the secret life of flowers: beautiful things

chapter 2: i saw the water lilies, and they changed my life~

last thursday, snapdragon and i made the trip out to Giverny, the little town outside paris where Monet lived. it had been pouring all week, but we had to go this weekend because the house/gardens are only open until the end of october, and then they close for the winter. and, for those of you who don't know this, i am obsessed, capital o-b-s-e-s-s-e-d with monet. i am just awed by him, maybe the way other people feel about... god i don't know the way my friends used to feel about the backstreet boys in the 6th grade. or the way people are obsessed with justin timberlake and jennifer aniston and brad pitt and lauren whatever-her-name-is that's on mtv all the time. he's a rock star for me, like da vinci and marx and benazir bhutto and and sartre and judith butler and shakespeare and olympe de gouges and the beatles. so when we found out we could visit his house for as much money as it cost me to print my revolutions project (about 30euro, which yes is ridiculous for printing, i told you this city was crazy), i had to, had to do it.

we got up early-ish that morning and got to the train station more than an hour before our train was supposed to leave (probly like 10ish), our train left at 11:03. we decided in line that, as we were at a major train station in paris, i would just ask for our ticket in english and we wouldn't waste the cashier's time and ours by me stumbling through sentences trying to practice my french. but, when we got up to the desk, our plans were foiled, because when i asked for "2 (and held up 2 fingers) to Giverny", the man looked down his nose at me and said, with no accent whatsoever, "i don't speak english". so, i glared back at him, held my 2 fingers up again and said "2 å giverny". he smirked a little, pleased with himself, but i was happy because he was unable to fluster me, and i answered every question he asked.
once we successfully bought our tickets, we wandered around outside for a little, and noticed a bridal shop! very normal, except it had a giant stuffed tiger in the window. jamila (my stuffed giraffe who is travelling around paris with me. dont worry about it, the pictures will explain everything) really likes finding other stuffed animals besides herself, so we took a picture of it. however, the connection between wedding dresses and tigers i dont understand at all, maybe here tigers are a symbol of matrimonial love, but i was not informed. observe the ridiculous:

anyway, so we got on the train, and took it to Vernon, a little town near Giverny. then we took a bus to Giverny, which was not at all hard to find. it was a fun game of: follow the old people! seriously, if it had not been for a 2 year old along for the ride with grandma and grandpa, we would have been the youngest people there by far. too bad this wasn't an episode of the amazing race, we would've won for sure. we even sat by the exit of the bus! just in case.

um this is the bus stop in giverny? supercute.

when we got to giverny, i didn't even know what to do with myself. we were lucky, and it was an absolutely beautiful day. our bus arrived and pulled into a parking lot on a field, we could have been anywhere. the hills looked so much like home that i had to keep reminding myself that i was in france. we found our way to a roundabout-- and were nearly mowed over by about 4 minicoopers and a semi. again, we followed the old people (who by now we had discovered were americans) until we found this sign:

i took a picture of it for you, mom. <3>

we walked along the main street of this little town, which really, was the only street that wasnt a driveway (it was called rue claude monet). all the houses were covered in ivy, which was red because it was fall. it was absolutely gorgeous, and we both laughed about how stalkerish we felt taking pictures of random people's houses. i didn't feel too badly for them; they live in the french countryside within walking distance of monet's garden. we finally made our way there, and paid our 6 euros to get in as students (which is always an accomplishment for me; i no longer have a valid student id since it was stolen 3 weeks ago). but we finally got inside, and walked into the garden. it was breathtaking. honestly, there aren't words to describe it. we probably spent over an hour just in the first part of the garden, taking pictures of every flower we could find. normally, i have a hard time taking pictures, but this was different. i wasn't posing awkwardly in front of the eiffel tower,trying to smile as if caught, spontaneously, in a moment of actual life enjoyment, and not as if i'm exhausted and i have to pee and this is the 35th picture i've posed for today. it was art, and me making art, and art making itself, and i really, really liked it. i think i'd really like to be a photographer, really. i told snapdragon that with 3 hours and 3 nude models, i could make myself famous. my flower obsession was thoroughly satisfied; this garden was breathtaking. it had personality, and it was falling all over itself, too busy being beautiful to care. it was absolutely wild, as if someone had once, a long time ago, just mixed a thousand types of flower seeds in a big bowl and thrown them all over the place. and i remember asking out loud why anybody even goes to Versailles, and why there were only 30 people on our bus, and why young people don't go here. why was everyone in that garden 65? and why don't we consider this garden with the type of reverence we do with the kings' gardens? is it because they belonged to kings? is it because they remind us of an era we romanticize, and a time we imagine to be full of kings and princesses and chivalry, whatever chivalry means to us, and renaissance, whatever renaissance means to us? versailles was gorgeous, but i am not in love with versailles. i am in love with monet's garden. and if im in love with monet's garden, with its wildness and its poetry and its absolute refusal to be anything other than what it is, what is everyone else in love with? everything that versaillees represents- order, wealth, uniform extravagance, our supposed supremacy over the natural world? straight hedges, straight trees, straight roses, straight lines? i guess that explains our differences, then.

we continued through the garden, making art and begging the flowers' forgiveness for invading their privacy. but they insisted that they didn't mind. and we danced with them. it was nice.

here, as promised, is my giraffe, jamila noor. as you can see, she's very photogenic.

next we went "downstairs". we climbed down the stairs to the lower gardens, and came out of the tunnel into the sun. there was a field trip of maybe 4th graders to the gardens (thank god) and they were playing pooh sticks. for the unenlightenened, i will explain: pooh sticks is a game, played on winnie the pooh (hence the name) in which all the players find sticks (see really, this game is pretty self-explanatory) and stand on a bridge with running water under it. they each drop their sticks on one side of the bridge, then run to the other side to watch them come out from under the bridge. the player whose stick wins the race and come out first wins. i have been playing this game with my family at henry cowell woods since probably before i could remember. so, these 4th graders were playing pooh sticks, and i turned to snapdragon and- remembering that no one i have explained it to has ever heard of pooh sticks- asked if she had ever played "racing sticks under bridges". to which she replied "yeah, of course, it's called--": and i said "we call it--": "pooh sticks". at nearly the same time. first, i almost died. then, i just stood there and stared at her, and asked her where she'd been all my life, and shook my head a couple times, and finally managed to squeak out:"you play pooh sticks?!" "oh yeah, my family plays it all the time. of course i know pooh sticks". my brain exploded several hundred times, and i remembered why we're getting married.

but when we saw the pond, we got very quiet, as if there was nothing else there. it was the most beautiful thing i've ever seen. there were trees and flowers and wines everywhere, and you cou;dn't tell one from the other. the horizon had disappeared and there was no way to differentiate between the sky and the trees and the water. and the water, it was made of light. there were lily pads and a little boat and a man in another little boat scooping leaves out of the pond and collecting them. it's one of the most beautiful things i've ever seen. and when i saw the bridge, i stopped breathing. i've seen that bridge painted so many times, beautiful every time. i was sure that when i saw the real thing, i'd be disappointed, that nothing could be as beautiful as the image monet had painted in my head. but i was wrong. it was incredible. and it made me think about... everything. i always wondered why he painted, what made him wake up and decide that today it would be water lilies. but i saw that garden, and the way the reflection in the water made real life and colors and lines blend together i thought that if i saw this every morning, i would be nothing but a painter. i wouldn't be able to help myself.

it made me think about why im not a painter, which strangely is something i think about on a pretty regular basis. really, the things i want to do with my life are crazy, and i've come to terms with the fact that doing them will not make me happy. it will not be fun. my chosen career is certainly an unpleasant one. i mean, im not one of those people who is planning to do something they hate for 10 years until they're filthy rich and can live off it for the rest of their lives. obviously. i want to work for an NGO that does human rights work, and maybe someday have my own- basically, i want to make social rights happen. women's rights, children's rights, prisoners of conscience, labor rights, religious/ethnic/gender/everything-else equality. and really, what that means is that i'll be dealing every day with the things that scare me most, the things that make me the most angry. the events that we talk about in human rights class and i have to put my headphones in because i can't listen to it, even just in passing. that's what i want to do with my life. and it's not for love and it's not really rational- i mean, there are rational aspects to the decisions i make. i am aware that i live in a staggering level of luxury compared to the vast majority of the people on this planet. i am also aware that my standard of living is unsustainable if a greater level of world equality is to be achieved. i think that if people who had things just gave some of them away, we'd all probably be doing ok. but we're not giving anything away and we're not doing ok. it bothers me that some people have everything and other people have nothing, be it money or political power or social status or anything else. and i want women to be empowered and i want white people to stop prancing around like they own the place, and i want our children to grow up better than us. and i know that this is me being silly, and that it won't happen, and that no matter what i do, i won't won't won't in a million years fix what's been broken for as long as we've been writing things down, but i think that's precisely why i know that this is what i want to do. because it's illogical, and irrational, and impossible, and it won't be fun, and i can't tell you why, but i just have to. if i was going to do something for love, it would be poetry, or art, or maybe fashion (but whatever it was, it would be philosophy). and some days i really just want to change my major and go to art school and after that go live in an abandoned lighthouse in iceland and make a living by building fountains out of weird things like pots and pans and silverware, and collect books and drink coffee and write a lot and paint a lot. and i wonder what would happen if i did, and if id be able to be happy that way, doing everything that would in theory make me happy. anyway that probably seems way off topic, but i thought about it a lot, looking at the water lilies, and wondering if, had i lived here, i could have ever done anything but paint.

anyway, so we walked around the garden for a while, and took pictures and sat and meditated and stood on bridges and watched the man in the little boat scoop leaves out of the water. we wandered through a bamboo area, and across a little stream, and around several giant trees, and then back to the pond. it was really gorgeous. and i told snapdragon that this was one of the only places in the world where i would never even think to take a flower from. if you didn't know, this blog is named after my poetry journal, also entitled "the secret life of flowers". and, in the back of the journal, i collect flowers from places that inspire me. im accumulating quite a collection. but i would never, ever, ever in my life pick a flower from monet's garden. walking around his house was like being in a holy place for me; i wasn't sarcastic and i wasn't funny and i wasn't even thoughtful, i just was. in his kitchen, which was wholly covered in blue and white tile, and a little overwhelming, we talked about how it must have been to live there with him. i love imagining geniuses in their pajamas, eating cereal. it's a very pretty thought, i think.

just a snail at monet's house. i just though it was cool.

the house

we left the house, and afterwards, i did probably the coolest thing i will ever, ever, ever, ever, ever do in my life. again, if you didnt know i constantly carry little packs of seeds in my bag and plant them everywhere, in sidewalk cracks and cemeteries and other people's flowerboxes. it would make sense that i plant flowers to replace the ones i take, in some weird attempt to maintain sustainability of world happiness and also to ease my guilt about picking them in the first place. but it's not. i've been planting flowers far longer than i've been picking them, and i don't feel guilty at all. but this was probably the coolest moment of my life thus far.

the coolest thing i've ever done

afterwards, we wandered around giverny for a while, looking for some food. it was glorious. we saw the monet family grave at the church, where i planted a few more seeds on the grave. snapdragon asked if it was strange that monet somehow feels like santa claus. "well we always see him looking ancient in pictures," i said. "i feel like he was old for most of his life." "yeah, i agree," she replied, "i think maybe the country can do that to you. but i meant that i feel like he's omniscient. like he randomly knows your name, and that you just did that, and the wind whispered thank you... or something awkward like that." we laughed about it... but we weren't really kidding. it was strange. we finally found some food, which was weird and not that good and expensive as expected, and with the typical semi-rude service that isn't outwardly rude, but where the waitresses were obviously looking down their nose at the americans. we've really gotten used to it. unfortunately, this time we gave them too much money for the bill, and when we didn't bring back change, we had to awkwardly go ask for it... and watched the girl pick coins out of her tip jar. awk. afterwards, we wandered back to the meadow/parking lot, where we were to meet the bus, almost got run over by several more minicoopers, and talked about how much the hills and the air made it feel like home. really, if i ignored the cottages around me, i could've been holding a starbucks and walking to valley fair to go christmas shopping. it was ridiculous.

...the end?