I’ve never been there. I thought about it once. I could have
extended for another six months in the “Dirty Little War,” and they would have
sent me anywhere in, what they called back then, the “Free World,” for a month
and then brought me back. It was called “basket leave” and didn’t count toward any
leave on your records. It was free, but so would have been the “ass-whupping”
my Sainted Mother would have given me next time I saw her.
Still, I thought about it. I had read that those folks drank
wine with breakfast and I thought that was pretty neat. Oh yeah, there were the
cathedrals and museums and places where Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and the others showed
out. It would have been terribly interesting, but I opted to return home, or
at least to go to Charleston, South Carolina and live aboard a ship for a year
and a half. Oh well. Sainted Mother was happy, but she didn’t have to deal with
the people of South Carolina and their gendarmes.
They made the Viet Cong seem like Disneyland tour guides.
At any rate. I’ve thought about the French over the years. I’ve
heard that they don’t like tourists, but I’ve also heard that they don’t like
anyone and that it is only Americans who take it personally. My father-in-law
was through there with the 79th Infantry Division. He wasn’t too
fond of the French, but then, like I’ve heard many a veteran of the “Good War”
say, the only Europeans that the American soldiers liked and identified with
were the German people, and that was after all the fighting and crap.
He told the funniest story. During the occupation, he saw a
young woman standing in the yard holding a young dog. Trying to maintain good international
relations, he commented on what a nice “puppy” she had. After several moments
of miscommunication, she nodded in understanding and giving the universal “wait
one” sign, ran into the house, returning moments later with a partial role of
toilet paper.
I thought about when the French opted out of the monumental
crime and misadventure known as the American invasion of Iraq. There was once,
while at a “church” function, I heard a dentist, his son, and a “minister,” without
one second of military service between them, referring to “French Surrender-Monkeys.”
Gagging, I held my tongue, but thought about French villages that,
after World War One could hardly muster an undamaged man between the ages of
14 and 70, “Surrender Monkeys” indeed. War is a simple matter for people, like most of our current leaders, who have never seen one up close and personal.
So, I spent some time yesterday regretting the fact that a wondrous work of human endeavor was gone while the most corrupt
government in American history still stood. You know, I read once where the
French had let that cathedral deteriorate, paying it scant attention, until
Victor Hugo immortalized it in his famous novel. Then, observing it, as if for the
first time, falling into ruin, they went about restoring its wondrous beauty.
Maybe it takes the realities of abuse and neglect to awake people
to the beauty, not only of structures, but a country as well. I, for one, will
hold out for restoration instead of the all-consuming fire. I think it's important.
 |
A thing of beauty is a joy forever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health,
and quiet breathing.
- John Keats |
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