Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Monday, 30 June 1884

I had to restrain myself with all my might from slashing my canvas with a knife. Not one corner of it is done as I would wish!! And still another hand to do! But once that hand is done, there is everything to redo!!! Ah! Wretchedness — damnation.
And three months — three months.
No!!!
In Bastien's studio there was a great basket of flowers. These flowers seemed to be a day old. Mme Mackay had sent them then, for the beloved himself. I do not know why I thought of it all afternoon with bitterness, with sadness — a sort of drunkard's sentimentality (why drunkard's?) to the point of weeping: three or four wretched tears that did not fall.
That basket which he found there on his arrival enrages me.
It is absurd — but it is like a bar set before me that leaves me with the sadness of a sick child.
I amused myself making a basket of strawberries such as one has never seen. I picked them myself with their stems — real clusters; there were even some green ones, for love of the colour. And leaves. In short: marvellous strawberries picked by an artist with every delicacy and care, as when one does something one is not accustomed to. And with them an entire branch of red currants. I crossed the streets of Sèvres like that, and held the basket on my knees in the tramway, taking care to hold it slightly raised so that the air passed underneath and my warmth would not wilt the strawberries, not one of which had a mark or bruise.
Rosalie laughed: if someone from the household saw you. Is it possible!
— But it is on account of his painting, which deserves it. Mme Mackay loves his face, which deserves nothing. But his painting.
— So it is the painting that will eat the strawberries?!
— [Crossed out: No but one]