By Emanuel Boutros
When I was an exchange student in Paris, the romantic allure of the city of lights did not last long. I lived alone, in a small square-shaped room, with a small square-shaped wooden table in the corner of a small square-shaped kitchen. Complementing the cubist monotony of my apartment was a small square-shaped window overlooking enormous air vents buzzing obstinately on the roof of the hypermarket. The days spent at school were long, but the nights felt even longer and more isolating. At the peak of my loneliness, I would trek on my bike, desperately looking for a passe-temps, a distraction.
I leave Porte de Montreuil, where my apartment is, where the buildings rise unevenly, their walls covered in the decay of peeling paint and scrawls of graffiti. The air is thick with the scent of exhaust fumes and cannabis. Wails of police sirens fade in the distance as I pedal further into the city. Its grandeur unfolds before me, a striking contrast to the somber outskirts where I reside. Here, buildings are adorned with intricate details under which lovers seek shelter from the rain, locking eyes in silent conversations, intertwined in embraces. Yet, as I absorb the scenes of love and beauty, the solitude accentuates the void within me. The city offers a feast for the senses, a panorama of life’s richness, but to me, it’s a spectacle I observe from the outside—a ghost merely existing.
After an hour-long trip in the pouring rain, I get off my bike, leave it at the side of the road, and rush to shelter: the temple perched at the 16th arrondissement. “Billet pour un,” I say as the security guard examines my soaking wet figure, certainly thinking of the damage I would cause to the revered mansion’s floor. The sound of the pouring rain fades as I step past the threshold, finally feeling a reprieve from the loneliness of rainy Paris.
Soothed by the masterful strokes of Renoir and Gauguin, I hear the clattering of my steps on the wooden floor, echoing across the empty rooms. They get slower, as if the urgency, the need that propelled me here, has dissipated. I walk down to the basement, the Holy of Holies. I sit down on the wooden bench and watch the sun rise over the deep sea, casting its bright reflection on the water’s surface. In the distance, I see three fishing boats sailing through the thick fog on the horizon, where larger ships and cranes seem to half-exist behind the shadows, only their silhouettes marking their existence. The left corner reads “Claude Monet 72.” Despite the quiet ache of loneliness that follows me, I find comfort in knowing that Monet’s Impression, Sunrise is hung in this room, in the basement of the Marmottan. I feel a connection, the mysterious warmth of home, thousands of miles away from my own.
An association is forged deep within my memory. A reminder of views from a happier past, from my childhood, where I grew up on the edge of the Mediterranean. Where I used to sit next to my father on the breakwaters of the western harbor as he held onto his fishing rod. Where I watched the sun set over the deep sea, casting its reflection on the surface of the water. Where I sat with her as she weaved her sorrows and dreams into words, pondering the waves, as if the sound of them colliding with the breakwaters whispered in only a language she could understand.
In the midst of my despair, sitting in my room, where everything is square-shaped, I hang a poster of Monet’s masterpiece. I stare at my new wall art, consumed in thought until I get a phone call. A voice rings through, one that has the ability to immediately transport me home again. Suddenly, I am sitting next to her on the promenade on the coast, watching the sun as it sets amidst the foggy sky. I can smell the scent of salty water mixed with her perfume, hearing her nervous voice imitating the turbulence of the waves, her laughter harmonizing with the seagulls’ distant cries. I can feel the touch of her hand, timid yet seeking, like how the high tides of the Mediterranean reach for the night sky. In my square-shaped apartment, I feel a connection: the mysterious warmth of home, thousands of miles away from my own.
Perhaps home is not a place, for if it was, I would be homeless. Instead, I like to believe that home is a feeling, a collection of scenes, moments, and emotions that I carry with me wherever I go. It is the sound of my father’s voice as he taught me how to fish, the laughter I shared with a friend, a kiss I shared with a lover, a memory that echoes in our hearts long after it is gone. I cannot help but wonder if we can go back in time. If we can stop, rewind, look back on the beautiful details we have missed, and relive that long gone memory. Are we forever bound to the unalterable script of fate, exiled to places where we would never belong, left with people who would never understand? People who would never imagine how beautiful the sky looked where we grew up, how the sand felt brushing on our faces, and how the sea called, and only we could hear.
Perhaps one day we will go back again, sit on the shore on which we used to sit, and tell everything we have been through to that sea of ours, shedding tears that the waves will carry. Until then, I sit in my apartment, unbothered by its dullness, by the buzz of the vents that my square-shaped window overlooks, because I know that outside this box there is a world where those memories truly exist, weaving connections between me and Monet’s painting…between me and her voice…between me and home.
Emanuel Boutros (he/him) ’26 is a mechanical engineering major with interests in particle physics and the mechanics of composite materials. He likes to play music, spend time with friends, and write about his daily encounters.
