home to France

It’s too late to write. What am I doing? The white glow from the computer is the only light in the room.  My mind is full. I think I’ll go back to France for the night. Come along for the ride if you will.

The flight is long. It always is. Not in hours; in anticipation. I listen to the voices around me and do my best to nod, pout my lips, and keep quiet. I want Les Francais to think I am one of them for as long as I can. When I have to speak, I do my very best accent of oui and non.

I look out the window and see it approaching. Butterflies. The wheels descend. We touch down. Immediately, I feel home.  My heart feels a certain peace, there is a warm rush in my gut and I smile. 

I walk outside and feel the sun on my face, drop my bags and just stay still for a moment. The sun seems a little warmer here in southern France. I look about and smirk at all of the small colorful cars I love whizz by. Even the street signs are more gladdening to me, with bright blue arrows instead of our stodgy rectangles. 

I get to my flat in the village, up a winding cobblestone street. The shutters, a shade of turquoise are wide open letting in the balmy mistral winds, the floor, a terracotta mosaic is beauty understated. The patisserie is down a charming fleur framed block, and la fromagerie is down another. Café’s line the streets, never seeming to close and animals are always welcome at all. Trees canopy me as I walk along narrowing paths and passerby’s really do carry baguettes in their armpits on their way home for family dinner.

I venture out to the countryside and watch as the sunflowers raise their head to sun in the morning and bow their heads in the evening as faithful parishioners. I walk out to the fields and get lost in them, the stalks taller than me. There is an absolute enchantment in being immersed in the reeds, entangled in their grace. In the distance I see the proud, rugged Montagne Sainte Victoire reaching into the heavens with its vibrant, varying hues from limestone, clay, and Cypress friends.

Fast forward to the lavender fields. I can always smell its sweet perfume in the breeze, the thyme and rosemary mélange. My eyes look as far as they can and see only a blur of violet haze, in the tiers of a maze. My hands float atop the sea of buds as my fingers grab a bunch and pull gently. The scent lingers on my skin. My eyes happily squint from the golden sun resting in the cobalt sky, as picturesque as the day Van Gogh and Cezanne painted it. To be under the same sky, shielded by the same sun, walking the same streets is all but surreal.

It is extraordinary here, my sanctuary, my home.

I do not want to go back. Not yet.

But it is late. Next time I will go back to the market place and sit for a moment in the hall of my favorite cathedral...

For now, I must return to my waking life, and leave my home behind.