A Chocolate Nothing
Excerpt from current novel in progress
by Justine Létourneau
Usually people don’t know that I’m drawing them. I work the whole page at one time, so my eyes are probably somewhere else when they look up at me again. I also only look at the person for a flash, like I’m taking a photograph in my mind. I only need the energy of their pose for my work.
It’s not that I don’t want them to see me drawing them, or that I don’t want them to know that I’m drawing them — it’s simply that I don’t want them to change.
If I ask them, they’ll become self-aware. And self-aware people are not good models. They’re perfect models. Perfectly aware of every part of the body. What I need is an imperfect model… A person. I don’t want models, I want people. I want the way they slouch, the way they scratch their head or scramble up their hair when they’re trying to think. I want tired eyes and disheveled jackets. I want lopsided posture, contrapposto. I want real people. I want the realness of them, and I want it to translate seamlessly from my eye to my hand to the parchment on the table. Flaws and all. With coffee stains and ink smudges. I want… I want the moment. That is all.
I want the moment.
And I want it to last forever. That’s what art is, isn’t it? Preservation. Preservation of the details of a moment, if you’re a realist. Of the impression of natural light of the moment, if you’re an impressionist. Of the tangled emotions you feel inside at that moment, if you’re an abstract expressionist. Of the intellectual “aha!” moment of revelation, if you’re a symbolist. Or of the fantastical scenes that play out within your own imagination, at any given moment, like dreams that come and go, if you’re a surrealist. Whatever your moment is, it is yours to capture.
My ice cream began to melt. I dipped my pinky in the gelato cup and made a chocolate swirl on the page, in the sky above the disgruntled man figure drawn in black ink, drinking his coffee and reading the morning’s paper, lopsided leaning on his right hip, left leg crossed over, right elbow on the table, hand in his scrambly dark blond hair, eyeglasses slightly crooked on his face. This is my moment, and his. And the gelato’s. Which will be short-lived, I’m sad to say, as this is my last bite. I dipped my spoon into the rich and creamy chocolate ganache thick and cold gelato and slipped it onto my tongue where it melted into a foam and fizzled out, like ocean waves coming and going and leaving foam on the sand that soaks into nothing. A nothing that tastes like sea salt. Or in my case, chocolate.
A Chocolate Nothing
I titled the illustration in my sketchbook and scraped the bottom of the gelato glass with a small metal spoon.
Holding on to a moment that is already gone. This is what we call: a memory.
Amalfi Candy
Excerpt from current novel in progress
by Justine Létourneau
Raspberry, Strawberry, Watermelon, Cantaloupe, Vanilla, and Tangerine. These are the flavors of the buildings on the Amalfi Coast. All with lime peel green shutters, made of slatted wood.
It's like walking in an ice cream kingdom dream. Colors so delicious, you don't ever want to wake up.
Where are the cookies for these visions?
Where are my sugar biscuits on top?
(And) There they are... The bell towers.
And candy?
Stripes of green and white and red and blue... The boats.
When you were a child, you dreamed of a land made entirely of pastel deserts. And when you grew up, you found Italy.
(The Nutcracker Ballet may have taken place in Germany, but the Sugarplum fairy was definitely from Cinque Terre, Italy.)
And then... there are the mountains.
And then... there is the sea!
The crisp blue refreshing sea, painting the edges of each candy town with froth and cream. The sea, a dream unto itself, a dream in blue -- phthalo blue, tropical phthalo blue -- in thin layers over sand -- Naples yellow sand, of course -- and soft small rocks in raw umber and titanium white.
Under raw umber rocks,
Rocks raw under umber,
Umber water, rocks raw under water.
Dreams come in waves,
Waves of phthalo blue,
And candy boats carry the dreamers through.
"Melone o Fragola?"
"Che cosa?"
"Melone o Fragola!?"
"Melone! No, Fragola! No, aspettare, entrambi?" Melon! No, Strawberry! No, wait, both?
Chiara speaks to the gelato man. Then he says something I can't here from over here, and Margaritte chuckles. They walk towards me, carrying three gelato cones. I am sketching the seascape with conte crayon in my leather-bound sketchbook of cold pressed paper, 90lb.
90lb for conte, 140lb for ink, and 300lb for watercolor.
One melon for Margaritte, one strawberry for Chiara, and one melon and strawberry for me.
"They were out of lime," Chiara says, "and pistachio, and raspberry, and lemon, and vanilla, if you can believe that. So, it was melon or strawberry-"
"My two favorites!" I burst out.
"I thought so", Chiara says with a smile.
"Yeah, you always have two favorites," Margaritte adds.
"What do you mean?" I ask.
"Melon and Strawberry gelato, pesto and marinara on pasta," Margaritte says.
"Olives and mushrooms on pizza," Chiara confirms, "It's never one, or three, or more. It's always two."
"Hmm, I never noticed that" I say, a little concerned about myself.
"Of course not, you're you!" Chiara says, matter-of-factly, "This is what friends do -- we notice things about you that you don't see yourself."
"Like mirrors," Margaritte says.
"Yeah, or a jury," I say.
"No, no opinions, just observations," Chiara says with that mild and warm smile she gives me, the one that says hey you, you're my friend, and I love you. Followed by a little nose-crinkling wince. The kind that says you're funny and I like you. The same smile and wince I've been receiving since grade school. Such an old tradition it feels like home.
We walk our gelato cones down to the shore and dip our gelatoed toes in the sugar-foam ocean. Cold melon on my tongue, cold saltwater rushing over my sunkissed toes, and two of my oldest friends at my side. Could life be any sunnier than this?
Forest Dream
a poem by Justine Létourneau
