Mais ou sont les neiges d'antan!
(But where are the snows of yesteryear?)
—from "Ballade" by François Villon (1431-1465)
We're tennis fans, so last month, when we had a chance to see the Rogers Cup (Women's Quarterfinals), we jumped at it. An irresistible bonus was that the Cup was played in Montreal, where, once upon a time — in the summer of 1977, to be exact — we had spent a memorable holiday.
I turned 45 that year and so, without giving away Jeanne's exact age, we were clearly at the top of our lives' mountain, the long view in front of us downhill. Our two youngest children, Gretchen and Tim, were teenagers; and during that trip we became aware of their rising energy crossing the graph of our dwindling stamina. Our choices were turning negative, like throwing bags off a sinking ship: soon I'd stop smoking and Jeanne would become a vegetarian. That summer, we — going to bed early — watched with complicated thoughts from our window in the Hotel Nelson, as the kids went out and frolicked with the young Canadian crowd surging through the square below.
So we looked forward to returning as certified geezers to Montreal, where we had first felt the twinges of mortality. We got off to a good start, our friend having chosen the Hotel Nelligan, near where we had stayed 33 years ago. In its baronial main hall, the Nelligan has a portrait of a handsome young man, accompanied by a beautifully printed poem, Le Vaisseau d'Or (The Golden Ship), signed "Émile Nelligan." At first I thought we might have a rare example of a poet/hotelier, but he was no relation — the original founders just admired his poetry; his Selected Poems were for sale in the hotel's gift store. The fact that Nelligan was a doomed romantic poet who spent the last 40 years of his life in an asylum only made me more appreciative of Canadians, Montreal and the Nelligan: they're crazy, and like their poets!
The tennis matches were in the evening, so the rest of the time we walked around Vieux-Montréal, down the Rue St. Paul to Place Jacques-Cartier, where the 62-foot column with Admiral Horatio Nelson towers over the square. Again, I had fond thoughts about Canadians: here's a huge monument in a French-speaking city of an English admiral famous for his victory over France (Trafalgar, 1805). Mosque-like thoughts flitted through my mind.
While the crowds were prosperous, the food delicious and the artists hawking their wares on the Rue des Artistes cheerful, all's not entirely well in the old town. Like us, it has lost some energy. Touched by America's recession, there were many "à louer" (to rent) signs sprouting like warts on the picturesque buildings, including the Hotel Nelson. Jeanne had brought along her drawing of a restaurant we loved, Le Nautique, so we could recognize it. The charming ancient windows and façade were still there, but obscured by an awning with garish signs shouting out BEANIE BABIES/POKEMON/SOUVENIRS! The restaurant had folded.
There were other signs of a certain coarsening: fewer artists, and more stores selling T-shirts with images of dildos and general obscenities (BITCH!) prominently displayed. But we're probably too touchy. The ancient brick buildings, the courtyard restaurants, the musical language still hold their magic — though less comprehensible, bien sûr.
The tennis was exciting — we watched Denmark's Caroline Wozniacki, seeded #1 in the U.S. Open, overpower last year's winner of the French Open, Italy's Francesca Schiavone. As we left the city our intrepid host and driver, in a suitably time-bending non-tennis finale, stopped in front of a small crowded shop, the famous Fairmont Bagels, from which she emerged with a bulging bag. Montreal bagels, sweet, chewy and délicieux, arrived with Jewish immigrants from a different section of Europe than the ones who went to New York. It brought back visions of myself as a boy in Brooklyn, in the 1930s, running to Katzinger's Bakery, corduroy knickers whistling, socks drooped down on my ankles and a quarter in my pocket. Those were the days.
On leaving, I bought Nelligan's book. Similar to Stieg Larssen and his Swedish trilogy, Nelligan's passionate poems were published after his breakdown, and became a hit in Montreal. He never saw it.
Clavier vibrant de remembrance,
L'évoque un peu des jours anciens,
Et l'Éden d'or de mon enfance
Se dresse avec les printemps siens…
(A sounding-board of memories,
I summon up the long-ago
And see my childhood's Eden rise
Golden with Springs it used to know…)
—from "Clavier d'antan" by Émile Nelligan (1879-1941)
—Pierre et Jeanne (Peter and Jeanne) Meinke will be reading and talking from and about their books at the Times Literary Festival at USF/St. Petersburg, on Oct. 23rd.
This article appears in Sep 16-22, 2010.