From There To Here - 26 April 2011

Tuesday, 26th April 2011 

A week ago, today, we stood on the promenade in Nice. A few feet from us a flutist played something haunting and bittersweet. I fell into my husband’s arms and sobbed quietly as I looked out to sea. The music, us, the sea, the horizon, as unreachable as ever, filled me with a sadness for all that I had ever reached for and fallen short of and for all that would, like the horizon, forever remain beyond me. And then the music ended, the moment passed and we walked on, leaving the sea to its own restless tide.

The day was warm and breezy, the old part of town beckoned. And so we wandered up and down the now familiar streets that we had come, slowly, to love over the past few weeks. Like so much of our experience in Provence, Nice put us in our place.

This town, which we had scorned upon arrival, seeing only the modern ruin of it, became one of many teachers that taught us how to look beyond disappointment and judgment to that which remains. And perhaps these spaces and places that still exist are even more precious to us because they have survived not only in spite of us, but because of us. By us, I mean those valiant souls who treasure history and tradition and find a way to keep its heart beating amidst the urban sprawl. Looking back over our weeks there, we see that it was this discovery, time and time again, that not only took our breath away, but comforted and nourished our spirits.

As I write this I am sitting on the couch in our living room in New York, looking up once in a while to watch the light play on the Hudson River. Helicopters are a constant whirr, a jack-hammer joins in, behind which plays the endless drone of traffic streaming along the West Side Highway. I try to turn these sounds into jazz but it’s not working and I’m wondering how do I look beyond this and find something of value, here, in the greatest urban sprawl of all.

A few seconds of silence descend and in that still, small space a bird sings.