Sunday.
Bleak as a Lowry painting.
Hot sun, hot wind.
Empty, apart from a boy in his car with music thumping
Empty, apart from a boy in his car with music thumping
through open windows as he braked too hard around a corner.
Obviously, I had completely misread the posters in Malaucene.
"The Jewish Music Festival" I had come to see wasn't something that was spilling out onto the streets.
Or advertised in any way in the town, even at the locked tourist office.
However, I found the flee market which was spread eagled over a long stretch of ground under plane trees which were already dropping their leaves.
It is a gross exaggeration, as I do not have a divine parent nor did I cook my son for dinner, nevertheless, I can appreciate the torments of Tantalus.
Browsing the vide-greniers with an overladen motorcycle is achingly full of fruitless yearnings.
A verdigris figure twisted upwards supporting a pair of putti which had been part of a water feature, a red and white striped silk chaise longue, a mountain of white damask curtains, and a weathered, oval gilt mirror with fruit entangled candle sconces were all utterly impossible. Setting my sights on the realistic, I bought two crucifixes which were encrusted with pale, compacted soil. The vendor had found them in a medieval village using a metal detector. I threaded them on a string and tied them around my neck.
At a table of war memorabilia: unpolished medals, bomb casings, dented helmets, etc. was an enameled box whose insides were speckled like an egg in yellow and green. The man said it was a soldier's lunchbox. After reading so many soldiers' names, sadly the ones who no longer needed a lunchbox, I felt I must rescue this remnant of domesticity and comfort. I studied the scratches made by a fork and the patches where the enamel had been chipped away and tried to imagine how it felt to carry something so dainty when there were bombs going off.
I made good use of it while traveling. It was the perfect size and shape to be stuffed full of tissue packets which eventually were replaced with newly acquired treasure.
The remaining crucifix, as I lost one of them somewhere along the way, is now polished through constant wear, and reveals the figures which decorate both sides.
And, interestingly, it labels me, rightly or wrongly,
And, interestingly, it labels me, rightly or wrongly,
as I have discovered many times.
To get a bit more historical information, I have just googled my very
special, unique, never been seen before lunchbox,
special, unique, never been seen before lunchbox,
and you can buy them on e-bay. Or etsy. oh well...
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