Day Forty-Eight: The Ninth Circle of Orly
Well, here's the reason so many books have silly and/or disappointing endings. The author, having been fired with expansive sentiments, shrewd observations and poignant rhetoric, plans a finale full of subtlety, emotion and edification... And by the time she gets to it, she's too damn tired and remembers hardly any of it.
I am on the plane. I had a variety of thoughts to record that would elevate and inspire, but right now I'm so weary and footsore that I feel like I've been savagely beaten. The effort to keep clear of the hijinks of the young marrieds in the seats next to me while not falling into the aisle and getting my head whopped by a beverage cart... the child with pterodactyl ancestry just behind annoying us all bilingually... the long procession of ill manners and poor organization that has so far distinguished this set of travelers... it is all providing an early buffeting to my commitment to peaceful joy in all aspects of life.
But sometimes our species is so hateful...
The counsels of peaceful joy would say -- the flight is only eight hours more and folks will be simmering down and going to sleep soon... Young love is nothing more to be ashamed of than health or beauty or any other arbitrary blessing... It's good for children to be unafraid of expressing themselves.
But back to the beginning, to this morning. I settled up and got my taxi to Montparnasse without incident.
And there the horror begins.
None of the technologically advanced electronic lockers in the station work. None. There are no less technologically advanced, usable lockers in the Gare. Staring at my albatrosses, I am nonplussed.
Maybe there's a cloakroom at Cluny that will accept my baggage while I view the museum? I have the phone number -- why not call and find out before heading over there?
There are no phones that accept franc pieces in the Gare. I haul my albatrosses from pillar to post, no longer nonplussed but livid. The cheapest telecarte I can buy at the station newsstand is 40 francs.
Damn the frogs.
The woman at the Cluny information number is not encouraging, and I don't have the physical stamina to contemplate what would happen if they declined to take my albatrosses. Reluctantly, I decided to take a cab back to the hotel and take a room for another day, to establish my right to leave baggage there.
And surprise, surprise -- the folks at the Ibis are more than friendly, and show me into their special little room where people can leave baggage for free -- Monsieur won't even take a pourboire from me. I scamper off a hundred pounds lighter in body and spirit.
The amount of time wasted in this exercise was not inordinate, and for once I didn't even turn the wrong way when emerging from the Metro into the street.
Did I mention that the Cluny hosts a Friday lunchtime concert series of early music -- today's offering 12th and 13th century trouvere chansons -- ending exactly at the time I need to start heading for the airport?
Well, I couldn't have even begun to concentrate enough on such a beautiful, rich collection as is gathered here -- I just zenned out and wandered from case to case enjoying anything that rose especially to the eye. I suppose I left drool in every room... I had been thinking, "God, these are far and away the best tapestries I've ever seen" -- BEFORE I got to the "Lady and the Unicorn" room. What the reproductions don't show well, or I had never noticed before, is how merry the unicorn looks, as if it's just about to break into the giggles. The other tapestries are amazing too -- the detail, the motion of the drapery on the figures, the individuality of the faces -- these are PORTRAITS, ferchrissakes. Unfortunately, they are hung a little high -- prolonged perusal gives you a crick in the neck.
What else, what else? A terrific Ste. Marguerite with the cloven dragon curled up underfoot lime green and sheepish like a cartoon character, "I been a baaaaaad dragon, Margie..." I'm willing to bet the life-sized head of John the Baptist (complete with plate) was tacky even in the 14th century. Jittered quickly past the Romanesque capital section... Some beautiful books of hours cunningly displayed in frames on binder rings, so one could see both sides (one imaginative naturalist substituted a lobster for the sign of Cancer -- one can imagine a plaintive, "Well, I can't do crabs...") And by the time I'd wandered to the end and back, it was time to lose my head in the gift shop prior to the concert.
The concert space is a lovely one -- a white stone courtyard full of headless statues and statueless heads -- terrific acoustics. The ensemble was a tidy, hardworking little group -- everyone turning their hands to half a dozen instruments, with the soprano working the bellows on the harmonium as required. And what a soprano! The first song was the same one Harriet and Peter Wimsey sing in Busman's Honeymoon, and the soprano so pure and fresh and lovely, I soon found warm, slow tears making their way down my face. Not from sadness, mind, but from fullness.
But this was not, to my surprise, my final brush with the performing arts in Paris. I dashed for the Metro, my head sweetly dizzy with counterpoint, when I heard the sound (second to automatic weaponfire) you least want to hear on public transportation. "DAAAAAAY-OOO! Daa--aaa-aaa-o!"
I saw that everyone facing opposite me had a look of blank disbelief, the sort of look you get when someone is undressing in public... Should I turn around? If someone is stripping to the Banana Boat Song in your subway car, I guess you should know -- to be able to avert physical contact, if for no other reason.
Two enterprising impresarios were holding a rope between them; a third artiste had thrown a large navy blue towel over it to make an impromptu stage for the lively gambolings of their sock puppets. Yes! Subway Sock Puppet Cabaret was my last contact with the French Art Scene.
It wouldn't have been me trying to catch a plane if I didn't get lost then... I got so dang frustrated -- I exited from the wrong end of the Montparnasse Metro station in my hurry to put as much of God's fresh air between me and the sock puppeteers, and walked far enough in the wrong direction to hit the next station on the line -- I hailed a taxi. The very kind fellow behind the wheel was appalled by my itinerary (taxi to hotel, then to Orlybus, Orlybus to Orly) and offered to take me to Orly himself for one hundred francs. I leapt at the offer -- leapt out of the cab, leapt at my albatrosses, and leapt back.
The only problem is he left me at the wrong terminal -- I don't know if it was Orly West or Orly South, but it was the wrong one, I discovered after mournfully tramping up and down looking for Corsair. I managed to elicit information from the information desk -- miracle de dieu! -- about a shuttle bus that would take me to the other terminal toute suite.
...Where I arrived in time to spend a thousand hours in poorly organized lines with rude, selfish, sneaky, line-jumping sort of people. If this plane goes down, there's plenty of folks around me who are taking mortal sins to the other side, that's all I have to say.
Anyway, here I am, and however uncomfortable I am in body and soul, it will end. I will never have to carry those bags again, and I'll sleep in my own bed with my own cats.
Postscript: Upon arrival, I found, with disbelieving fury, that I was the only person on the entire plane who was paying duty. I'm a librarian, fergawdsake -- I'm compelled to play by the rules. Everyone else was streaming by, "Nope, this case of wine cost $3.89..." while the peons of the US Customs Service puzzled their noodles over how to go about taking money from someone. I'm not kidding, they had to actually call a supervisor to find out how to take money. Welcome home!