I was twenty, and it was somewhere round three o'clock in the morning.  I sat at a battered desk in the corner of the bedroom in my basement apartment in Montreal.  The floor was warped from one of the unending water leaks in the ancient plumbing and the desk wobbled. Charlie Mingus's music played from a small radio.  The shelf above the desk was stuffed with books and paper, pens, a empty glass, an overflowing ashtray, and a plate covered in toast crumbs.  The air smelled of damp and cigarettes, and ever so slightly of drains.  I...