In 1988 I spent the summer in Perpignan, France. My good friend, Olivier Brial, arranged my stay with his cousin, Jacques Vial. The family house on the Quai Nicolas Sidi Carnot was in the center of the old Catalan city. The River Basse coursed past the fourth-story mansion east to the sea in Olivier's parents were out on Carnet-Plage, a middle-class beach resort. Nothing special and certainly not the Riviera. Still it was free accommodations and the house was the office for the Vial law firm and every day we gathered a hearty lunch and then sprawled throughout the first floor on the sofas and chairs. Everyone had their favorites.
It was a quiet city that summer.
Everyone was at the beach or on holiday. I was writing a short story collection set in the East Village 1978-1980. I took the train the Colliure on the border of Spain. The Mediterranean waters were warmer than the Rockaways and the rocky beach more pleasant than the wide commercial strand of Carnet Plage. I still went there by bus. It was close and Madam Brial always was happy to see me.
At night I wandered through Perpignan. I never found any place to drink. Not in the Gitane quartier of St. Jacques or next to the Caserne Joffre, the Foreign Legion barracks. I was 36. The age limit was 40. I was never tempted to join, even though the Legion offers a place to sleep, a uniform, and food without any questions. I was no longer in hiding.
Thankfully Jacques invited me on two day trips to Barcelona. Lunch with Catalan business associates and stopping in Cadaques to play blackjack at Le Perlata. I never really won or lost. The Vial family owned casinos on the Core de Rousillion, but his one-armed uncle banned all family members from visiting them.
"No one wins at gambling," he told us at a family dinner outside town. Oliver and his redheaded Californian girlfriend Cindy came down from Paris with another friend. It was a good weekend. After they left, I felt stranded. At least it wasn't Lille.
One Friday after lunch Jacques led me outside and said he had to ask me a favor.
"Anything."
At least until I heard the request.
"Tonight my wife wants me to attend a chamber music concert up in the Pyrenees at an ancient monastery. Le Abbee of Saint Michel de Cuxa. Part of he Pablo Casals Festival. After the Civil War in Spain the cellist found refuge in Prades. He hadn't play again in public until 1950."
"Fourteen years."
I had heard his LPs in high school." Franco had seized control in 1936.
"They'll be playing Bach Bourrée tonight."
As a revolutionary these quartet concerts sounded like a musical reprise accompanying the ablutions of ancien regime.
"Normally not, but anything attached to him is a go." Pablo Casals was a genius and a revolutionary.
"Please, just come. They'll be playing Bach concertos tonight I'll being a great bottle of wine. plus you'll get into the mountains. I'll drive and you can sit in the front. The women will behind us and we'll roll with the windows open
"Who's the woman?"
A friend of my wife."
"This better not be a blind date."
He didn't understand that expression and I explained its meaning.
"Une rendez-vous à l'aveugle. Would I do that to you?"
I wasn't sure, but he had been a good friend this summer and agree to accompany them.
How bad could it be?"
We met at the cafe in the center of town. Olivier's sister ran the bar. I fortified myself for the ordeal with two Calvas.
"So you are going with Jacques?" Marion's voice confessed that she had refused his offer.
"Yes, he's picking me up shortly."
"Bonne chance."
Jacques arrived on time. I downed by third Calva and ran out to the Peugot 505. His wife and the other woman sat in back. She was my age. Attractive and I politely introduced myself. I was new blood in an old town. Her name was Sylvie. She was blonde and wore a wedding ring. She told me that she didn't speak any English." "D'accord. On parle en Francais." I had taken two years of the language in grammar school. It was my second second language after Latin.
Jacques drove west into the mountains. D615 to D66 folliwing Tet river. Numerous dry riverbeds scored the valleys into the Lac de Vinca, a large reservoir. The women spoke in the back. Jacques and I smoked cigarettes with the windows open. It was a beautiful evening and even more sout turning off onto the D27 leading to Le Abbee of Saint Michel de Cuxa. The peak of Canigo rose to over 9000 feet. Higher than any mountain in New England. The smell of pine forests.
"C'est tres belle ici." I was content to have come.
Sylvie smiled back. Conversation was unnecessary with the windows open. It was turning into a pleasant evening, until the monastery hoved into view and I gasped.
Sylvie asked what was wrong and I explained in bad French that I had been here before and that I have seen this place before."
"Vous etes de New York?"
I explained I lived there and she laughed saying in good English, "You have not been here before, but one of your millionaires, John D. Rockefeller bought and transported half of the monastery and a good deal of its art to the tip of Manhattan."
"The Cloisters."
Sylvie explained my mistaken deja vu to the Vials. We had a good laugh. The evening was better than expected. A young woman performed Bach Suite #1. We later drank a good bottle of Cote de Rousillon at the Les Halles du Conflent. Sylvie was fun. A good time for all.
Yesterday I traveled on the A train from Clinton Hill in the freezing cold to visit Professor Bertell Ollman in the far north of Manhattan. West 190th Street. Only 55 minutes. The elevator ascended to street level. I strolled across the Bernard Baruch park. Below the Hudson filled the fiord. No snow in sight, but the temperature was 21 and windy. I walked into Fort Tyron Park. Alone, except for a dog walker. The Cloister tower was far away. I had only been here twice. Once in 1980 a friend and I had walked from the East village to here. The hike took a little over two hours. Today I was satisfied to view the medieval monastery from the Linden Terrace. I tried to recall the taste of wine and the music. I heard Miles Davis' KIND OF BLUE instead. I shivered for a few minutes and walked back to see the Professor. He was in good shape and happy to see me. I told him of seeing the Cloisters twin a long time ago back when wew not so much young, but not as old as now. I showed him a photo of both places."
"They do look alike."
They still do and I only say that shit about chamber music to bug pseudo-intellectual. I never play it in the bathroom, then again I'm not royalty. SA for Perpignan and my family there. One day I will go. And this dream is always deja vu.
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