My flatmate is building himself a crown. What does this signify?
My relationship with Arnaud has been a rocky one. Each night or meeting brings fresh complications. There was, for instance, a time last week when he invited me to meet him after work for a drink in the Vlasjmarkt. Normally, an invitation for a drink would be perceived as a friendly gesture, but Arnaud was in a terrible, bloody-minded mood. This was not helped by the manner of the night’s beginning. Before we left for the bar, Arnaud suggested that I take my bicycle there, as he wanted to walk to the bar with Orphée (his dog). I was slightly affronted that he suggest that I arrive at the bar on my own and that we both travel there separately, as these seemed like a discordant start to the evening. But, since he suggested it, I of course consented, and the imagined consequences took place: I could not find the bar and so took a drink somewhere else, Café Afnis, I believe. When he arrived and saw me sitting serenely at an al fresco table, in a place he did not normally patronise, his face became a knot of savage anger, and his arms immediately flicked up to perform the ‘what on earth are you doing?!’ gesture. Shocked by this radical display of impatience and anger, and my friend’s stormy expression, I simply said, we can go to the other place afterwards! I just couldn’t find it – I looked. I could not help, at that particular moment, with a slight grin on my face, conclude that I had found myself the most archetypal Frenchman imaginable: so unpredictable and emotionally volatile; so inflexible.
But sometimes I think that these very tiny conflicts arise and exist between us out of a difference in language. Though Arnaud actually speaks academic-level English (as he is a PhD lecturer), in some ways this is more of a hindrance than a help. Actually, as we discussed last night, there are many ‘false friends’ between French and English, i.e. similar or even the same word, can have radically or subtly different connotations in both languages, linked etymologies but different emphasise due to slightly deviant usages. Between Arnaud’s almost-very-good English and my convoluted, rapid speech, full of hesitation, parataxis, sub-clauses and self-qualification, I believe sometimes we find ourselves in a right muddle: I believing myself to be understood, while he puts the wrong kind of emphasis on the right words.
For example, this, is what I am beginning to see is the true story of that night. Arnaud, adopting the excessively polite style of good, spoken English, suggested out of politeness that I cycle to save myself time. I understood this not as a polite overture but as an imperative, and out of politeness rather than will, agreed accordingly. It was then Arnaud, and not myself, that was annoyed at this seemingly antisocial gesture, believing that I had thrown his hospitality in his face but not agreeing to accompany him on his walk. And the rest is history.
English and French, what a deceptive relationship they share! Such a similar grain, but what a different bark!
Yet, I feel, distancing myself from some of the more turbulent early encounters that ranged from pure ecstatic cameraderie to almost total incommunicado and teasing derision, we have at last found a true way to speak to each other which is not insincere, flirtatious or combative. The break-through happened two nights ago, when for two evenings in a row Arnaud witnessed and then became actively involved in two skype conversations I had with very close friends. It was as if his vicarious participation in these conversations and the understanding of myself that he gained from them, but had been up to that point unable to elicit himself, enabled us to set up a new model of friendship on which to relate to each other. It also provided a little window into my true soul, which I think shone onto him, finally, with a comforting light. He at last recognised that I was no demiurge, or virago or threat, but a heart-broken dancer in the dark, a little like himself. So our new model of friendship, bolstered by the discursive beacons of the previous night’s conversations, is evolving to become like all real friendships: based on love, support, honesty and engaged intellectual exchange. So last night, there was no cycling back. Arnaud and myself went to a jazz bar, drank red wine in moderation, met his colleagues from the university in a charming beer house and walked home arm in arm – talking the entire way.
833 words a day 