any Anaïs Nin, although I just bought one of her books from Shakespeare and Co,. It’s hard for me to, again, fully grasp and understand what Pizer is talking about in his article. I mean, yeah I understand it, but I don’t feel like I can really discuss it much because I don’t attain enough knowledge on her as a writer and her history. 

I’m at a loss for how to end this blogpost. I don’t really have much more to say but I feel as though it’s missing something. Maybe because it’s 2 a.m. and it’s only Thursday. Who really knows anyway?

JOURNAL NO.12

For many authors who write about walking, Nature seems to be their go to walking route/spot. Two specific writers that discuss the beauty of Nature in retrospect to walking are Wordsworth and Thoreau. Wordsworth explains his ability to get lost in nature and find himself while Thoreau explains how nature is a key to one’s happiness/sanity. I personally am not a big fan of Nature. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I can appreciate the beauty of trees and plants along with open fields and birds chirping through the air. There is definitely something serene about sitting in Nature and taking everything around you in. Literally breathing in the Natural air and having a crisp feeling inside your lungs. In order for me to fully maintain some sort of happiness or sanity, though, I must take a walk down a city street. I need to be alone yet surrounded by people. Seeing a flower blossom is not nearly as rewarding or helpful to me as noticing a piece of graffiti on a familiar street for the first time. 

Walking through Nature, I feel alone. Most of the time, I am physically alone. But that aside, the quietness and peacefulness of Nature has an ability to make me feel alone in every aspect of my life. There’s something about complete and utter quietness that makes me feel uncomfortable. There’s something about perfection and cleanliness that makes me troubled. You see, I’m a city kid. I grew up in Brooklyn and have spent most of my time in either Prospect or Central Parks. These parks are dirty. They are tarnished and filled with people. Their grasses are far from perfect and their fields are filled with people. Walking through one of these parks is pretty much like walking anywhere in the city itself. You’ll find some pigeons flying around, maybe a duck if you’re lucky. There will be garbage cans filled to the top, and garbage all over the grass or little cement walkways. There will be a few homeless people asleep on benches and a few teenagers smoking weed or drinking beer. There will be cigarette butts and picnickers. You will never be alone. 

Thoreau states, “When we walk, we naturally go to the fields and woods; what would become of us if we walked only in a garden or a mall?”. This statement just isn’t true for me. If I need to go on a walk and do some intense thinking, I’ll hit Clinton or Henry Street — naturally. The thought of finding a field or some woods to walk through has never crossed my mind and I doubt it will. As I walk down a city street, I find comfort in the people around me. I find comfort in the sound of the cars driving down the street and comfort in the filth that makes up the sidewalk. Sometimes, if you’re in a really busy and popular area, you’ll get a whiff of garbage or body odor, and I’m not gonna lie, sometimes I like it. Well, maybe I don’t like it, but when I’m away from it for too long I begin to miss it. 

Here in Paris, a street where I have done some walking and some thinking is in Le Marais. We had to take a walk down this street for one of our blog posts, and I didn’t realize which street it was until I got there. I never knew the name of it before I did the walk for class. Anyway, for this walk, we had to keep an eye out for street art and discuss it in our posts. This assignment brought me a lot of inspiration and a lot of knowledge. It was here that I rediscovered the beauty of taking a walk down a busy street. It was here that I became inspired to write once again. And it was here that I did my best thinking since my arrival in Paris. 

Rue Vieille du Temple was no Clinton Street, that’s for sure. It is kind of a mix between Clinton and Mercer Street. Parts of Rue Vieille du Temple are emptier than others, and parts are more aesthetically pleasing than others. I have always said that Le Marais is the Soho of Paris, so Mercer street is a great comparison. Before taking the walk down this street for my assignment, I had never really paid attention to or noticed any street art. While I was looking for it, however, I found numerous pieces on each block. Not all equivalent with beauty but, in my opinion, equivalent in importance. What I realized as I saw more and more graffiti is that there have been so many people that have walked down this street and marked it with their art. And, there have been even more people that have walked down this street and have not noticed the art that it has. I was one of those people…I hadn’t noticed a majority of this artwork until I was actually looking for it. 

These discoveries brought me to think about invisibility. The invisibility of the history of the people who have walked down a street before you. The invisibility of art and the invisibility of things in general. I like how when there’s cement, or some surface that you can write or draw on, you can mark your territory. You can mark it any way that you like so that everyone and anyone knows that you were there. But they don't know exactly who you are. They don't know your name or anything about you. They just know that someone walked the same route that they are walking and drew something to show it. I know that if you’re walking through Nature and you see a tree, you can carve your initials into it or something and mark your territory. But with carving something into a tree, it’s much harder to notice. I mean, if it’s hard for someone to notice graffiti in bright yellow spray paint on a dark blue door, how can someone discover a small carving in the trunk of a tree? 

There’s a huge difference between people who need nature for sanity and those who don’t. A few of my friends find the need to get out of the city for a while because it seems to become too much for them. I have never felt this way. Except for when I decided to come to Paris, that is. But that wasn’t because I needed a break from a city in general…just a break from my own particular one. I needed to experience something new and unfamiliar for a while. And I guess I could have decided to experience something new and unfamiliar like Nature if I really wanted to, but that would have driven me crazy. Unlike Thoreau who needed to take a walk through Nature to get away from society and find his sanity, I need to be surrounded by society and remember who I am. Remember my contribution to the group and my own value. 

I’m an invisible person and an invisible walker to the thousands of people who have walked before me and will walk after me. In Paris and in New York. But I, the invisible walker, and everyone else, the invisible walkers, have something in common. If you can’t guess what it is…it’s invisibility. We don’t know anything about each other and we don’t know if we would be friends or not. But thats what I like.

Walking through a city, you know people have walked the same exact route that you’re taking. Walking through Nature, you have no clue if anyone as even seen the same things that you’re seeing. The presence of others is uncertain. If you can’t be certain about their presence, you can’t feel their invisibility. 

JOURNAL NO.11

The unreliable narrator. An unreliable narrator is one that is biased and concerned with him/herself. One that doesn't include or consider any perspective other than their own. An unreliable narrator cannot be trusted. They are ignorant, they are liars and they are selfish.
John, the narrator of the passage we had to read for this blogpost, is most obviously unreliable. The story he is telling is that of an unfaithful and manipulative wife. If I were to narrate a story about my unfaithful and manipulative husband, I can guarantee that I would be unreliable, or biased, too.
Since we're only reading about John's perspective on this subject, I can empathize with him considerably. Although his tone comes off as quite arrogant and bitter, I can understand his anger and frustration.
Who wouldn't be angry at a spouse who was controlling and constantly cheating? Who wouldn't be bitter after knowing their loved one cheated on them multiple times and didn't seem to care at all?
Since we only get a look into how John, the narrator, feels/thinks about all of this, we automatically sympathize with him.
I find something kind of comforting in truly understanding one person's thoughts and feelings, however, this passage causes me to want something more. I want to hear about Florence's thoughts. I want to her about Jimmy and Edward, and if they agreed with John about her cold heart.
The unreliable narrator causes a story to be one-sided and extremely simple. I don't have any problems with John as a narrator or a character, I just don't like the role of the unreliable narrator here.
I don't think that John comes off as mentally unstable in any way. It seems as though he is just an angry man that has dealt with a lot of bullshit. I mean, granted, when he says he would have given Florence and Edward money and allowed them to be together, he didn't seem to sane. But generally speaking, he seemed like a guy who was caught up with a girl and did his best to marry her. He then realized that she isn't someone who he should be married to. She isn't someone who should be married at all.
I don't know if I'm a good person to have discuss the difference between American and British mannerisms because my father is British. My aunt and uncle are British. At least 20 of my cousins are, too. I know them all extremely well and their mannerisms don't seem much different to me.
However, to get stereotypical, I really can picture John's voice in a British accent. His sarcastic and bitter tone almost fits the sound of that accent.
It is interesting, though, how he talks about Florence's aunts and her family's desires for her. He seems to find them strange and he doesn't understand. This is a good example of a difference in British and American culture, not so much mannerisms.
I don't really feel like anything in this passage relates to Paris as a city. The Ford Maddox Ford passage I had to read did, though.
Ford's personification of Paris makes me feel warm. I feel his love for the city and I think I can relate to that love deeply.
I wish I knew where the square is that he talks about in the very beginning of the passage. Personifying the city brings the city alive, as redundant as that sounds. She [Paris] is the city filled with cafes and cigarettes and artists and politicians and writers alike speak at different volumes. She is the city who has endured many invasions.
In my opinion, Ford Maddox Ford's "A Paris Letter" doesn't seem to have an unreliable narrator. It seems to have a very reliable one, actually. The narrator doesn't seem to be only concerned with himself. It's quite the opposite, in fact. The narrator seems to include all different information and descriptions that are open to interpretation. They don't emphasize one feeling or thought. It's all over the place.

JOURNAL NO.10

My walk through Park Monceau was a pleasant one. A sunny and warm Sunday afternoon, I dragged my roommate out of the house to walk with me.

We took the metro and got off right in front of the entrance of the park. 

Reminiscing on this specific walk I took with Ali, the strongest feeling I remember is cheerfulness. As we strolled through the cement of the park, sometimes stepping on the damp grass very briefly, I felt happy and present in the moment. 

It wasn't a very pensive walk. It was more of a nice, fun thing to do. Something that made us 100x happier to be here in Paris and be together. 

This walk made me think about history. The history of the different statues that are placed throughout the grounds. Why are they there? Who created them? What's their meaning? I don't really know the answers to any of these questions.

But I then start to think about the people who have walked through this park in the past. The people who walked through this park the day before I did, or 80 years before I did. This brought me back to my idea of invisibility of street art and invisibility of common walkers.

The people who have walked through Parc Monceau before I have, are invisible to me. They're invisible to the rest of the world, now. 

There were some people who walked through this park alone, trying to figure out why their hearts were hanging so low in their chests. There were some people who walked through this park trying to figure out how their hearts could beat so fast and feel so good. There were people who walked through this park that just walked and looked around. Some who didn't even look at all. 

I think taking a walk isn't something you can really define or something you can explain how to do. Everyone walks throughout their lives. Sometimes, a walk could be life changing or eye opening. Sometimes a walk could be just a plain old walk. Sometimes they can be dreadful. 

It's hard for me to say whether or not someone knows how to walk, or if they're good at it. And I don't mean literally how to place one foot in front of the other, but figuratively about the thinking or pondering they do whilst walking.

I don't think we always need to have a specific outcome in mind while we're walking. Sometimes it's nice to talk a walk and take in the fresh air. Sometimes it sucks to take a walk because your feet hurt and your legs are tired and you're running late for something important. Sometimes its nice to walk around with your best friend and forget about your surroundings while simultaneously discussing everything you see. 

That's how Ali and I walked through Parc Monceau. We made a point to look at each statue we saw and we even noticed a strange area with different trees and mosses that didn't seem to belong or didn't seem quite natural.

We noticed the horses walk past us. We noticed the old men sitting on the bench talking and throwing bread at the pigeons. But we forgot to notice the birds. We forgot to notice the sky and each tree. We forgot, for that walk, that we were in Paris. Instead we were just in the park. Taking photos of statues. Making fun of the people we see. Reminiscing on our childhoods and wishing to be 4 years old again.

I was told to meditate on walking for this blog post. For me, walking is so many different things. I go on walks that consist of tears and pain and sadness. I go on walks that consist of joy and laughter and thirst. 

There are all different types of walks one can go on. There are all different types of walkers. Everyday, we change the type of walker we are. Sometimes more than once in a day. 

Walking is something we all do. It can help us learn and it can help us grow. It can just be a pleasurable activity. It can be a necessity. 

I'd hate to give it one definition or one type of person who meets the criteria. Who walks correctly.

A walk is a walk is a walk is a walk is a walk....