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sculptor’s
studio. Even though his sculpture is still a few days away from
completion, he realizes the soft clay will not survive the flight
back to New York. He lifts his plaster casting by the waist and
his single piece of luggage, and walks to the bus stop in the cobblestone
Piazza del Castello. Before boarding the bus, as the sun sets slowly,
coloring his face orange and red, James takes one last deep breath
through his nostrils of the substance of the women of San Miniato.
He prays that some residue will remain in his lungs.
As he sits
down on the bus - a bumpy journey downhill to the main road where
he will take another bus that will bring him to Sienna - James
buries his head and all its thoughts in the cocktail napkin with
instructions that Alessandra gave him. He concentrates on reversing
the instructions: a train from Sienna to Rome, instead of Rome-Sienna.
He pays no attention to the view. He looks at the napkin and concentrates
as if it were a crossword puzzle. He is pleased to find this task
easy for him.
It is 2:45 PM on a Wednesday, most of New York City
has returned to their cubes after a quick lunch and sit facing their
computers. James sits in the apartment-studio and scratches his head.
He cannot explain his failure even to himself in silence. He goes
to the Art Student League every morning, he then thoroughly engages
in his inspiration walk, then works in the studio for at least
five hours. He thinks that maybe the reason he cannot complete
the sculpture of Arnel is because it is made of plaster. He was
never good at working with plaster. His fingers are so much freer
on soft clay. But he had no choice four months ago when he left
Tuscany. He had to act quickly and a plaster casting was the
only reasonable solution. In his mind, he scans the figures of
the last ten models that posed for him in his attempts to find
one to complete the magical Arnel. He does this as nonchalantly
as he used to flip through his Rolodex of contacts back in his |
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