A ways back, I wrote a piece called Notre Dame Burns and I Can Not Cry. It was mostly about my minimalistic approach to life recently and in that throwing out of unnecessary junk, I accidentally threw out my appreciation and love of beauty for the sake of beauty. I used ND as an example because I wasn’t able to fathom why anyone cared this much about a building, old and pretty albeit.
Since that post, I had the opportunity to travel to France. Notre Dame is closed for the burn renovations, but walking around the outside of it was more powerful than I expected. Because of the nationwide strike at the time, I walked a good chunk of Paris. I wasn’t able to use the metro system as thoroughly, so I hit the streets became better acquainted with Paris on a more personal level. Notre Dame is the center of Paris, the historical and literal center, the beginning of Paris, on a literal island, that many view as almost sacred. It is Ground Zero for both the city and for Parisians. That helped my understanding to the response to this fire. Notre Dame burns, and it is seen as all of Paris burning with it. The Louvre, the Musee d’Orsay, the Eiffel Tower, Moulin Rouge, all safe. But it didn’t matter, because Notre Dame is Paris.
So there’s my recant of my dislike of the planet-wide response to ND burning. (I do still stand by the opinion that the Amazon burning should have brought together more donors to stop it. That should be more important to the world, but alas, even if more money was donated to stop the Amazon, the Brazilian president probably wouldn’t stop his savagery. )
My nephew was in Macedonia for three months, and flew home to right before Christmas, via Paris. Confession: I have never had a desire to go to France. Maybe the south of France in Provence, but no big desire to navigate Paris since it seemed simply like a prettier version of New York. I’m not a fan of big cities. Give me the cathedrals of mountains and deserted hiking trails over crowded city streets leading to beautiful man-made structures any day. But I also rarely turn down a chance for adventure, so I found myself studying French on Duolingo and flying out in early December.
I get it now. Paris is a big city. It does smell like New York, share its tiny streets, and my anxiety did peak a couple times. But I get it, Paris. You’re great. The buildings as old as my country. The bakeries every block with cheap croissants melting in my mouth. Macaroons. Wine. Musée d’Orsay was my favorite, and it might be my favorite art museum of all time. The chance to stand closely to Van Gogh works and see his brush strokes, was a beautiful moment of my life, one I will cherish for a long time. His ability to take his own pain and manifest it through color and light, has made my own life better. Thank you, Vincent.
The Venus de Milo, The Winged Victory, Liberty Leading the People by Delacroix, Saint Chapelle, Monet’s Water Lillies–this city is full of beauty for the sake of beauty. I would go as far to posit that this is what Paris is–the expression of beauty in our world, a purveyor of beauty, a collector of all things beauty for beauty’s sake.
Thanks, Paris. Thanks for bringing me back to beauty, for showing me the greatness that comes of both simple and complex beauty. For pulling me out of this funk of active disappreciation of beauty and life’s expression. You helped me see humanity’s view of creation in new ways, and now I can begin all again, my own search for and creation of beauty, simply for the sake of beauty.
Honorable mentions to Bordeaux and Marseille, two spectacular cities. Cit de Vin in B and M’s own Notre Dame are well worth the train tickets.
Petrichor 