Moulin Rouge
The greatest thing you’ll ever learn is to just love, and be loved in return.
– line from the movie Moulin Rouge (2001)
One night after watching that movie, I grabbed one of my old oil canvases from my oil painting days and painted (not even with paint, but with gesso) those words on the canvas. As cheesy as it might sound, it was fun, so Hunter and I hung it on the wall. I still have it. Those words splashed on a not-so-great mountain landscape in a huge gold frame.
Anyway, I just bring this up because when I arrived in Paris last sunday, I gave the taxi driver my hotel address and as we drove up to my hotel (which I had no idea where it was) was in the Moulin Rouge district. Very easy to spot with the red windmill and the streets and streets of sex theatres. I also found out very quickly, that this area, also known as Montemarte area (because of Montemarte!) is one of the greatest sweetest areas of Paris. When I used to come in my earlier years with my family to visit Paris, we didn’t come to the bohemian hubs.
A few nights later, I moved a little closer to my school in the center of Paris. The room is as small as a closet, but it has a huge window that overlooks central Paris, and the whole Montemartre area and the top of Sacre-Coeur. C’est beautiful!
I’ve met some great people from both my french language school and yoga studio. This weekend I spent some time with two lovely artists Shelly De Vito (who instructed one of my yoga classes) and her husband, graphic and architectual artist (& chess champion) James. We had a nice dinner in Montemartre, talked about Shelly’s work in the theatre and La Spirale d’Or which is a group of artists that work together internationally. It’s wonderful energy in this city. Their dear friend, author of The Lord of The Barnyard, Tristan Egolf, who passed away in 2005, was deeply inspired by Hunter. It was good to talk about loved ones on the other side.
The school work, walking around Paris and the interview ms are some of the reasons I’ve been out of pocket. But I’m headed back to Geneva soon, then after a week or so with my niece and nephew, will fly back home to Owl Farm. The Woody Creeker should be in the mail now. The home crew had some problems getting it out the door. But they should be sent out by now. If not, I’ll fly home sooner.
We’ll also catch up on the Hillary/Obama issues. The news coverage here in Europe is much different than it is in the States. I have no idea what is going on with Britnie Spears, but BBC keeps me up to the minute news on the Zimbabwe elections, Tibetan protests, Bush/Putin AND Sarkozy/Brown Brotherhoods and the weather all over the world. I haven’t heard a word about Hillary, Obama, McCain until I log on and check my NYTimes, Post, etc….
Will check in soon. I’m tired tonight, and now a little depressed. It rained all day. I went to Hotel De Ville on Ralph’s advice to see a photo exhibit a day early to attend a rally that organizers staged to try to push the French governement to force the release or at least medical aid of Ingrid Betancourt. What that woman has gone through all these years, I can only imagine.
Otherwise, Paris is fantastic. I only wish… well anyway…
Until next time, your friend,
Anita Thompson
p.s. My wonderful brother Peter, after correcting many typos in the blog last night, emailed this to me this morning:
The Moulin Rouge quote, just like all the other songs in the film, is not original. It’s a Nat King Cole song (originally written by Eden Ahbez in 1948) called Nature Boy:
NATURE BOY
Written by Eden Ahbez
There was a boy
A very strange enchanted boy
They say he wandered very far, very far
Over land and sea
A little shy and sad of eye
But very wise was he
And then one day
A magic day he passed my way
And while we spoke of many things
Fools and kings
This he said to me
"The greatest thing you’ll ever learn
Is just to love and be loved in return"
-Pete
P.P.S. For those of you who have noticed I tend to have typos in my blogs; my disclaimer is that I have been diagnosed with Irlene syndrome, (severe light sensitivity). So, words on a page blur and move around unless I’m wearing my dark filtering glasses, which only help, but doesn’t solve the problem. It’s often misdiagnosed as dyslexia, but in my case, and the case of an estimated 2 million Americans is photophobia. That’s another reason nobody ever asks me to proofread their writing. It’s not that I don’t care, I simply don’t SEE letters/words correctly. Sorry!!!
