Leaving Biarritz: "Midnight in Harlem," Tedeschi Trucks Band
On the cusp of her Irish adventure, Marguerite makes one last stop in Paris and hears from Adam.
Hello! If you are new here, I suggest you go back to the start and read the whole story sequentially. The full list of scenes is here if you’ve missed an instalment, and read this if you’d like to know where the memoir is going.
December 2020
Walk that line
(Torn apart) Torn apart
Gotta spend your whole life trying
(Ride that train) Ride that train
(Free your heart) And free your heart1
In the end, we decide that Sacha will come to Ireland and continue his online schooling until the New Year. Ben will meet us in Dublin airport, and the three of us will discover the new place together. Depending on how the pandemic plays out, life will either resume, or they will fly to Virginia to ride things out with Luke and their dad.
I can’t bear to think of all three of my boys on the other side of the Atlantic when everything is so uncertain. The first jabs are being administered—what if our vaccination status forbids us from being reunited? Or if they get very sick and I can’t be there for them? I have looked after them mostly by myself for most of their life, and this isn’t how I foresaw them leaving home. Whatever geographical stability I failed to provide throughout our moves was compensated by their closeness as brothers. Against such a hazy horizon, it feels important for them to re-establish a solid trio in the familiar place and rhythms of their grandmother’s farm.
In the pre-departure flurry comes a pleasant surprise from Sebastian:
i attach photographs taken by a friendly neighbour, which owe more to his skill and patience than Photoshop. they are unreasonably beautiful, so i did not want to distract you with them earlier.
I can’t believe the beauty of the landscape, the elegance of the house. Nothing like the dingy digs I’ve been mentally patching together from his other pictures. There are intricate mouldings, floor-to-ceiling windows, elegantly curved banisters. Outside, sunlight ripples through majestic trees alongside a boathouse, and there is a tiny chapel with stained-glass windows. Things may be okay after all. He continues:
ireland is a small place (but big distances). all things are uncertain at present, and making friends takes time, but some engagement with the neighbours is important. they do not have to be your friends, but you may need their help some time: so a thank you and a pot of jam (or whatever) seems common sense, at least to me.
Jam is not one of my life skills, but it summons a homey, tranquil existence, and reminds me of when the boys were little and life felt simple and safe, baking bread, knitting under trees as cicadas echoed across the valley. That night, I dream of glimmering copper pans and ovens filled with pies.
Sebastian also attaches two letters for the border authorities, one in English, and a duplicate, remarkably, in the most impeccable French:
Mrs Rosenfern is kindly taking up the post of caretaker for this property with effect from December 9, 2020. The role is essential, in that she has sole responsibility for a heritage demesne in my frequent absence on business, and no such property may be left empty. I would be grateful if you would take this letter as authorisation to facilitate her passage.
Having spent the last fifteen years ticking administrative boxes in multiple countries, never fully letting my guard down, there is huge relief in the fact that he has gone to the trouble of researching the latest travel rules and that he seems fluent in my mother tongue. I will be in good hands.
Though there is less to pack up than last time, nine months of laying down roots nonetheless piles up to quite a bundle. Jars of flour, rice, sugar, an Art Deco folding screen, unfit for hand luggage, heavy paperwork, beach chairs, cat paraphernalia… All to be sorted, dispatched, or given away in record time.
The night before our departure, mid mop-up, I am hit by a wave of nausea and exhaustion, and crumple to the floor. I surrender to the anxiety, hoping panic attacks are not my new normal. Time passes. Sacha finds me curled up on the tiles, shaking uncontrollably. He covers and comforts me, then finishes tidying up. I overhear him discussing my state and logistics with my sister. Tears kick in, and then, just like that, it is over.
The next day, our direct flight to Dublin is cancelled. We must now drag everything up to Paris by train to catch another plane. To avoid crowding Sophie as Covid numbers rise, we stay in a friend’s empty flat in my childhood neighbourhood. Our few days there are an eerie goodbye to France. I walk everywhere, not just to avoid busy metros and buses, but to soak up the timeless beauty of my city.
Who knows when I will see it again, if ever? Everything feels loaded with meaning and fatalistic absolutes, as if the pandemic has thrown us into a merciless time of right and wrong turns. Anonymous passers-by change pavements or nod sombrely beneath their masks, the click of their heels and revving of scooters echoing louder in nearly vacant streets, and I am drenched in poignancy.
The last thing I must do is source appropriate instruments for the new practices I will receive in Ireland. I find my damaru, bell, and dorje trawling the bleak December streets, in one of the capital’s many Tibetan shops on the Left Bank. The vendor hasn’t seen anyone in weeks and is full of stories. He presses me for what I’m after, but I’m reluctant to tell him. I’m about to leave empty-handed when I spot it. Tucked high on a shelf, behind gleaming butter lamps and heavily brocaded thangkas, is my drum. The shopkeeper turns to the weathered picture of the Dalai Lama on the wall behind his till, and nods. He smiles knowingly at me, and blowing lightly on the damaru, places it on the glass case.
‘It’s been sitting there for years. First time someone asks about it—it was waiting for you. Very old drum. Special wood with mantras, and rare markings on the skin.’
My heart lifts, as if reuniting with an old friend, as if a seed has been watered in my heart, and my eyes tear up. My steps back to the flat are buoyant as I hold my carefully wrapped new friends close against me.
Before setting off, the Teacher asked me whether I would connect with Adam in Paris. Taking her words as an instruction, I text him, but the truth is that I’ve moved on. It’s perhaps the first time ever that he’s not on my mind here, that I walk the city without a love interest occupying my heart. When he doesn’t reply, I am neither disappointed, nor sad—a revolution in itself. When the Teacher checks in, I reply:
Me: I don’t think he’s the One—I clearly haven’t met the One. And perhaps I never will... It’s okay. I’ve got the Goddess, my Teacher, my Kula and the practices.
Teacher: The One is a huge myth that hobbles us and keeps us fettered... The world of romance is a farce. Not that love doesn't exist; it does. Deeply and truly so. But notions of “happily ever after” or “soul mates” don't serve us. Yet these are deeply ingrained in all of us.
Your connection with Adam was real. It’s sad that he is choosing something else. Yet our karmas are what they are.
Me: I was actually referring to the One as a consort.
Teacher: Aha! He might still be your consort, but the karmas have not yet ripened.
Me: But I can’t imagine him engaging in our Goddess practices. I don’t know what’s involved in consorting, but if a relationship is in the cards for me, it would be lovely to share that devotion.
Teacher: It is lovely to consider walking the path with a partner. Some consorts are on different paths than us, and that is okay too.
Me: I didn’t know that was possible.
Teacher: Not a first choice when we are new on the path. Later, though, many things can be possible.
It’s all too esoteric for now, and feels irrelevant anyway, given that I’m moving to the end of the world by myself. The time has come to leave France again.
No more mysteries, baby
No more secrets, no more clues
The stars are out there
You can almost see the moon
As our flight is announced, my phone pings. It’s a message from Adam, a smiley-faced caption beneath a picture of a newborn:
Désolé pour le silence radio. We’ve skipped a few chapters, haha. Meet my daughter, Alice. She had a bit of a rough landing, but has filled our life with sunshine.
I burst out laughing, which snaps Sacha out of his phone-thumbing stare. The last dangling thread that was tethering me to a fantasy life in France has been snipped. I’m genuinely happy that Adam has worked things out with his girlfriend and that he’s embarked on new beginnings.
And I’m as ready as ever to be that fierce yogini hermit in the Irish wilderness.
The streets are windy
And the subway's closing down
Gonna carry this dream
To the other side of town
This is Faye’s Wing, a series of multimedia scenes about the creative quest for fulfilment beyond a fixed spiritual identity. It features music and visuals and comes out every Wednesday.
© Tedeschi Trucks Band, Revelator, 2011.