Catherine Certitude

From her New York apartment, Catherine watches a small girl removing her glasses, preparing for her ballet lesson. Immediately, she's transported back to her Parisian childhood, long before coming to America.

Her mercurial Papa's job with his pedantic business partner, Monsier Casterade, was puzzling, constantly chasing clients, lorries coming and going. Catherine loved ballet with Madame Dismailova, and playing games with Papa, taking off their glasses to escape the world's harsh edges and daydream. That was thirty years ago.  She runs her own ballet school now; inside she's the same tiny girl.

Catherine's eccentric Parisian girlhood is beautifully described, the line illustrations elegantly expressive.  Her memories are tinged with bittersweet hindsight into the likely stories behind Papa and Madame Dismailova's identities, and regret for a past world.