My car’s headlights and the meager lighting of the courtyard made me conclude that I was on the right track. I was about to show up at the door but someone opened up for me. I explained that I had just come from Paris to see Joni Mitchell, the person did not seem surprised (phew!), and I remember that I was taken directly from this sort of hall on ground floor level, through a corridor towards a door that opened onto a fairly large square room, with a very low ceiling as I noticed, and flanked by a bay window at its back, on one of its walls. As I entered the room, along the wall to my left was a large sofa and armchairs, and Joni Mitchell was there, sitting and smiling. She got up from the couch and came to greet me warmly, very simply and with her big, bright smile. Someone benevolent, who made you feel good and relaxed in her own spontaneous and very sensitive way, this especially when the person facing her was obviously totally intimidated. I clearly remember that she was wearing a denim shirt and matching blue jeans that night (a bit like in the Gap ad that featured her, which was to appear a bit later at the end of the 1980s).
Before entering the large room where Joni Mitchell was, I had followed the person who had let me in the house, and in the corridor I remember coming across Larry Klein, whom I saluted with a brief nodding. I think I remember that I could see in his eyes a furtive weariness and an amused glint as well, something like "Oh My God, there we go, here is this little one again! They'll discuss painting at length all night long - we're not out of the woods yet!". In a flash, I then remembered Larry Klein four years before, in 1983, asleep in his armchair in Paris, while I bombarded Joni Mitchell with questions about the front cover of Hejira showing Norman Seeff's sublime portrait, and asking the singer how this gorgeous artwork's final steps had been assembled (at the time photoshop did not exist). Hanging onto her every word and the fascinating clues about how all that was done. And thus I could understand Larry Klein's fears. Would my presence coincide again with endless talks about painting?...