Behind the eyes we meet
Page 21
why music makes us want to dance
why we call a chair “chair,” a book “book,” and a glass “glass”
why dogs bark
why we have to go to bed even if we aren’t tired
why we have to eat our vegetables
why grown-ups are always right
why they blush when we ask where babies come from
why we shouldn’t speak to strangers
why it’s dangerous to play with scissors
why boys shouldn’t cry
why girls wear dresses
why it isn’t polite to put your elbows on the table
why we can’t jump on the bed
why the answer to most of our questions is “because”
but we forget to ask the essential
why does a man choose to devote a large part of his life to raising carrier pigeons?
We probably avoid such questions to protect ourselves. We’re afraid of being told life is meaningless and that pigeons are as good a way as any to try to give it meaning.
•
Pigeon racing is a funny thing. It’s neither a sport nor a cultural activity, just a passion. The people I knew who raced pigeons were in love with their birds, as devoted to them as they would be to the woman of their dreams. They gave them unflagging respect, talked to them, cared for them, did everything in their power to make them as happy as possible. They believed pigeons were capable of feelings, could tell good from bad. Creatures in search of happiness, just like any human. I don’t know if birds can feel as much as these men claimed, but they were clearly happy in their steadfast beliefs.
Only men belonged to the pigeon club, though the days when a woman’s place was in the kitchen had been over for years. Why, then? I suppose women prefer goldfish.
•
There was always electricity in the air on race days. The owners were nervous. They worried after their birds, hoping nothing would happen, that they would make it back safely, as always. Once all of Carpi’s pigeon fanciers had loaded their birds onto the truck that would take them to the starting line, the men returned home, full of adrenaline. All they had to do now was wait for the animals to return to the fold. The birds might be released anywhere from Bologna to Bari, more than 700 kilometres away, but they managed to cover the entire distance in just one day. The men used calculations that were far over my head to estimate the time it would take them to finish the race. They guessed that when the wind was favourable, the birds could travel at nearly 120 km/h. They never stopped to rest. They had one goal: to make it home. And they went about it without asking questions.
•
Celebrations began the moment the first bird appeared in the distance. I remember being there, excited and incredulous. I couldn’t get my child’s head around how a bird could find its way back so easily. I still don’t really understand, to be honest. Apparently they have a sort of internal GPS; they can sense the earth’s electromagnetic fields and are guided by the position of the sun and the stars. Returning to the dovecote is the only thing they know, and they perform this task unfailingly. That’s impressive enough. So many of us either make nothing of our lives or do a thousand things all half-assed. Especially me.
•
Sometimes, after travelling hundreds of kilometres home, a pigeon might circle the dovecote for some time before finally deciding to land. A bird can be marked down as “arrived” only once it has returned to its nesting box. A sort of clock would print out a list that included the pigeon’s registration number and time of arrival, which race administrators would pore over to determine the winner.
Sergio never got frustrated. Not even when one of the pigeons swaggered around boastfully, more concerned with trivialities than returning home. He waited until the bird was ready: he didn’t want to pressure his brood, convinced that they would feel his stress and perform poorly in future races.
•
Every once in a while, when my grandfather wanted to add a new racer to his team, I would go with him to visit the pigeon breeders. The choice was never easy; he had a long list of criteria. Whether they were grey with hints of blue, white, black, or red had little to do with their performance. But they had to be plump with soft, gleaming plumage, their pink skin without a hint of dandruff. Their nostril cere had to be white, their feet red and clean. These were all signs of a healthy bird. Those with a broader back wing had a greater capacity for lift, making them prime candidates for races over 600 kilometres. Some experts also believed that green-eyed pigeons made for better racers. My grandfather didn’t pay much heed to these sorts of details. He sought a certain light in their eyes, a glow that would reveal the animal’s energy. Sergio liked to say that the birds he chose were more intelligent than most men.
He had more confidence in nature itself than in human nature.
•
None of my friends could boast of having ever raced pigeons. I could. I felt privileged to have this contact with the birds, but also with my grandfather. We were so close. I’m not sure what happened between these years and the ones leading up to his death. How could I have grown so distant? How could I have forgotten how much he meant to me?
* * *
63.What a good kid, that Santini boy.
The Paradox of Exile
“why did you come to canada?”
It’s the first time Manue has asked. When other people ask I always tell them it was for the wide open space. But I know Manue won’t be satisfied with such a superficial answer. She’s looking for the real reasons. And for that, I’ll have to go back further.
Why does someone choose to leave the country of his birth, to uproot himself, his head and heart torn between his homeland and the promised land? Because he believes that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. Whenever we taste others’ happiness, we realize it isn’t any sweeter than our own. And yet we cannot help envying those around us, considering them luckier, prettier, taller, and so forth.
That’s why we immigrate.
Some people immigrate to survive, those whose existence is threatened by war, famine, homophobia. But more often we immigrate in search of a better life. Better than what is not always clear.
The problem with life is that it follows us everywhere. Wherever we go, the very same life will always be waiting for us.
Discontent isn’t confined to a continent. Hunger and thirst don’t disappear when we change our surroundings. The truly ambitious are never satisfied.
It’s never easy to immigrate. It’s even less so to try to explain what prompts such a decision.
•
“Do you have more wine? Because I think we’ll be here a while.”
“I’ve got a bottle of red that’s been in the cabinet for two years. It was from a client who didn’t know I only drink rosé.”
“Want me to teach you?”
“Teach me what?”
“To like red.”
“You can teach something like that?”
“Of course, just like everything else. You weren’t born with a taste for rosé. You developed it. Now we can try to develop your taste for red.”
•
I wasn’t born with a taste for Canada. I didn’t grow up dreaming about travelling around this vast country, and I certainly didn’t expect to move here one day. But that’s what happened. It was a combination of circumstances, lucky breaks, missed opportunities, and decisions. I found myself here with no friends or money and winter hot on my heels.
I arrived in Montreal in the middle of January. What was I thinking? It was so cold that I hardly ever left my apartment. I should have looked for work, but I couldn’t work up the courage. My toes were permanently frozen, along with my get-up-and-go. I regretted my decision from the start and spent my days talking with friends from Bologna and Milan on the computer,
writing to my parents to convince them I was doing fine, and reading the Italian newspaper headlines. Something I never did when I lived in Rome or Carpi. I didn’t watch the news, didn’t read magazines. I didn’t care about what was happening to my country. But when I got here, I began to take an interest. The paradox of exile.
Occhio non vede, cuore non duole.64 I can’t think of anything less true. The mind suffers even more when it is far, since it can only guess at what is happening on the other side of the world. It fabricates a probable, yet false, existence. And what it suspects is never the reality. Anxiety mounts and mounts and mounts and there is nothing to be done. It has lost all control over everything it thought it knew.
•
A friend of mine named Luna had been living in Montreal for a few years and seemed to like it. So I thought, “If she’s happy there, maybe I could be, too.” She put me in touch with a guy she knew who was looking for a roommate, and I sent in my application for a working holiday visa. A month and a half later, everything was set. I found myself sitting on a plane on January 9, 2009. Seat 7F, I can still remember. And for the first time since I’d gotten the crazy idea to move to Canada, I wondered if I was making a mistake.
Luna met me at the airport, along with my new roommate, Marc-André. They brought me back to the apartment so that I could drop off my things, and then we went barhopping downtown until three in the morning. They bought me my first poutine to help absorb the alcohol. I vomited up the whole thing when I got home. It took me three days to recover. I felt so stupid; I’d just arrived in my adoptive country and I was already falling back into old unhealthy habits.
I hoped Montreal would make me a better man. It was a lot to ask of a city that had its own share of problems. To become a better person, I’d have to manage on my own.
•
In Italy, I was a grip. Ads, music videos, amateur shorts, B movies—I didn’t turn down a single project. I needed the money to fund my work hard/play hard lifestyle.
We’d work twelve, fourteen, sixteen hours at a time, taking shots of espresso to stay awake. And when that stopped working, we snorted lines of coke off set. At some point the endless days of work were just to support our coke habit. We worked to destroy ourselves, and we loved it. We thought we were living it up while we were still young. I’d come home with a six-pack under my arm, a bag of popcorn in one hand and candy and liquorice in the other. I survived on precious little other than hops and packaged snacks. I didn’t see the point of cooking for one, of taking care of that one person—me.
I was always an easygoing sort of boy. Polite, well behaved, soft-spoken but friendly. I never had problems with anyone; I was always well liked wherever I went. I didn’t make waves. And since I never wanted to bother or disappoint, I went along with everyone else’s antics. When drugs are passed around, it’s easier to become a junkie than say no. I was never really addicted to coke or anything else. I was more hooked on how everyone looked at me when I took a bump. Feeling accepted by those around me, part of a group. The illusion of belonging because you’re just as high as the next guy.
I stopped using when I got to Canada. I didn’t even miss it once. A few months later I gave up smoking, even though I’d just bought a new pack of cigarettes. I took one, found it disgusting, and decided enough was enough. The rest of the pack is still in my dresser drawer, proof that I’m capable of making good decisions when I want to. Maybe not capable of great things, but things that do more good than harm, at least.
•
I’d wanted to work in the film industry ever since I was a kid. Of course, like everyone who dreams of making movies, I had my sights on being a director or cinematographer. I wound up a grip, paid to hook up huge lengths of wires and make sure there’s electricity on set. Though I’d never be the next Fellini, I took consolation in the fact that there wouldn’t be movies without people like me, since filming is all about light. Over the years, I ended up convincing myself that training spotlights onto the foundation-caked faces of pseudo-stars with Botox-frozen smiles was vital to the survival of mankind.
And then I eventually stopped believing my own lies.
* * *
64.Out of sight, out of mind.
Kamikaze Bees
like lots of others in the industry, I dreamed of working on the set of an American blockbuster one day. Movie stars, big budgets, mind-blowing special effects, mouth-watering buffets set up all day long. I’d heard that a number of Hollywood productions were based out of Montreal: this was my chance. What I didn’t realize was that in recent years the city had been finding it difficult to land these projects, which were turning to Vancouver or staying in the United States.
So I had to piece together odd jobs to survive. I washed dishes, shovelled snow, peeled potatoes, weeded gardens, tested video games, walked dogs, and pumped gas. Legally at first, and then under the table. My work permit had expired and no one wanted to hire me since it meant filling out the paperwork to sponsor me for a new one. Too long, too expensive, too complicated. And anyway, I wouldn’t have gotten the permit if a native-born Quebecer could have done the same job. I could work anywhere I wanted with my working holiday visa but once the six months were up, game over. I had to do the jobs nobody else wanted.
Just before losing my privileges, I managed to land a contract for a Hollywood film. Joy! I was thrilled at the prospect of meeting Steven Spielberg or Julia Roberts. What an idiot. I never caught even the tiniest glimpse of either. First, because Spielberg wasn’t directing the movie and Roberts wasn’t among the cast; second, because lowly employees like myself were exploited far from the spotlights. We were kept away from where the scenes were shot and given little jobs to do quietly, off to the side, without anyone telling us why. It was like working in an open-air factory. With only sandwiches or pizza for lunch.
On the bright side, the experience curbed my Hollywood dream, destroying it one myth at a time. I stopped kidding myself and realized that I’d never accomplish what I came to Canada to do. The life I’d envisioned simply didn’t exist.
•
“Like the bee that stung me.”
“I don’t understand. What do you mean?”
“Bees sting to protect themselves, to safeguard the survival of the hive. What’s stupid is that most of the time it kills them. They sting the enemy and when they go to fly away the stinger stays there and rips out all their organs. A lot of the time their sacrifice is pointless. If they’re lucky they might injure the perceived threat. If not, the attack won’t do a thing.”
“I’m not sure what that has to do with my story…”
“It’s a suicide mission. They’re kamikazes. You know, men and women who blow themselves up to defend their ideas and try to improve their family’s or country’s lot? You and the bees, that’s what you are: kamikazes. You came here in search of a better life, but you screwed up. You only found more disappointment. You didn’t die, but your dreams sure did.”
“Like the bees…”
“Exactly.”
“But at least bees make honey. Honey is good, it makes things better. What do I make better?”
“Me.”
•
I complain then feel ungrateful. I’m lucky I was able to pay my way across the Atlantic to get here. Some people will never make enough in their lifetime for a one-way ticket. And others have lost all hope of seeing their families again.
I wonder what my grandfather dreamed about while he was held captive in Russia. It certainly wasn’t making movies in Hollywood.
•
“But you ended up getting hired at Beaubien Cinema. That isn’t so bad.”
“It’s the closest thing I could find to my Tinseltown dream: selling popcorn and cleaning the bathrooms of the neighbourhood theatre.”
“I don’t get why they hired you though. Any native-born Quebecer could do that!”
“Well even people who can legally vote here don’t always do it…”
•
The Statue of Liberty: the ultimate symbol of the American dream. It’s a bunch of crap when you think about it. A statue that doesn’t move. Who dreams of a freedom that’s stationary, set in stone? With her arm raised high she stands there holding an extinguished flame, pointing to a horizon she will never reach. When I feel lost, like I’ve messed everything up, I remind myself that at least I can get up and leave. I can always start over again, if that’s what it takes.
Collapse Disorder
i’m sleepy, but Emmanuelle wants me to keep reading my grandparents’ letters to her. I pull one out at random.
Among all these love letters, here is one for me. Filled with love, but of a different kind. A grandpa’s love. It’s 1992: I’m twelve. It was back when I went pigeoning with Sergio every weekend. He writes that he hopes to give me the letter, along with his memoirs, when I turn twenty-five. But he didn’t. Why not? Where was I then?
That’s right—I was in Milan. I’d moved to the big city to work on a TV series. I was just starting out in the film industry and was so caught up in it that I would forget to visit my family every once in a while. Sergio had been hospitalized for pneumonia sometime around my birthday. I remember now. I didn’t go see him. I was too busy. Too self-involved.
“But you couldn’t have known.”
“What couldn’t I have known?”
“That that’s when your grandfather wanted to give you this letter, along with his memoirs.”
“No, but I should have realized that’s not how you treat people you love. I should have been there for him.”
“But he didn’t die until later. Why didn’t he just give it to you afterwards, instead of on your twenty-fifth birthday?”