Magic Gloves

One year on Christmas morning sometime in the late 80s, my stocking was stuffed with a pair of black magic gloves (most likely from Zellers or some place equally thrifty), that also happened to be sort of sparkly... Though magic gloves tend to be lost and replaced quite easily and frequently in the great white north, I saved my sparkly gloves (which I always called my Michael Jackson gloves) for my weekend figure skating classes and wore them without ever losing them until they fell to pieces. How magical is THAT? Other precious memories include spinning around on all fours as a toddler on my neighbours' slick parquet floor monotonously chanting: breakdancing, breakdancing, breakdancing...

I snapped this photo at the Jeff Koons exhibit at the Château de Versailles last December. Michael Jackson lives!

The lifestyle or the language.

There is a store in the Marais called Ben Simon. It's kind of like a tinier, more expensive version of Urban Oufitters. Or maybe Urban Outfitters is globalization's answer to stores like Ben Simon in the Parises of the world. In a word? Unaffordable. But cute! I used to live pretty close to it, and I enjoyed walking inside for a splash of eye candy and colour to contrast the beautiful but very grey architecture of the neighbourhood and beyond. Knit plush toys, prepare to be hugged in photographs forever. You want to go to Ben Simon but you can't afford the trip to Paree? I have just the post for your poverty stricken itchy feet. This is not Paris. This is Ben's basement.