April 2014—The announcements, invitations and press kits arrive daily in early spring, as they also do in September and then again in January, to present a new season of cultural happenings: exhibitions, renovated museums, restored rooms in castles, new routes for touring by bike, weekend festivals celebrating the centennial of this, the bicentennial of that, 400 years since the creation or birth or death of something or someone.
It’s a beautiful spring day today. We’re told that the air is moderately polluted, nevertheless the sky is cheery enough in its gauziness and the leaves of the Turkish filberts that line the street are a flirty green. I’m pleased that the scraggly lavender on my balcony has survived the winter. I could plant flowers, herbs. I could go biking out of the city. I could call a friend to play tennis.
No, not now. Comfortably ensconced on my couch, I consider the invitations, the pdfs, the brochures I’ve printed out and the documents I’ve received by post and at press events. I think about which exhibitions I might attend, which themes I’d like to investigate further, which piece of cultural news I might write about on its own or as part of something larger.
Aquitaine, the long coastal region of southwest France with the Dordogne bulge, is making a presentation about naturism and nudist camps; Douai, in the north, has mounted an exhibition about the preservation (and destruction) of art and cultural heritage during WWI, “Monuments Men” of an earlier generation; Fontainebleau has a new exhibition about François Gérard, “painter of kings, king of painters,” whose name has largely slipped through the cracks of art history; the Fraternal Order of Tripe Producers is once again gathering in Charlesville-Mézières.
I feel like I’m traveling. This is couch surfing at its best, and in Paris no less. I make coffee, grab a couple of macaroons that a thoughtful friend brought over the other day, take a few books from the shelf, notice the “Je ne suis pas un touristes” (I’m not a tourist) button then I was once given by a Burgundy tourist official, look down from the balcony to watch a woman who has strangely stopped in the middle of the crosswalk as though she’s suddenly forgotten where she was going, and I return to the couch.
As I say, I’m staying in today, working—though maybe work isn’t the best term for examining these documents and looking up further information in books; shuffling through them brings in no income, though it may eventually lead to some reward beyond knowledge itself. There must be some recompense for knowing that a nudist B&B has opened near Saint Emillion, n’est ce pas?
Perhaps it’s more like stamp collecting, traveling through space and time, sometimes daydreaming, sometimes investigating further before deciding that this one more special than that. In the past 45 minutes I’ve learned tidbits about the history of mining in Lewarde, the new WWI presentation in Péronne, the old recipes being revisited at the Napoleon III Festival in Vichy, the museum restoration in Pont-Aven, the biking routes around Bordeaux and the restaurant in Strasbourg that gained its first Michelin star.
I go through the pile: the Army Museum (Les Invalides) in Paris is examining the reality and the legend of d’Artagnan and the Musketeers; the Pinacothèque in Paris is doing the same with Cleopatra; Versailles has sent out their schedule of operas and concerts; Alsace, Poitou-Charentes, Limousin, Burgundy, Bordeaux, etc. Culture, history, folklore and gastronomy are in constant bloom throughout France.
One day, I think, I’ll get a call for personalized advice from VIP travelers with an interest in WWI, Napoleon III, d’Artagnan, Alsatian gastronomy, Burgundy wine, norther tripes and southern nudist B&Bs and I’ll know exactly where to steer them for an extraordinary stay in France.
But what’s this doing in the pile? A notice from the French tax authorities! And this? Something about new health coverage premiums. The Burgundy tourist official was right: je ne suis pas un touriste. But it’s such a beautiful spring day—I think I’ll go biking.
© 2014, Gary Lee Kraut