Let's Assume (X) Until We Have To Assume Otherwise

The other day Phil, an Englishman who's been travelling for the past 9 or so years, and I walked up a hill to the ruined old Casbah. Why was it ruined? Well, the damned thing seems to be built of sandstone. Kids take ten minutes with a rock and they've carved their name a quarter inch deep into the old barracks. As we walked back into town, Phil wanted to stop by a work-working shop and pick up a present for one of his grandkids. And so we did. A young man and woman received us, Phil bargained for a trinket, the deal went through. And out we--no, wait. The man tells me the girl wants to know my name: Jacques. He says she wants to give me her phone number: I take it. Do I have a number: Well, alright. She wants to make me a present I can come by to pick up tomorrow: No, too kind, don't want to put you to any trouble. No, it's no trouble... Boils down to me saying I'll come back to receive my present from this girl who has yet to speak two words, let alone allow an expression to pass over her face. We left. The next day I played chess and did not visit, though at one point the man from the wooden-things shop walked by and asked if I was coming: yeah, later. And so the next day, I returned, alone. Salaam Aleikoum... Nobody in the shop, hurrah! Oh, here she comes. I'm brought to the back room and sit down with the family as they finish their lunch and coerce me into eating with them. Jacques, from America, not married (shit, why didn't I lie? curiosity, I suppose), travelling alone, no, he's not my father, staying in Mirleft for a while, from America, Chicago... You get the point. The two of us get sent off by the rest of the family to go back to the house and get the present she's prepared for me. I'm suspicious, not without reason, of everything going on. They could be sending us off so later they can claim I took her virginity and have to marry her--two things of which I will not be having a part. We go, she speaks French poorly and asks me about France. I attempt to get it across that I'm from America, not France, and the furthest I get in this endeavor is instead being asked about life in Mauritania, but this only lasts the length of a goldfish's memory and then we are back to France. We arrive at the house and knock to be let in. No answer for some minutes, and I say pas grave, I don't need the present now (or ever). We are permitted entrance shortly thereafter. Zahara goes into a room and pulls out a diamond-shaped wooden block with the initial J inlaid in silver. She asks for my e-mail, we exchange e-mails. She suggests a walk to the beach. Oh no, alright. It takes about half an hour to walk to the beach, the sun is strong and she's wearing a parka over her sweater without complaint. She talks to me in fragments about money and Morocco being no good and France is the promised land and how I am pretty and we could get married. I respond with the opposite tack, parrying and feinting for each thrust. I say I don't believe in marriage, that it is a form slavery, that France is a hellhole and Morocco is paradise, that money means nothing--laying it all on as thickly as I can, while trying to remain in her good favor so that she wouldn't go along with attempts to defame and marry me against my will should such events come to pass. At the beach, we come across Crazy Ibrahim--I have a witness! No, but he's Crazy Ibrahim. We sit and talk about more of the same nothing, her scalp is greasy and she's wearing a parka over her sweater in the strong sun while trying to make conversation which is obviously floundering. I feel bad for the girl and am slightly upset with myself for being in this situation. She teaches me the Berber word for rock: azrou, and we go back. I say goodbye, as does she with a tint of defeat, and hope this to be a story without sequel.

Another the other day, I passed a dead dog in the dust, repassed it some hours later and it had lifted its head to pant some pants and I thought how could this not mean something, how could this not be shouting at me to listen up. Then another day there was a baby donkey outside the internet
café pushing its snout at something in the dusty right angle where street and sidewalk end one another. And some other day I came across a litter of new-born pups in a cactus patch. Just thought I'd share that.

Brief example of how to reread this blog: The other day Why was it ruined? with a rock and they've wanted a young man wait, the man phone number. Well, don't want alright to tell you she wants to make me to give me no trouble...

The things we save for people about whom we care less.