(no subject)

I did a lot of work today, especially in the morning, which I spent in the Montparnasse Cemetery. Stuff from the last three weeks came together. I want my site research done *now* so that I can sit down and write. What I can do now is take notes and think things through, to make things easier when I'm actually ready to write. That's two big jumps in two days, and yet I have a case of hypochondria and homesickness. I love so many things about travelling, but I'm really someone who is happier not even going out the front door. It had better be hypochondria - more sickness I do not need.

Because I knew that I'd be working this evening, and because I scolded myself for overwork the day before yesterday, I went to the Marais this afternoon and investigated the Jewish museum. It's got some amazing stuff, but it isn't sure if it's explaining Zola and deportation and the Blois case, or giving an overview of Judaism or showing some amazing treasures. In the end, it did all three, but none perfectly or perfectly comfortably.

What totally overwhelmed me were a dozen Medieval gravestones. It's the first time I've seen more than fragments. I know these societies. I know the Jews in these societies. I've been feeling guilty of disrespect for walking over decorated Christian graves for days. The beautiful letters, the strict formulas and the stern lack of other decoration really hit me. French Judaism was very French, but still not the Middle Ages that I know. My own ancestors, possibly (I say this because I kept seeing very familiar faces in the pictures of the deported) and yet, because people lived parallel lives, I know them not (or maybe just not as well - I do actually teach the Jewish French Middle Ages). This says something about the way we think about the Middle Ages, I think. It's much easier to think about Western Europe as Christian, with odd incidents of otherness. Western Europe has only ever had a single religion in patches, and even that assumes that all forms of Christianity converge, which is something I can't pronounce on. France, in particular, with its Judaism and its Wars of Religion, and its Cathars and its southern Moslems, France in particular has only had one religion in name most of its life. The graves reminded me that there are real people who were like me, trying to sort themselves out against a society that was really not that interested on a good day. On a bad day, it's like the moment someone saw me and spat today, but in spades.

I sat on the beach today and drank lemonade (the stuff with lemons, not the Australian sort) because I was dehydrated and had walked too far and it was just too irresistible to sit near a palm tree, on a boardwalk, and watch the Seine. I was also interrupted in my peregrinations by some Tour de France stuff (viz cyclists, but not the main game) outside Notre Dame. Wherever I go, the surreal follows me. One day I'm going to look it in the face and follow it.

I spent more of my birthday money on a nice top (note: I am extra large by French measurements - I had forgotten this and why I do not buy clothes here - I do not know how anyone larger than size 16 manages) and bought three books on the Ballets Russes. I was just walking past a Russian-French bookshop and saw one and asked about it and lo, there were more and they all take a quite different approach to Australian books and I may need them in 2 years time and...yes, my luggage isn't as light as it was. Also, I have no idea where to put all these books. This is possibly why my normal state of impoverishedness is good for me.

I'm behind on emails. Sorry everyone! I'll try to do a catch-up tomorrow.