Sunday, May 24, 2009

In The Bathroom





I recently finished reading "The Bathroom", by Jean Philippe Toussaint. The story is about a man living in Paris with his girlfriend named Edmondsson. She works part time for a gallery and he lives in the bathroom of their apartment. It sounds complicated at first but I suppose he does other things besides living in his bathroom, he dreams, he watches football and sometimes he talks with the Polish painters who have a show at the gallery where Edmondsson works but have offered to paint the kitchen for a little spending money and something to do while they're in Paris. In fact what color they want to paint the kitchen is a very serious issue, it isn't the simple economics of the decision, it also is a consequence of how time will change the color. They seem to spend most of their time inside the kitchen smoking cigarettes, drinking whiskey, and in some cases skinning octopuses. But there is more to their lives than choosing the color of their walls.



He travels unexpectedly to Venice. I'm not sure whether or not the adventure was a good idea, but it did get him out of the bathroom. The bathroom was too wombic, if he wasn't going to wash or look at himself in the mirror there was nothing else for him to do but smoke cigarettes, read and stare. His mother comes to visit at the request of Edmondsson, she brought pastries and suggested diversions but steadfastly there he remained. In Venice there is even less to do than in the bathroom. He stays in a small hotel room and doesn't do anything except wander the halls at night and stop into the bar for a drink or two when the football is on. He stays there alone and bored until he decides to call Edmondsson. The phone calls become an extensive regularity, sitting on the floor of the hotel lobby around the corner of the clerks desk in hushed tones he talks to her for hours. Everyday, sometimes twice a day, the phone calls become the focus of his existence, and then she visits. It's obvious he is in love with her. His relationship with her borders on obsession, but he seems to be out of sorts at the moment. While Edmondsson is in Venice with him, she wants to do all of the adventurous things like go to the museum, and see the art, but he's already been in the city for a month and all he wants to do is lay in bed with her. One morning he gets up early to find some tennis balls, he wanders around, to get some exercise, and returns to the room. But she doesn't really want to play tennis, and he doesn't really want to do anything else. Things got out of hand and he absentmindedly threw a dart at her. You are not supposed to do these sorts of things, Do Not Throw Darts At Girlfriends! She goes to the hospital and then returns to Paris, while he stays on in Venice.





Now the story is difficult to describe because there are so many details to it. He doesn't want to grow up. He'd rather play in the bathtub while his mother sits by his side than attend a reception at the Austrian Embassy. The couple is so free that they make love in the bedroom while the Poles skin the molluscs and paint the kitchen. While in Venice though he comes down with sinusitis and spends a good number of weeks living in a hospital smoking cigarettes and watching people in neighboring rooms through his window. And all of this is extremely unhealthy. I will remind you that Jean Philippe Toussaint is alive and well and continues to produce a massive volume of work. I found it all extremely depressing, this guy doesn't want to do anything when he is in Paris except make love and sit in his bathtub, his girlfriend even encourages it by joining him in the bathroom. But he leaves the city on an unannounced whim and heads to Italy, where he doesn't do anything except smoke and miss Edmondsson. I had trouble reconciling all of this. When Edmondsson arrived, she was thrilled, ready to enjoy him, Venice, and perhaps start a new life there if that's what he wants to do, she bustles around sightseeing, she gets him into a church where he is put off by the dark and the candle smoke. Finally, he wants to play tennis, in fact he's practically dying to, and she is so happy for him she says she doesn't want to, all she wants to do is lay in bed and make love.

In the end he returns to his life in Paris with Edmondsson, but I don't know if he has really changed. Actually I would guess not, because the first thing he does is go to the bathroom and lay in the bathtub. I don't know if I can really relate to this character. There was a point in my life when I was living in a little studio apartment in West Philadelphia and I was convinced that the woman upstairs was living in her bathroom. Whenever I went into my bathroom there was this sense that she was up there in the bathtub. I imagined her getting comfortable with a blanket and her TV. Insulated by the six inches of porcelain on either side. While I was down stairs, beneath her, shaving or washing or grooming, wondering if she was really their or not. And reading this made me think of Dottie Lasky's tiny tour. When she reaches the bathroom leg of the tour she's reading from her recently published book of poems "AWE", the audience and the camera sit in the bathtub while she stands in the doorway reading her poem about a universe of cats.




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