Setting Sun

I walk the same Paris city streets regularly. As I do so, I try to let the unexpected catch my attention, as well as enjoy the familiar that still fills my heart with joy.

But I do wonder. Will I stop seeing the beauty around me, in the way that we stop looking at the paintings or posters that hang in our homes? Will I begin to take this beautiful city for granted?

Thankfully it doesn't take much to snap me out of my musings. Just a turn or lifting of the head at just the right moment, and there it is, that connection with the here and now in all its perfection.

Walking home from a stroll along the Seine recently, skirting the Hotel de Ville from the back, I noticed the setting sun catching the yellow of the Metro "M", making it seem partially lit up.

Spring

For twelve years, I lived in Los Angeles, where flowers bloom year round: purple Jacarandas in April, fuchsia Silk Floss trees in September, Bougainvilleas and Oleanders all the time.

Bright colors were a part of every season.

And then two years ago, I moved to Paris, where in the winter color was drained out of the landscape leaving dark-gray slate roofs, dull-gray skies, pale-beige or drab-gray facades, leafless trees, and pale faces hidden under big scarves.

This year the winter was very mild, but the colors were still homogeneous. The lack of color on the outside gave me time to go within, to be dormant, setting the groundwork for spring.

And now it's here, earlier than expected, and just like last year, I'm somewhat unsettled and slightly in shock by it all.




Everywhere I look, there is a symphony of colors that borders on kitsch...Pink tulips growing next to blue hyacinths, sprouting next to bright yellow daffodils, springing next to pansies of all colors.

Trees growing flowers one day, and, as if by magic, leaves overnight, where a week earlier there were just smooth stems.

Color is everywhere and there is just no hiding from it; forcing me to pay attention; to snap out of the meditative inside to life bursting outside in all its glory.

A Glimpse...

The tiniest bit of warm sun is soaked up by sun-parched Parisians on an Easter Sunday by the Canal Saint Martin.