SoC 2:4

Julie Anne the Anagram
With illustrations by José Luvier López C

 

Chapter I

 Julie Anne Berubé is a girl, as you might have interpreted based on the title of this story, a girl unlike any other only because everybody in the world is not the same. If we were we all would have noticed and agreed upon it a long time ago.

Julie Anne thinks about time all the time. For her there is but one important moment in a day: The instants that transpire between the last milliseconds of 11:59pm soon to be yesterday and 12:00am tomorrow.

“The end of the world will happen then” she once said.

That’s why Julie Anne only sleeps after midnight.

Julz is a talented artist undiscovered. Her reason of being is representation, a wonderful addiction to possess characterized by unpredictable urges to paint, write, draw or just doodle. In her art she finds satisfaction, as she does closure and a productive practice that goes well with depression. For example, when her father lost his job at the local paper mill last summer due to yet another case of corporate downsizing, all she did once she was told this had happened was draw herself with waves for eyes, along with a message that read:

Ceci n’est pas moi. 

Chapter II

One late night, after the melancholy died down, and employment made its way back to the Berubé family, an epiphany arrived tracing a charcoal sketch in black and white:

“Heaven is a library” she thought,

“Borges was right”.

The living room bookshelf grew vastly soon after, but surprisingly no Borges titles could be found.

“They’re all lost in translation”, she frowned.

A few days later in a daydream an idea materialized from way back when filled with promising potential...

Chapter III

There was a concert to be held in the town of Moonbeam on July 15 of the year 2006 at 20:30 hours, in the heart of northern Ontario. This is a place Julie Anne called home. Feel free to look it up. 

The persons attending surpassed the actual population of Moonbeam itself, well into the thirteen hundreds. The main act, one Marie-Mai, finalist of the inaugural Star Académie competition, a Quebecoise version of American Idol you might say. At around 8:00pm the crowds were allowed to enter the outdoor arena, many running towards front row centre with all their might to get a better view of things soon after; of course the rows were but imaginary unless you brought chairs, for most everybody chose to stand.

Members of the first warm up band, Partly Skimmed, began preparing their equipment, adjusting guitar straps to a perfect fit; connecting all necessary cables to distortion pedals; etc, etc, etc. And thus a drop of rain fell upon somebody near the stage, pre-announced by the grey clouds lingering up top since early afternoon, blatantly contradicting a certain weatherman’s overconfident predictions. The transparent tears soon multiplied with vengeance, accompanied by a force filled gust of wind that seemed to never end.

Julie Anne was soaking wet and cold as an iceberg on Christmas, but determined to tuff it out.

The rain went on for about twenty minutes more before it departed like a mixed metaphor on our consciences. Amps were checked for safety, the stage was thoroughly swept, mics were dried with rags, and musicians got into place once again. The cliché goes as follows: The show must go on, in spite of Mother Nature’s eccentricities.

Partly Skimmed rocked out with an original composition, “Five Star Rock Star”, well worthy of mainstream radio exposure; something even senior citizens would be forced to move their heads to throwing devil horns in the air. Then followed a band from near by Kapuskasing called Portés Disparus with a couple of ad-hoc cover songs, including Daniel Powter’s “Bad Day” and a Bon Jovi number  I didn’t catch the title of as my concentration was focused on the fact that I found myself  dancing with Julie Anne all of a sudden.

It was Marie-Mai’s time to shine now. We all cheered her on, all 1300 of us, lighters in the air, flames a’ blazing. How pleasing it was to finally attend a concert where each performer actually sang. Fast forwarding to the second to last song of the night, a sorrowful rock ballad that went great with the stars in the sky and cold air exhaled like frosty smoke close to day’s end, we were now joined in our corner by Eric, one of the vocalists and guitarists of Partly Skimmed. He stood to the right of Julie Anne, about 2 feet in front of myself and my cousin Chanelle. I am supposing that at a specific point in the song it just felt right enough to do what he did, with such confidence I actually questioned my own. Eric crouched down just enough to be at shoulder height with Julz, embracing her from behind, and began swaying back and forth to the music; she followed his pace dipping down slowly, then back up, repeating the movements once more; he must of whispered something into her ear, something spontaneous and from the heart, for seconds later they kissed, not rushed, but taken with ease for what it was, an unexpected occurrence in the jungle that is life. I swear her cheeks were burning, because even though midnight had passed, the reddish glow emanating from them was unmistakable. A true example of how all those cheesy romantic comedy climaxes aren’t too out of the question.

Mademoiselle Berubé wrote a poem about this experience when she woke up later that morning.

Remember how I mentioned an idea that materialized a little while ago, if not; here’s your chance to check.

Chapter IV

Could a poem be painted?

I say, what an interesting question to ask one’s self. How would one go about proposing a solution to such a conundrum, that for so many in this world would surely cause extreme boredom, and weakness in the knees?

Dear old Julz began by sitting down in front of the desk beside her bed. The poem, scribbled on a wrinkled piece of paper, still conserved its original likeness, hidden inside a side drawer far from extreme heat or light. Eyes closed, she imagined each line, word, and letter transposing itself onto canvas; each color she evoked without knowing during the text’s original conception; each stroke required to capture each unmeasured dose of emotion portrayed by means of pen and pad. This until a rough draft of sorts formed in her head.

At around quarter after midnight, well past any imminent apocalypse, curled up in bed, was Julz breathing deeply, dreaming privately. Therefore, quietly as humanly possible, I will not inquire any further than revealing the verses the image conjured up during yesterday’s last hours was, and still is based on:

In a quiet voice,

Kiss me under this umbrella,

Before it stops raining,

So our light can contradict the sky.

You must be thinking that I wrote the poem, but I’ll tell you something else: All I’m doing here is storytelling; fabrication is a big no no in my book.

Chapter V

The anagram that is Julie Anne resides not in her actual ways of living, but rather the manner in which they are externally perceived by others. She does not stutter when she talks, or limp when she walks; yet unsurprisingly a love for solitude never ceases to raise rumor amongst people in general.

During my heartfelt pause in the present narration, the paragraph you just read: Under a sparkled sky covered in blueberry ribbon our girl persisted, mixing and matching, reenacting and recreating past sensations, drawing on the purest of inspirations as tools to push forward. Exhausting yet pleasure-filled, her hard self inflicted toil came to fruition, converting vision into something believable.

“I’ll never finish”, she said heaving a sigh. 

All that remained was to sign on the bottom right of the canvas: