Thirteen is a horrible age to be a boy. Your testicles are developed enough to make demands on you. But the rest of you is sufficiently immature that you can’t do much about it. Thirteen year old girls are already young women—with airs and wiles and the beginnings of sexual instincts. They have no interest in thirteen year old testicles. So you’re trapped in that nether age of sexual indeterminacy with no release except the release you invent for yourself.
When I was thirteen, most of my friends relied on stolen copies of Playboy and Hustler, a wide-ranging capacity for fantasy, and a firm grip. In these, they found their release. Never having been a thirteen year old in the internet age, I have no idea what adolescent boys rely on nowadays. Whatever it is, I’m sure it’s available in abundance. God bless the Internets.
Unlike most of my friends, my only access to Playboy and Hustler was whatever I could steal, which wasn’t much. To my knowledge, my dad never subscribed, read, used, whacked off to such magazines. I could be wrong. My dad could have been far more clever in his discretion than other dads. I’ve never asked my dad about this. Maybe I should, just to get everything out in the open. I doubt I will, but you never know. One day, there might be a deathbed confession: Son, Son, come closer. I have something for you. Take this key. There’s a trunk in the attic. Open it. Everything inside is yours. Use it well.
With limited access to the usual “gentlemen’s” magazines, I had to be resourceful. Also, I was a bit of nerd. It would be unfair of anyone to expect me to follow the usual course when answering the call of Onan. Coincidentally, thirteen was the age when I began to take seriously my studies at the Royal Conservatory of Music. I decided I was going to take all the courses for my A.R.C.T. before I finished high school. Like I said: I was a bit of a nerd. So in the summer after I turned thirteen, I enrolled in the first of three required music history courses. It was a survey course of Western music that sometimes took detours for a look at political history, philosophy, literature … and art. The text was full of pictures. One of those pictures was a black and white photo of a painting by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, a nude torso of a young woman, Torse, effet de soleil. I didn’t care much about the details of the painting. All that mattered to me was the boobs.
Despite its crass beginnings, I developed what you might call a relationship with Torse, effet de soleil. Apart from the boobs, I noticed that the woman seemed to shimmer in the sunlight. This, I learned, was a hallmark of impressionism and characteristic of early (and later) Renoir. There was a blurring of boundaries, no clear distinction between the young woman’s body and the space it inhabited. Everything was light and airy. I also noted how odd it was that a woman should be standing nude in a park at midday. Does this sort of thing happen often? I wondered. Will it happen to me? As I approached adulthood, I looked forward to the many times when I would stumble upon pleasant-looking women standing naked in parks at midday. Sadly, adulthood hasn’t lived up to its promise.
Sometimes, the young woman and I would chat. She’d smile and wait patiently amongst the leaves while I finished my business. I’d ask if she minded being naked in the open like that. No, it was sunny out and as long as the sunlight kissed her skin, she didn’t mind the occasional breeze. But don’t you feel vulnerable, standing like that for everyone to see? After all, you never know who might show up in a park. She told me my concern was sweet, but the fact is: security is such an illusory thing. She said this was something that I would learn as I grew up. I squared my shoulders and tried to keep my voice from breaking as I told her that I was already grown up, preternaturally wise, ahead of my time. Her laughter went well with the shimmering leaves and the flecks of light dancing on her shoulders. Do you ever get bored, just standing in a painting like that? She shook her head and told me how, every day, she had lots of interesting conversations. I felt hurt, but knew it was naïve to suppose that I was the only one.
Last month, I visited the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. I hadn’t thought about what I might see there. A friend had recommended I go; it was more civilized than the Louvre where bus tours swarm through the galleries and people crowd around paintings as if they were the bones of saints. He said I might enjoy the impressionist gallery. Downstairs, I saw a familiar portrait of Hector Berlioz; I had first seen a photo of the famous portrait in my music history text at the Conservatory. I wonder … the impressionist gallery was upstairs. My heart began to race as I rode up the escalator.
I strolled from room to room, trying my best to look nonchalant. I passed paintings by Degas, ballerinas stretching. I noted Whistler’s famous portrait. Monet’s shimmering facades of Notre Dame. Water lilies. Reflections. I couldn’t give a shit for any of it. All I wanted—
There she was.
— Hello. She called to me from across the room.
I stammered a greeting but choked on my words.
— I never thought I’d see you again. What’s it been. Nearly forty years?
— Thirty-seven.
— Still. That’s a long time.
— You haven’t aged a bit.
— You have. You’re chunkier. And you’ve lost most of your hair.
— Ah well. And I laughed my false laugh.
— Do you still whack off?
— I’m married now.
— So?
— I’m mean, yes, sometimes. I’m in a serious relationship, you know.
— Of course. And yet here you are. Talking to a painting.
— And here you are. Hanging from a nail.
— Touché.
— So how long has it been, you know, since Renoir painted you into that park?
— Oh mon dieu. Let’s see. A hundred and thirty-eight years.
— Really! That long?
Clumps of people drifted through the gallery. A couple times, a teenaged boy stopped to ogle my friend’s boobs. Our conversation petered out until all that remained was silence. The encounter reminded me of a high school reunion. You know the feeling. You’ve lost touch with your best friend, but they’ve promised to go to the reunion. You can’t wait to meet them. There’s so much catching up to do. The anticipation makes you feel like you might burst. But when the evening arrives, and you come face to face with your old friend, a quick exchange is all either of you has for the other. There’s nothing to say. The intervening years have risen like a wall between you and no amount of excitement or nostalgia will tear down the wall.
That’s how it felt with Torse, effet de soleil. With the passage of so many years, we had grown apart. I was married and had kids. She, a former prostitute or mistress to Renoir, had found respectability in a gallery overlooking the Seine. I nodded my good-bye and left her boobs shimmering in Renoir’s glorious illusion of sunlight. Although our encounter was bittersweet, one thought gave me solace. If I were to canvas all my friends from our days as randy thirteen year old boys, there isn’t one of them, all these years later, who could say: Oh yes, I was in a Paris gallery and had a lovely visit with Miss July. Centerfolds don’t end up on those kind of walls.