spent the day in a fancy hotel with a bunch of francophones, discussing literature, performance art, and cinema in a cross-cultural context (volunteering at a 20th and 21st century French and Francophone literature conference). The panels and subjects were so rich with diversity and depth that my biggest frustration was that I couldn't attend them all.
Among the perks of volunteering: delicious calimari, lamb, and chicken for lunch ♦ green tea orange tea earl grey tea darjeeling tea pomegranate tea with honey and milk ♦ brownies and white chocolate macadamia cookies on a mahogany pyramid shelf ♦ meeting all of these crazy different highly intelligent people who had briefly converged for a weekend in Southern California to discuss their shared passion before scattering once more to the corners of the world.
Everyone's idealism and pure enthusiasm for learning and the arts helped me, if only for a brief second, to find my footing once again against the stress of plain old living (I never really liked realism anyway). In that moment, while a panelist spoke about the reactionary nature of modern travel and another about one writer's infernal portrayal of Hollywood, I thought that I would be okay with being a poor student in France for the next three years, or a penniless filmmaker for the foreseeable future. As long as I stayed faithful to myself and did what I loved, I would be okay with whatever obstacles came my way.
I was especially overcome with the notion that while I loved this community and being here enthusing about these subjects, each paper was about someone else's work, and it was that work, more so than the papers about it, that initiated impact. The pull of action, of creation, is quite a bit stronger.
P.S. I tried to make up for the lack of photos with a drop cap.
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