We left Lyons a bit groggy-eyed. Fortunately the rain had let up and the sun warmed us a bit as we stood by the side of the road and stuck our thumbs out. I cannot remember all the rides we had that day, but I do remember the last one. A fairly genial young man, maybe in his late twenties to mid thirties, picked us up in his big moving van. He had fairly long hair, wire-rimmed glasses, and soft features. Back then in France I remember being struck at how people seemed to have a number of well defined class and socio-economic roles. These weren�t necessarily seen as bad. In fact, they gave a well defined structure to ones work and career life, freeing one up to lead enriching interior lives. Our truck driver had a job, a truck, and a house. The state took good care of him. He had all he needed. But I wouldn�t necessarily call him complacent.

He lived in Avignon, and as the day was drawing to a close by the time we got that far, he offered to put us up for the night with his family. After the night before, we tired gypsies rejoiced at our good fortune.

Let�s call our host Jean. Jean lived in a nice two-story house in a small suburb of villas that lay on either side of eucalyptus lined streets. His wife greeted us and did not seem at all put out by his having brought us home. Inside we found a very comfortable place in the Mediterranean style with marble floors and efficient cupboards, shelves and organizers. The place had big windows that on the second floor opened out onto a balcony which commanded a breathtaking view of the mountains. He told me that when the Mistral blew, it would blow debris onto the balcony and it was awesome to watch the force and speed of it in that tight space. On the ground floor on the other side of the house he took us into his ample back yard where he had a sizeable garden. It was there that I first saw an espalier, which is when they train and prune the branches of a fruit tree to run along a low frame or a fence so that the fruit can be easily harvested.

Back inside the house, his wife fed us a great meal that we shared with their two beautiful children, a boy and a girl about 3 and 5. After dinner, we sat around talking. He was not snobby or impatient with my French and I found myself having a nice conversation with him. We did not watch TV-I�m not sure if they owned one and it would have been an affront I�m sure to put it before one�s guests.

When it was time to turn in, he showed us our rooms. On the way, we passed a family photo. In it I saw there were three children-an older girl who did not sit with us at the table. When I asked him about her, Josef said �Oh. That was my oldest daughter. She passed away last year. She had a bad heart.� And as he said it, he brought his right hand up in a tender gesture and tapped lightly over his own heart. My own heart aches now, 22 years later, as I remember what a sad thing to have happen to such a sweet guy. Yet, he did not seem to have a victim�s mentality or feel outraged at his luck. �Yes, that is life,� he sighed.

When I first got to Paris, there was a big flap in the papers at how the Americans had developed the neutron bomb. This bomb, we were told, would create a blast of sub-atomic particles that would not harm buildings but which would kill all animal life in the vicinity where it was dropped. Somehow that was seen as the perfect weapon. To my mind, it represents the purest of evil. Way back before there were guns, armies fought hand to hand and the terror of that I�m sure made power hungry men think twice before leading their troops into battle. World War II, pretty much dropped the pretense that war was fought by soldiers for noble causes and the civilian population was not to be included in the target. With this bomb, however, you could wage war from afar, never seeing your enemy, which it killed indiscriminately-men, women and children, soldiers and civilians.

Because I did come from America and bought into the victim�s �why me?� mentality, I took every affront by Parisians personally. Therefore, I am ashamed to say, when news of the neutron bomb broke, I joked that Paris was the perfect place to drop the neutron bomb-�get rid of the Parisians and it would be a great place.�

That was before I met Joseph, however, who restored my faith not just in the French but in all of humanity. It reminds me of a quote I recently heard by the fiction writer, Scot Turow. �Why do bad things happen to good people?� a character asks. �I�m convinced that God does that to us to bring us together. If everything were perfect and there was no suffering, we�d all just be these individuals doing our own thing.� That pretty much sums up what I learned from Joseph.

Ravel�s Pavane Pour une Infante Defunte is one of his most well known and lovely pieces. There are two versions of it-one for piano and one for orchestra. Thought he piece means a kind of dance �for a dead infant,� Ravel did not write it for anyone in particular. He actually wrote it to evoke the pleasant emotions the sounds of the word had on him. And the word �infante,� refers to the child of a Spanish monarch, the French word for child being �enfante.�

I haven't heard this piece for a long time, but writing about Joseph and his daughter reminded me of it. It's things like this that make life truly worth living.

Ravel Bio Midi Files: Scroll down to Ravel. There are three midis of this piece. The third one is the best. Album with Real Audio

Enjoy

top