Friends with very young children have had to drive them around in the car to get them to fall asleep. Families, bundled up drive slowly and smoothly through the suburban night hoping to trick junior into dreamland.
For me, the car has a different effect. I need to ride, some distance, to trigger a change of brain. In Paris, car ownership is extravagant, so we rent one from time to time, for medicinal and work purposes.
Thursday noon, we picked up our rental to make the drive to Frankfurt. Five and a half hours, including a gas and cookie stop, and we were there. One of my English associates gave me a jar of marmalade earlier in the week, which greatly enhanced the "waffle" cookies -- dipped.
We stayed outside Frankfurt, because most of the central hotels were booked for Ambiante, the big European tabletop show. We'd been there before, peddling Blair's silverware and seeing what was new in the silver and china market. This year, our time was full of appointments to sell American product. I lost my gloves between rendezvous'.
The translation from French to German food is as awkward as the change of language. In a roadside cafe on the way to Koln, I ordered the daily special (how could I go wrong?). It was a great surprise to see that dish of cold pickled herring in cream, with a side of homefried potatoes and onions. It is this kind of contrast that spurs my thoughts.
We made the drive via Antwerp to spend a night on the North Sea coast in Belgium. We stay in Zeebrugge, a run down industrial port with a fantastic beach (the rest of the world is touring Brugge, or putting on the dog in Knokke). I can watch the container ships unload from my window. I carry binoculars.
The Belgian coast is among the most lovely stretches of sandy beach in Europe. It was barely 1 degree Celsius (about 34 Fahrenheit), so our walks were brisk. I had hoped to see the bird migration at the Zwin in Knokke-Heist, but we are just a shade to early. All the birds who go up to the Arctic for the summer pass this way. Instead, I made friends with Pauline, the grey parrot at the hotel. She is just 6 months old, very shy, but shows a promise as a pirate parrot from this port town.
I brought my picnic set and folding tables and chairs for naught, as the temperature never rose above 3 during our entire time at the ocean. I couldn't get close enough in the car to see the ships in detail; painting outdoors was out of the question. We decided to push on to the coast of Holland.
As we drove by Bergen op Zoom, I was struck by how important it is for Blair and me to make art, to create. This work/play trip was a perfect example of our life as artists: half-way. The world has no taste for artists -- they seem to enjoy what they are doing. Imagine funding "art" (not in the guise of the ballet or opera) -- research of all sorts is funded with the hope of monetary return. As we drive through his native Holland, I think of Van Gogh's parents wishing he were an accountant.
We circled Rotterdam: big (the largest port in Europe, the size of the next three largest ports combined). I decide I will do a series of port paintings, prints and stories -- from all around the world. It would be fantastic, done over a year, from Qatar to China to Rotterdam. We would be like gypsies, Blair reminds me.
We drive all the way to the Northern cities of Holland, before turning back and driving home to Paris. We see real windmills, although I never got to see a real d**e. What I mostly saw was the names of huge multinational companies with European headquarters in this little country with few resources and a fight to keep its soil. It is as much of the story as the flower fields.
We stop at a roadside stand. As I enter the arctic door (cold weather happens a lot by the sea), I am overcome with the delightful scent of hyacinths, just inside the window: pink, purple, white. On a Persian-carpet-covered table I ate two meatballs and french fries. Two beers.
At the Paris market this morning, I fall in love again with the food. For lunch I will make a pumpkin (potimarron) soup, followed by a veal roast with orange-glazed carrots. We don't have to return the car until Thursday.
Laurie (lino-gravure and text) and Blair PESSEMIER
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