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| street in Bruniquel, France |
The Art Gallery, the Castle and the Priest
And though it went in that order, the day’s events that is, it didn’t end there, with the short walk together down the stone steps in some unknown, unfamiliar street in the ancient town of Bruniquel. I thought there was only one main street, the one we walked up, to reach the castle. After we left the castle, I could only see one road, but we must have branched off somewhere, maybe when I was distracted by a spreading lemon tree, or a short flight of stone steps, or a few pigeons on a rooftop, silhouetted against the pale grey sky.
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| lemon tree, Bruniquel |
It was late afternoon, and the sky had been grey all day, a smooth cloud surface, nothing interrupting the uniformity, so the background remains in memory, the yellow stone steps downhill, or in Montricoux, the doorway framing the entrance to the garden where, we were assured, the museum curator lived. The same background, playing no part, and it is as if we, the actors, moving in and out of doorways, moving from one place to another, changing scenery but always with the same backdrop, we actors and our encounters, our relations, and what we do, are thrown into relief, we acquire colour and energy and we acquire too, significance.
This for me has always been one of the hallmarks of spending time in France. That rush, like a southern wind, of significance. I travel a long way for that energy that spreads, like a lamp lit in autumn, a soft glow maybe in the darkness, but what a difference.
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| pigeons on roof, Bruniquel |
It becomes clear that this street in Bruniquel is not the one we walked up. So, where to now, how to find the street where the car is parked. A man approaches, he wears a hat, has a short beard, one arm in a cloth sling, and a long sweeping coat of expansive cloth wraps around him like a robe. He and his companion are also looking for their car. We are lost says P* and the robed man says it is good to be lost for then you will be found. He then says something about time and eternity. Or was it Diego who said that? Whoever it was, I don’t quite remember it, or who said it originally. But this man seems to suggest that we are heading towards our childhood rather than away from it. But he smiles broadly, and says Dieu vous bénisse, well, a blessing can only be another good thing, even if you can’t collect them in a jar reverently like rare stones, you can collect the memories.
He must be a priest I think, and later, after we have both got lost in the same direction, only we were not lost, we were on the way to being found, easier for him as he had someone else to go looking for him, he said that he was, and that his name was Père Lazar, and he lived on Mount Athos.
Never in all my years have I met someone who lives on Mount Athos. I should remember though that the tram from the métro station Villejuif Louis Aragon had as its destination, Athis-Mons. And every day I went into the métro station or I walked past it, and I saw the trams outside. And sometimes their destinations were Athis-Mons & sometimes it was on ne prend pas de voyageurs. And when I left the flat in the towerblock for the last time, it was 6.30 am, I took the tram to reach the métro station, line 7 to Jussieu, to change there for Austerlitz. And it was dark and though there were already many people on the tram, perhaps going to work in many different places I could not imagine, there was that silent, early morning feeling of significance. Pre-dawn dark with its promise of light, that is like the robe of god itself, it hides, and it hammers at your heart until all defences are lowered like a drawbridge, and the huge wooden doors of la bastide are pushed open.
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| gare d'Austerlitz, Paris |
So we continue walking together, the priest and his friend, P* and myself, all of us now clearly lost, and lost together, with Père Lazar saying that it is wonderful to be lost.
We take our leave from the priest and Bruniquel, and travel back to Montricoux because P* left his walking stick behind. He phoned Diego to ask if he had left it in the museum and when Diego called back to say it was not there, P* said he might have left it round the corner propped against the wall in front of the laundrette, where we had parked the car. A few minutes later Diego called back to say he had gone there, found the walking stick, to P*’s delight, he brought it back to the museum and so we head back there, to collect it.
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| carved capitol at Chateau de Bruniquel |
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