vol. 17, summer murmurings: libraries, homemade froyo, & yin yoga
Now,
In June,
When the night is a vast softness
Filled with blue stars,
And broken shafts of moon-glimmer
Fall upon the earth,
Am I too old to see the fairies dance?
I cannot find them any more.
- After Many Springs - Langston Hughes (1901-1967)
In Montreal, a tornado has just subsided yet my red geraniums remain intact in my balcony planter. A butterfly wind chime (purchased with the help of my two-year-old niece at an attic sale in Creemore, Ontario) rustles lightly before a pink and grey sky.
I’m just back from rehearsal of Act II of La bohème, a piece I’ve known so intimately for so many years it feels like I’ve interpreted each character before in dreams. I’m playing the fiery Musetta in a small-scale production staged by François Racine and conducted by Victorien Vanoosten. My days are filled with rehearsals and coachings with some of opera’s luminaries including some of my favourite mentors, with whom I’ve been enjoying some nice lunches stealing away and catching up.
“I know of no one who has described the Paris of [the 1830s] as well as Puccini in La Bohème.” - Claude Debussy
(Nicole Car as Mimi and her husband Etienne Dupuis as Marcello - the duo running the production with which I’m involved.)
Life in the performing arts is far from dreamy these days, particularly in Canada post-Covid. Companies are still backlogged from cancelled productions and well-established artists scramble for the few jobs available. I’ve had my share of frustrations, and am making an effort to remain positive as I continue to make sacrifices for the art form I love (it’s a blessing and a curse to have a calling!).
One glimmer in my days that’s been keeping me going has been my new job teaching yoga in downtown Montreal. The studio I’m working at is in a gorgeous old bank building, and for the moment, they’ve asked me to teach a Yang-Yin class. For those not familiar with Yin Yoga, it’s a post-lineage yoga practise founded in the 1980s that targets deep connective tissues with long held postures. My favourite type of yoga class are the ones where you can hear everyone breathing deeply and there’s a mix of laughter, playfulness, and self/community love. It’s so fun having people laugh as they work to interlace their toes in butterfly pose or hearing people drool and snore in a nice long Savasana.
Another glimmer in my days comes from Montreal and Toronto’s public library systems. My bf lives next door to one of Toronto's biggest libraries, and the two of us regularly visit and compare our choices of books. :) I recently checked out Alison Roman’s Sweet Enough after months of waiting for it on hold. Unfortunately, it’s proved such a fantastic book I may need to buy it…!! The first recipe I made was her homemade frozen yogurt, which truly blew my mind. Next up, iced, frozen (slightly boozy) coffee (apparently the alcohol mostly freezes off) and of course, banana bread.
The process:
Are you a library person? I’m biased, as my mother and grandmother were librarians and I worked in libraries during my degrees. While living in Chicago, I loved recharging in the Harold Washington Library (which even has practise rooms!). In Toronto, I’m a big fan aesthetically of the brutalist Robarts Library, shaped like a giant, concrete peacock. For a more Hogwarts-ian vibe, Emmanuel College Library is quite magical. On a sombre note, one of the most beautiful and poignant Holocaust memorials I’ve seen is Vienna’s Nameless Library, in the pink Judenplatz. Each book faces inward, symbolizing how each life lost in the Shoah is a story we’ll never learn; a book we’ll never read.
Not quite a library, but today I visited one of my favourite Montreal bookstores where the shopkeeper let me know that every Wednesday, they host a reading hour where everyone pays 5$, is handed a glass of wine, and sits and reads quietly for an hour. Consider that on the calendar! One of these days, I’ll make a comprehensive list of my favourite bookstores and libraries in the different cities I’ve lived in.
As far as reading goes, I’ve read some juicy/Nobel Prize-winning Annie Ernaux lately (although there’s only so many details of her affairs with young men I felt like taking in) and am getting back into The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell, the third book I’ve read by this amazing author. Are you reading anything fun? Any summer rec’s?
À la prochaine, books and breakfasters! :)