last night after the perfection of the eiffel had ended--and we had taken our separate subways back to our individual places, he text messaged me and asked what i was doing the next day. i was going to versailles. i wanted to go alone, but i invited him anyway because i knew he was only there for a couple of days and everyone should see versailles if they're in paris. or so i had been told.
he accepted the invitation and immediately i wish i hadn't extended it. as much as i had enjoyed him the previous day, i just wanted to keep enjoying the "aloneness". i told him where to meet me and at what time and then went to bed feeling the way i feel so often when i put other people's feelings before mine. then i resolved right then and there to stop doing that so much.
we were meeting early, so i got up and got ready. i had been looking forward to seeing versailles for soo long--it was a 'special' day in my mind's expection.
i arrived at our meeting spot on time. he wasn't there. i was relieved. he didn't call. i was relieved. he didn't show up. i was relieved.
after 15 minutes of waiting (which yes--i realize wasn't that much time), i got on the train to complete the remainder of the trip to versailles. i wanted to miss him. i hated that feeling of being that selfish, but it's what i felt...so i got on.
i arrived at the train station near versailles and my phone rang. it was him. i was not relieved. i wanted to be alone today more than any other day on the trip for some reason. i wanted to walk the gardens with my camera on and my mind off. i wanted to feel the 'nothingness' of alone energy around me and take it in and drink it down, but...it wasn't going to happen. i wasn't going to drink anything of the sort.
he was there waiting for me with a huge smile. i felt like a total bitch. then i smiled back anyway.
he had already been there long enough to walk through most of the gardens alone. i was hungry. i wanted to go straight to finding something to eat. he had already eaten. THIS was why i wanted to be alone. i didn't want to have to consider this about someone else. i didn't want to consider someone else at all.
he immediately suggested that we find something for me to eat...and then walk through the gardens again. wow.
simple. kind. thoughtful. discerning. mind-reader. angel.
we sat down to order. he took my camera right away. i was irritated by this. i was irritated period by him being there, even as sweet and perfect as he was. i felt again like i just wanted to be alone.
i ordered quiche, which he laughed at because i had ordered it for dinner the night before. that's what i wanted. that's what i ordered. i didn't want anyone laughing at my choices. i wanted to choose and just enjoy that choice without having to explain it or feel weird about it.
he ordered ice cream with a TON of whipped cream on it for lunch.
i forgot that i was irritated.
you can't sit across from a grown adult eating ice cream with whipped cream and a little yellow umbrella sticking out of it for lunch and not smile. i smiled-----the first smile of the time with him. he video'd it. i didn't know. again.
he gave me back the camera. i didn't look at what he had done. i didn't care. my camera made me feel like i wasn't naked. i just wanted to hold it and eat and not do anything else. and i didnt want him taking it away from me anymore...you never know when there might be a piece of dirt that intrigues me and that i want to take a photo of. i'm weird like that. i like that i'm weird like that. i just wanted to be weird with the dirt and my camera.
we walked down through the garden and i took a lot of pictures. he wanted to see them all. he liked my photos and wanted to see if i got a 'good one'. i was irritated again. he felt it.
i walked for a bit and as i continued on i could feel him less and less. i didn't care. i didn't want to feel him. i only wanted to feel me. i kept walking. he kept following but his gant got slower and slower.
we came to the part of the gardens that is intersected by a 'pond' that is very formally laid out. there were paddle boats lined all along the pond. i wanted to be in one. i needed to be in one. i needed the water. i needed my feet in it, my hands in it--my body in it. i wanted to run away in it. alone.
he came up behind me and saw me looking at the boats and asked if i wanted to go on one. i shook my head 'no'. he heard 'yes'. he had never been on a paddle boat before. he was scared of the water. he got in it and didn't tell me either of these things until we were in the boat...which he nearly tipped over while trying to balance while getting in. i laughed. i guess that made him happy. he laughed too.
something about being in that boat took away my irritation. it completely turned every single thing around in my mind, my body and my soul until i was totally content. content with him being there. content with the fact that he had never been in one before. content that i would have to row because he didn't know how. content to teach him. content watching him laugh while trying. content with him not doing a very good job at keeping us in a consistent direction. content being on the water. totally content. beyond content. happy.
he asked for my camera. i rowed while he took pictures (i thought) of the surroundings. he took a lot of 'photos' in my direction. a lot. little did i know....
we stayed on the row boat for an hour. we had paid for an hour and i rowed the first quarter of the way--the showed him how and he rowed for the next quarter and then when we realized that we were going to be late getting the boat back, i rowed it in quickly--him taking 'photos' all the way--while i laughed at him....and while i just mindlessly talked about stuff that no one cares about--not even me. but he did...or maybe he didn't. but his video did.
we got out and i wanted to walk further down into the forest where there are trails that are more hidden and less frequently taken. he didn't know there were any, but i don't think he wanted to walk anymore. he did anyway. i wasn't stopping either way.
i had walked for about 20 minutes i guess--totally wrapped up in some thought process in my mind...and in taking more photos. without looking, i realized that he wasn't there anymore. he wasn't behind me. he wasn't next to me.
i looked everywhere.....i saw him about a quarter of a mile behind me...walking very slowly and not at all in my direction. i kept walking and decided to just let it 'be'.
i walked for maybe another hour and then got a call from charlotte that our dinner date was going to be early and that i needed to head home. i didn't want to 'head home'. i hadn't seen marie antoinette's house yet. i hadn't seen that little hidden garden that i wanted to see. there was a bridge up ahead that i wanted to take a picture of. i wasn't ready to leave.
but i did.
i walked away from there feeling sad. like i hadn't seen what i went there to see. like i wasn't totally fulfilled by this tour. like i was being pushed to do something tonight that i didn't want to do and if there is anything i hate it's being pushed to do something i don't want to do. i wanted to act like the little girl that i felt like and sit down there on the trail and refuse to leave. but i didn't. on the outside anyway.
i ran into modesto on the way back. i was happy to be able to say goodbye to him. i asked what happened to him. he spoke his profoundness so loud and clear to me in this moment when he said, 'i felt like you needed to see the rest by yourself'.
how is it that you can spend 31 years under the care of a person and they can't understand you like a person that you JUST met and have spent less than 10 hours of your life understands you? and i hadn't "said" a word. not one. i never asked him to go. i thought i had covered my 'irritation' well. i tried to anyway. it didn't matter. he wasn't upset. he was kind. he was quiet and understanding...and he had let me just be 'me'. no complaint. no 'why are you being so quiet'. no irritation with my irritation. he just understood..and went away...and gave me just what i needed in that moment: me.
we hugged and i told him i would send the pictures to him that he had taken. he smiled and told me to keep in touch.
i walked back to the station alone and got on the train bound for charlotte's dinner plans. i wasn't all that happy. i felt weird. i felt guilty for not having made him feel welcome enough to stick around all afternoon while i meandered through the rest of the park. i felt guilty for not waiting for him longer at the train station that morning. i felt guilty for getting on the train knowing that he was probably going to show up a little later. i just was having one of those moments in which i didn't like myself very much.
i turned on my camera. sitting on the train i started to peruse through the pictures that i took earlier in the morning--going through the castle. through the "hall of mirrors" that i didn't want to look in. through and down the gardens until i had seen modesto and a couple took our photo together.
then--i saw a photo of me that he had taken at lunch. only it had the little 'play' button blinking on it. i hit play. then it hit me back.
he had video taped me sitting there with my hair perfectly a mess from the wind. he taped me eating, chewing, laughing at his little umbrella covered ice cream lunch.
it was short. i watched it again.
and again.
i saw something there that i didn't know existed anymore. there was a happy girl sitting there. there was a beautiful girl sitting there. i saw a confident girl sitting there...and a funny one. actually what i saw was a woman. tiny, but all woman.
i watched it again.
then the next one...where i was walking in front of him. where i was turning around laughing at him and my hair was all over the place.
and the next..where i rowed him around the pond of versailles. the sun on my face making my eyes light up like a green and blue rainbow. the sound of my laugh....which i liked actually. the 'frail' strength of my body.
i watched that one three times. no four.
i got home and put the videos on the computer so that i could see them bigger. i actually was stunned by how much i liked what i saw. how 'different' she was than i imagined. how 'un-broken' she was...when how i saw her in my mind was splintered. i sat there at my laptop for about an hour by myself watching those videos and cried. i watched a person that i thought was dead in living form. i watched her and i fell in love with her.
i text messaged him and told him 'thank you' for what he gave me, although my text messaged words could never convey it-- he had given me a view of me that made me feel beautiful.
he understood what i meant exactly but told me that he had felt 'useless' all day and he thanked me for telling him what his videos meant to me.
wow.
he was one very dark angel with one very useful gesture. i saw exactly what i was supposed to see that day at versailles. but it had nothing to do with the gardens, or that little trail that i missed.
