A Sketch of Week #1889

Monday, March 2



9:20 a.m. and I’m leaving for the 10 o’clock class. It’s cold and slippery, I negotiate carefully with the icy patches in the yard, open the gate, and gingerly step onto the even icier back alley. I turn around to wave at Kitty, who has acquired the habit of seeing me off at the back-yard window in the morning. But his back is turned to me – he’s looking at something inside the house. I stand there for a few seconds, reluctant to go without this wave, but on the edge of being late. He is still turned away from the window. “Kitty!” I whisper, inaudibly. He turns and looks at me right away, and I wave, and the week can begin.


Kitty at a (different) window


4:00 p.m. I am waiting at the Peel metro station, after a swim at the YMCA. I know exactly where to stand so I would get into the car which will unload me in front of the proper exit at Berri-Uqam where I change lines. Vaguely happy about my well-chosen spot, I turn around to cast a look at the few people sitting on the stone benches behind me. My eye is instantly drawn to a yellow-haired man in his 50s, dressed in a black suit, absent-mindedly picking his nose. Then, as if it were one continuous, seamless movement, his hand goes straight to his mouth, where his fingers stuff the catch through the barely open lips. The train roars in, and we all get on it, the man making miniscule chewing motions.



Tuesday, March 3



9:25 p.m. God bless small pleasures, like the anticipation of watching again a movie you love. I’m about to see Revolutionary Road for the second time, and I know I will sink and drown, and I like it, and I let myself go, and I am not here any more.

Wednesday, March 4

1:58 p.m. I am walking down 3G wing, on my way to my BXE class starting at 2:00. A girl, in between classes, stands leaning against the wall in the corridor. Her left arm is thrown up and around the back of her head, her left hand holding the cell phone pressed to her right ear. Instant yoga? Stretching exercise? A ploy to attract looks? She returns the glances of passers-by with a hint of a dare. She’s 18, after all.

Thursday, March 5

2:15 p.m. It’s about 20 minutes after the usual time I leave to make it to the pool, so I’m in a hurry. Just outside the back gate, I become aware of a strange, methodical noise coming from somewhere in the yard. My first instinct is to let it be, and simply go on with my projected day (now somewhat late). The noise, however, is insistent, and I locate its source underneath the plastic cover protecting the hibernating barbecue from the winter elements. The plastic is visibly shaking, announcing the presence of a living thing in its bosom. At first I think it’s a raccoon – a rare visitor in our neighbourhood (but which did appear one evening a couple of years ago, swaying it’s big rear end lazily across the yard and slowly climbing the tree outside on the pavement, from where he looked at me calmly). I am a little nervous but mostly curious, and try to sneak up to the barbecue as quietly as possible. But the snow crusted with icy layer on top gives me away, there is a sudden silence inside the barbecue, and from underneath, a squirrel darts out, and hops onto the trellis above. She stays there for a few seconds looking at me, upset at being disturbed; in her mouth she holds a sizeable wad of cotton-wool, undoubtedly looted in order to build a nest. That’s right, the nest. It’s March 5, and the squirrel knows without knowing that spring is coming.

11:15 p.m. Everything is ready: the vast green towel (inherited from Sophie, after she went back to France in 1999) laid out and straightened across the cleared table, the iron into which I’ve poured some water for steaming, the concentration-inducing music on the radio. They say it will be +9 degrees tomorrow, and I want to wear my new, pleated skirt. The problem: the damn thing is made of some hyper-creaseable fabric, and even the pleats themselves are half-lost in the crisscrossing crease-lines. And I’ve never been good at ironing. (I’m so not good at it that, the evening before my Ph.D. defense, it was my boyfriend at the time – a chemistry student with gentle fingers and the necessary patience – who in the end ironed my pants for the big occasion the following day). I apply myself fully to the task at hand, the iron hissing and spitting as I manipulate it here or there, tracing the pleats. Twenty minutes later I look at what I’ve done, and it’s not so bad. In fact, it seems pretty decent, and I spend the next half-hour in front of the bedroom mirror trying on various vestiary combinations with the tamed skirt… only to find out that I can’t really wear it before the summer since it doesn’t have the lining and keeps ballooning around the height of my crotch as it comes into contact with my nylon tights (definitely indispensable in March). I can only laugh at the whole thing; and put the skirt away.

The pants, which were perfectly ironed the night before (did I ever say thank you?), looked like this after my 3-hour long Ph.D. defense

Friday, March 6

12:20 p.m. Walking through the underground corridor connecting the college with the mall where I get my lunch, I spot a dimly familiar woman (a colleague from around the D wing?) going in the opposite direction. She’s wearing a black skirt made of a felt-like fabric, severely crumpled and thronged above her knees, from the friction with the tights. And she doesn’t seem in the least bothered by it.

Saturday, March 7

10:30 a.m. Still in my PJs, I slip my feet into Martin’s humongous yard shoes, throw my winter jacket loosely over my back, and run out to investigate the barbecue situation. The plastic cover is too stiff to remove completely, but I manage to lift it enough to see what the squirrel was doing the other day. The inside of the cover is lined with a thin layer of cotton-wool, which now shows gaps and empty patches, where the squirrel tore it off in her nest-building zeal. Good luck, in any case!

This is what the squirrel wants: cotton-wool

Sunday, March 8

Early morning. I am in Belgrade, and I can see that I will be late. I need to take streetcar number 3 but since I haven’t been here in a while, I can’t find the terminal right away. I seem to remember parts of some streets leading there, but many things have changed, and in the end I have to ask a passer-by for directions. Finally, I get to the right place, and notice all the novelties, such as the electronic board displaying in red the order in which streetcars covering various lines are coming in. There was nothing like it when I lived in Belgrade, and I’m impressed. I see that the next one up is number 3, and I approach the stop but there must have been some mistake as, instead of my streetcar, a red bus zooms by without stopping. I have only 25 minutes left, and I’m now quite worried about the time, and upset with myself for not having checked out the route the day before. I am on my way to register for something called “the civilian army” and it is becoming quite clear that I won’t make it to the registration place even if the streetcar were to arrive this very minute. Suddenly I realize that cika Stanko is here, with his composed posture and reliable moustache, ready to help out just as he helps the kids from the apartment building when they get in trouble. “Cika Stanko,” I whine, “what am I to do?!” He seems to be fully convinced that I will make it on time – perhaps he means that I should take a cab? And this is when Martin brings purring Cica to bed, by way of saying bye before he goes to work. I stretch under the covers, quite pleased at my narrow escape from a possible boot camp.

Monday, March 9

12:30 p.m. I sit in my office and calculate that this was (roughly) the 1889th week in my life.