To update you on the narrative involving the sixty year old sailor-artist- I had a rather unpleasant exchange of words with him which ended with me pretty much terminating our friendship. He had asked me to go round to translate his book, and i'd agreed on the time and date a few days before and written it in my diary.
Such a lover of control is he, that were i to break off our rendez-vous, i knew he would take offence and accuse me of being "méchante", leaving me with a feeling of guilt and and a bitter taste.
So it was that i reluctantly went round to his studio, feet dragging on the floor. My eyes were closing with weariness- probably because i'd spent all night online to my boyfriend looking at pixilated versions of each others faces and not really saying anything interesting.
Upon entering his flat, I think i visibly shrunk away in disgust when he kissed my cheeks, a gesture which could be considered quite impolite and contrary to french norms and customs. But i felt irritable and vowed that i wouldn't allow myself to be persuaded into doing anything to please him that was contrary to my true desires.
On my previous visits he would instruct me: "lift up your top, i need to see how your belly is" or "take off your jumper so i can see your figure better" all under the guise of needing to know my body better in order to make a sculpture of me.
Naturally very compliant in character, especially when up against someone with such a dominant personality, I would of course acquiesce, but nonetheless would leave feeling as if a part of myself had been eroded, like some sort of cheap whore.
Which may seem like a very harsh comparison- but he was always offering me money, which did prick my ears up. Fifty euros for translating the book plus two euros for every copy sold. Two hundred euros for making a film in which we film each other: him acting as himself and me as a student enraptured by him and his work... the projects go on... always involving some sort of role in which i have to "show the sensual side of my character".
After some consideration, and talking to Emily on Skype, I had firmly decided on following her suggestion, which was to just say no to his projects. One can always earn money some other way. My expenses are not really so great here, so hopefully from my teaching, I should end up with a few hundred euros in my bank.
I sat on his sofa, with my bag next to me, creating a defiant distance with both my words and my body language.
He was very disappointed when i told him i didn't want to do the film, nor the sculptures, almost angry, and after that took an unpleasant tone with me. He began criticising the way I speak french, pulling me up on every preposition that i might get wrong (which verbs go with "de" and which with "a" it really is a matter of guesswork to me).
I maintained that this nuance of french grammar wasn't something to get all het up about, since the most important thing is that you can make someone understand you- regardless of small mistakes. He told me that the way i spoke was the same as someone who knows nothing of the language, and that i better change my attitudes, otherwise i would never be a french teacher. All the while he was talking to me, he was stood at the other end of the room, fiddling about angrily with a sculpture of a skinny naked girl (me), manipulating the clay, his giant fingers fondling it's miniature breasts and legs and neck.
It seemed to me that he was trying to get one up on me on the one area where he could be superior, but he calmed down and apologised. I am very bad at taking criticism. Just try and critisise me and i will become horribly defiantly defensive and flare up in a rage.
I continued what I'd been saying and explained that when i came to his studio, i often felt trapped, because he always made it near impossible for me to make an excuse and leave. Also the phone calls throughout the week deranged me and the small gifts to guarantee my loyalty made me feel both pleased and sick. The insistence that he book my time in advance, rather than just let me come round whenever i pleased, all this amounted to create a feeling of nausea and suffocation in me, which I tried to explain in perhaps not the kindest way possible.
I think the last straw was when he tried to give me a gift of cut roses. Don't ever get me cut flowers, they are a token of insincere love and misguided affection, and remind me of stalkers and grasping older men that i've known. I hate to see a flower wallowing in a stagnant vase and slowly wilting and drooping like a disappointed penis.
The scene finishes with me leaving his studio in a huff, and marching off up the steep cobbled street, him waving and shouting behind me, making a hideous and humiliating spectacle of himself infront of all his artist neighbours. "should i call you?!" he kept repeating and seeming not to understand when i shouted "NO" in response.
Something which he said as i made my escape, made me feel somewhat guilty "you've been laughing at me for the past two months", which i think means that he feels i've been taking the piss. But i never asked to be given gifts and food, never wanted that he should try and transform me into his obedient muse. Like with most obsessives, the kindest thing you can do for them is to leave them alone for a time until they start to forget you, and the self inflicted lacerations on their hearts start to heal.
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