Looking for NiceAs I sit and I
write today, with All Because of You singing out of the speakers,
I've got the image above on my computer screen. For me, it's a blissful
combination. There's a view of a U2 video going in the upper left, and
there's this little fledgling sonnet budding in the bigger "window".
Alt+PrtScrn gets me the image you see. Add the fact that I'm having a
nice time writing, and I've got the juice.
Nice
Nice is nice.
It's probably been written a million times.
All I Want is You is playing out now, and thoughts of France,
and Nice in particular, with gentle waves of Laguna and
3 and a half beach tiding in for good
measure.
France has always been comfortable for me. When I was two and a half,
I learned some words in French, like how to say "See you soon!" and
"Good night!" I could count to ten. The sounds quickly grew familiar in
my acquisitional ear. Et avec du temps, j'ai apprendez comment'un peux
parle le francais avec la fraternité
d'un qu'ont parlez le francais tous la vie. Even in that sentence,
likely chock full of mistakes, I have communicated a clear message. The
grammar may be wrong, and the spelling may be off, but my pronunciation
will carry me through. Anyone who speaks Parisian or Montreal French
would understand, and not be put off so much by my deficiencies.
Now it's Bad
on the wee monitor to our left.
I first went to France as an 18 year old young man. My girlfriend at
the time had taken French in high school, whereas I had taken Spanish.
So She could communicate better than I when we suddenly found
ourselves in Paris during the Bastille holiday. Such was our youthful
relationship that we each were taking trips to Europe after our senior
year in high school, but we didn't know that we were going to be on the
same busses and in the same hotels during that month in June and July.
We went to different high schools, but had jobs at the same ice cream
shop in Laguna Niguel in that year of 1986.
I don't recall how
we each left it during that heady adolescent time, but I do recall being
absolutely surprised, in a magical way, to see Falu in the hotel lobby
in Heidelberg on my first night in Europe. I don't remember the order of
countries. Germany, Austria, France, Italy, Luxembourg, England...there
were seven in less than a month's time. I do recall, however, some of
the first memories of my France. Et ils sont ecrits la bas.
I remember taking the bateaux mouche, a serpentile touristique
escapade in my view now, twenty years hence...I remember a different
Bateaux Mouche, where we young 18 year old seniors-in-high-school
dressed up and met in the hotel lobby in Paris and caught taxis to catch
a boat on the river Seine to see the City of Lights by night. I remember
that the meal was good, and that the wine was included in the price of
admission, and that our proctor from Dana Hills High School (Read: there
to have a good time himself, and from a public school, no less, not the
private school I was at...)...I remember a photograph, perhaps two
glasses into the evening, when Falu and I crossed wrists and were simply
looking at the lens...no pretense. It was one of her favorite
photographs of her, which for some reason I remember to this day.
Later that night, I
remember Ms. Vora, a bit inebriated, singing "Toot toot...heeeeey...beep
beep!" and running her long nails along the chest of a local man who was
intrigued by her advances. She made eye contact, and we tried to usher
her along...
That was Bastille Night, 1986, Independence Night in the
capital city of France. We were caught in our youth, lost in
unfamiliarity, and Falu's French carried us through. We stopped not far
from the landing of the Bateaux, at a hotel. Falu thought, then spoke, "Ou
est...?"
"Oui, Ou est...'where is,'" said the concierge of a now
unknown hotel to me. Falu guided us, and in a gap of my memory, we
arrived at the tour'eiffel. Immaculate, beautiful, a Holy Grail of
european tourism. Et nous ont ete la bas, a la tour, durant la nuit de
Bastille...
We
arrived under the Eiffel tower on that night, and the place was packed.
I was worried about Rupa, who was feeling very flirtatious. The pavement
was covered with firecracker papers - you couldn't even see the cement
for the broken red papers. There were groups of locals, and in an
instant, a fircracker blew up very close to my face. I couldn't see, and
Falu and Rupa got worried and guided me eventually to the hotel where we
all were staying.
In truthful
retrospect, I wonder now whether I was as blinded as I said I was, just
as a ruse to get us out of the situation where I was uncomfortable. I
was blinded at least temporarily, and I remember Falu guiding me out of
the crowd toward my perception of safety. I vaguely remember that we
arrived at the hotel safely that evening, late, according the face of
Mr. Stephens who was our chaperone, but not as late as some. We had the
time of our lives, as privileged youth will do when they are young. We
lived it to the edge of our comfort, and beyond, and recall it another two-scores
later.
But we still haven't gotten to Nice, now have we?
