A LOVE AFFAIR WITH FRANCE

A series of essays.....



MY FIRST VIEW OF MONT SAINT-MICHEL ~ TAKEN IN 2003
I FINALLY MADE IT!

.....as seen through my eyes!



By: Jacqueline E. Hughes

This is not a 'simple' love affair. No. However, it is one that is destined to withstand the test of time......and so much more.

Through the eyes of a small child, his Princely ways light-up her world; they charge it with the electricity of a foreign language so strange to her yet beautiful, at the same time. Today, many years later, she forgets who introduced "The Little Prince," written by Antoine De Saint-Exupéry, to her.....she is forever grateful. "There are a few stories which in some way, in some degree, change the world forever for their readers. This is one," claims Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc. They are correct.

 

THE LITTLE PRINCE ON
ASTEROID B-612

The little girl had changed her way of thinking, forever! Her life was filled with visions of the Eiffel Tower looming large just beyond the window of her imagined, Paris walk-up. She shared this flat with a 'million possibilities' and not another living soul. Not yet, anyway. Life was young; she was young.

She was going to become a writer and she just knew this to be true. Instinct, desire, love of words all factored into her equation of life and she began writing in her very own journal. It really was just a lined notebook held together with thin, spiral metal at its spine. It was a 'blank canvas' waiting to be filled with childhood memories, hopes and desires. She decorated the pink cover by adding sleek stickers marking the continuum of experience in which events pass from the future through the present to the past.....time. Life for her was coming around full cycle for she truly believed that her past was soon to collide, in a good way, with her future.

 

The 1960's brought new ideas and high expectations for so many young, vulnerable 'ones.' After all, early into the decade, a handsome man named Kennedy became her Prince and Knight in Shining Armor. She remembers how Jack would bend his arm in a princely manner and his beautiful, young wife would slip her delicate arm through his. Her name was Jacqueline. Jacqueline Bouvier. The girl was ecstatic to be sharing her moniker.

Ultimately.....her prince was only human. And, when his smile was taken away, his spirit remained for all of those who truly believed. The girl did believe that 'man' was innately good and life goes on and we would travel to the moon and back! She understood so much more than she even thought she did at such an early age.

Rhinie, Hoosier, "The Abominables," all a feast for the creative mind of Eva Ibbotson. Imagination ruled her days now and the growing stack of journals were kept safely hidden from her brother's prying eyes. "French 8" and Ms. Clementz became her new heroes as the words she had always known began to blend into sweeter versions studded with accents and gravelly beginnings! Irregular verbs danced in her head like sugarplums at Christmastime and year after year after year she studied and memorized their conjugation by voice, tense, number, and person.

 

CHATEAU DE CHENONCEAU IN THE LOIRE VALLEY

 

Ms. Clementz introduced the girl to possibilities!

Paris, of course, but, also,....the island of Mont Saint-Michel....surrounded by the cold, clear sea at the mouth of Le Couesnon.  Sipping a pastis in Marseille while waiting for the bouillabaisse (de fruits de mer) to finally arrive at the table. Roaming freely through the ancient castles majestically dotting the Loire Valley knowing a crisp Vouvray is chilling to accompany the evening meal. Museum after museum awaiting perusal and each guaranteed to enlighten the senses and open the mind to the past. The history that encompasses every fiber of human consciousness while walking in the footsteps of the Greeks, Romans and Carthaginians who established themselves deep into the rich soil eons ago.

The young girl can hardly wait to feel this soil beneath her own feet.

France becomes her 'comfort zone.' She envisions thriving among the gaiety and richness of the French way of life, the people and culture, while fluently speaking their romantic language. Learning so much more about their habits, desires and expectations. Understanding the blending of old and new, past and present, and how this culture plays into one's every day life. Whether it's Boules or Pétanque in France or Bocce in Italy....the game is the same. She knows how it is played. It's not just a man's world anymore and she will learn to make her way among the skeptics and naysayers as best she can.

 

LA PARTIE DE PETANQUE
BY CHARLES HOMUALK DE LILLE

The little girl has grown into a young woman. She owns her own copy of "Le Petit Prince" printed in French and waits to place it on the bookshelf in her first apartment. She digs deeply trying to remember who first read this book to her. She still cannot.

Sadly, she has not maintained communications with Ms. Clementz throughout the years. She does recall the young teaching associate that enlivened her French studies at Michigan State University by inviting her small, French Language class to her apartment for a wine tasting experience. Everyone was to speak only in French. They did.

 

THE CITY OF HONFLEUR
AT THE MOUTH OF THE RIVER SEINE

As she slides the slim volume into position on the shelf, she knows that the box of journals on the floor, kept neat and alive, will feed her soul and take flight someday as the basis for stories yet to be told.

She could still remember conversations between the author and the Little Prince:

"Indeed, as I learned, there were on the planet where the little prince lived....as on all planets....good plants and bad plants. In consequence, there were good seeds and bad seeds from each. But seeds are invisible. They sleep deep in the heart of the earth's darkness....

Now there were some terrible seeds on the planet that was the home of the little prince; and these were the seeds of the baobab.

And one day he said to me: 'You ought to make a beautiful drawing, so that the children where you live can see exactly how all this is. That would be very useful to them if they were to travel some day.' "

In the back of her mind, she knew she would always be aware of the baobab tree and its seeds sleeping deep within the earth's darkness. But, this was her time to shine and.....the good prospects before her seemed endless.....indeed!

 

 

ALONG THE COAST OF NORMANDY

 

 

 

Copyright © 2015 by Jacqueline E. Hughes
All rights reserved

"WHEN I PAINT MY MASTERPIECE"

A series of essays.....

BOB DYLAN AROUND 1971

.....as seen through my eyes!





By: Jacqueline E. Hughes


Upon my return home after ten fabulous days in Michigan with my children and five amazing grandchildren, I discover that our Bright House DVR (Digital Video Recorder) has reached an all time high of eighty-three percent!! What? How can that be?

I know that we record many good shows each week and tend to watch them within twenty-four hours so as not to collect them for extended periods of time. With my absence, those hours filled our seemingly controlled void rather quickly. The Voice was the main culprit and, considering this season was soon to wrap-up, there were several taped hours to catch-up on before the finale on Tuesday evening.

One of my favorite contestants, a home-grown Michigan boy who attended Michigan State University and now lives in Traverse City, Michigan, Joshua Davis, performed a song written by Bob Dylan in 1971 entitled "When I Paint My Masterpiece." Dan and I have retained all of our albums from "back in the day" and I vividly recalled this particular cut off of Bob's Greatest Hits, Volume II album. It was first released by the group The Band who covered the song on their album Cahoots. This song has always held a soft spot in my heart because it represented a young, aspiring, female writer who had nothing but the entire world to roam around, play in and write about in her future. The world was a blank canvas and she was going to make sure it didn't stay that way for very long.....

I was just out of college, single, and the world truly was my oyster.

BEAUTIFUL DYLAN

Listening to Joshua sing the lyrics so beautifully brought back memories of people attempting to second guess Dylan's intentions specifying his conspiracy implications, witch hunts, and turning the Spanish Steps in Rome into code for more clandestine operations. Okay. Our minds can translate almost anything into whatever we want them to be. I never bought into it. I like to think my explanation reached a more personal and straight-forward dimension called....reality.  Hopes, dreams, and the power and sadness of love, for me, inspired Bob Dylan's words in "When I Paint My Masterpiece":


"Oh, the streets of Rome are filled with rubble
Ancient footprints are everywhere
You can almost think that you're seein' double
On a cold, dark night on the Spanish Stairs

Got to hurry on back to my hotel room
Where I've got me a date with Botticelli's niece
She promised that she'd be right there with me
When I paint my masterpiece

Oh, the hours I've spent inside the Coliseum
Dodging lions and wastin' time
Oh, those mighty kings of the jungle, I could hardly stand to see 'em
Yes, it sure has been a long, hard climb

Train wheels runnin' through the back of my memory
As the daylight hours do retreat
Someday, everything is gonna be smooth like a rhapsody
When I paint my masterpiece

I left Rome and landed in Brussels
With a picture of a tall oak tree by my side
Clergymen in uniform and young girls pullin' muscles
Everyone was there but nobody tried to hide

Newspapermen eating candy
Had to be held down by big police
Someday, everything is gonna be diff'rent
When I paint my masterpiece"

Lyrics © BOB DYLAN MUSIC CO



Listening to this song again, after so many years have passed, brought me back into the present. I thought about the trip I had just returned from and all of my interactions with the five young lives that teach me more about life, love, and myself than anything else could on a daily basis. Five bright stars out-shining the billions of others as they float dream-like in the heavens above. Their light is so bright it hurts my heart and brings tears to my eyes. Arms hug me so tight, my muscles ache and sweet, sugary kisses bless my lips with a thousand calories of loving deliciousness. Heaven.

MEMORIES FROM THE FARM

Thanks to a very dear friend of mine and her gracious husband, Farmer Fred, my children, grandchildren and I discovered the daily workings of an active sheep farm that was surrounded by lush, forested, and rolling Michigan acreage. The 'little ones' took turns steering the enormous John Deere as their small shapes were comfortably ensconced within the distinct glow of green and yellow paint, and Cheshire Cat smiles. The quintessential white Amish farmhouse rose high above the sweet lambs hopping in the green meadow below. And, the cherry on top was the huge, multi-level barn, home to the mighty rams and celebrated 'ancient ones.'  It was built by hand decades upon decades before, painted barn-red over and over again and houses unimaginable treasures, unpublished memories, from within its dusty, shadowy nooks and crevices. Truly a writer's delight!

"HOME TO THE MIGHTY RAMS AND
CELEBRATED ANCIENT ONES"

A simple trip to the Mall to ride the double-decker carousel over and over again turns into a journey. Pretending to capture a jungle excursion on the back of a giant gorilla, one grandson straddles the 'giant beast' as the other rides his zebra along the vast Serengeti Plain while the sun sets over a Masai village in Tanzania.




SERENGETI PLAIN



A ROMP THROUGH THE JUNGLE

Our imagination is captured by the miracle of flight when we visit the Air Zoo in Kalamazoo. My youngest granddaughter harnesses her inner Amelia Earhart in order to fly solo across the concrete floor in her shiny, blue machine.

SOLO FLIGHT

Mother's Day memories are captured on three smart phones while fingers and toes are painted bright, Easter egg colors at a nearby Spa.  Three amazing women can only just sit now while their bodies imbibe delight through every pore as they enjoy one another's company.  Relax my beautiful Daughters and Mothers in your own right. Relax because the world often just gets in the way.

CELEBRATING MOTHER'S DAY

Birthday celebrations were in order for my oldest granddaughter who turned eight years old during my visit. Oh, and did I happen to mention that she lost yet another tooth on her birthday eve? What a busy, wonderful time!

 

Bob Dylan wrote his song about all of the above....and, a little bit more.

He wrote about the struggles and emotional journey we all endure in order to find what makes us whole....our own masterpiece called 'True Love.'

He wrote about the artist striving to create his 'masterpiece' while self-doubt, disillusionment, and time nips at his heels. It's about filling a hole in our soul and discovering the power of faith, hope, and love.

He wrote about feeling the disappointment of allowing time to slip through our fingers while our masterpiece sits, incomplete. The awakening is when we realize, after all this time, that along each journey we decide to take, every story our life writes, and all the people we meet and love along the way, each one helps to complete our masterpiece. In the end, our personal masterpiece is our own legacy handed down to each life we have touched; each life that has touched us in return.

In Dylan's case, it was about the task of growing-up and simply observing his own maturity. He stopped talking strictly about his 'social world' and began speaking in terms of personal growth. "Yes, it sure has been a long, hard climb," he writes.

His whirlwind tour of Europe among a post-religious era fills him with a strong sense of the practical secularism sweeping through Europe at the time. A new Enlightenment looms on the horizon and this 'golden thread' weaves its way into Dylan's new world. He anticipates his future, at home, when the time will come for the hero to finally take the time to paint his masterpiece.

For myself.....  As I grow more comfortable in my own new world of Enlightenment, self-love and respect for the Earth and all of mankind that walks her fragrant meadows and dusty trails alike, I am that much closer to achieving all of my goals in this lifetime; my personal masterpiece.

My favorite line of this song has to be, "Someday, everything is gonna be smooth like a rhapsody when I paint my masterpiece." I wonder if Dylan has achieved this goal yet. As long as we are breathing, everything remains possible.



Copyright © 2015 by Jacqueline E. Hughes
All rights reserved

THE NEW COLORS OF PHILANTHROPY: Red, White, and Blue

 A series of essays.....

"PATRIOTIC PHILANTHROPY"

.....as seen through my eyes!


By: Jacqueline E. Hughes

When I was very young I sometimes heard the word philanthropist spoken in conversations by the adults around me. It was one of those long, undefined words that made me stumble over its pronunciation several times before almost getting it right while sounding like a needle skipping over a scratch on an LP (Long Play), 33 1/3 rpm microgroove vinyl record. Sometimes I would make it through to the next syllable, note or lyric. But, usually, I did not and I'd inevitably be stuck in the middle of the word trying to spit it out.

Today, of course, I can speak, spell and define the word  philanthropist, along with all of its derivatives. But, I do remember asking my Mother one day what that long, curious word meant. Her reply went something like this, "When a man has been blessed with having so much money he decides to share it with those who have far less than he has, and his heart is large....because he has great love for his fellow man. Oh......., and I really wish we knew one!!"

How many of us have said at one time or another that if we were fortunate enough to win BIG in the lottery, we would give some of our winnings away to charities and to others who might benefit from it, as well? In today's terminology, this way of thinking would be called 'paying it forward' and a good many of us do our part with this admirable philosophy whether we're loaded with  bundles of cash or simply possess an abundance of good intentions. Either way....we are all winners! Our time is precious to each and every one of us and to donate even a little of it towards benefiting those in need constitutes a magnanimous contribution to the world.

I am talking about Big Bucks here and the philanthropic benevolence and good will shown by the likes of Bill Gates in the fields of science and medicine in the hopes of enlightening third world countries to the importance of vaccines and good health. In the U.S., his foundation's main initiative is education with teacher training in particular as the main project. 

Standing side-by-side and, initially bolstered by Microsoft stock, Bill and his wife, Melinda Gates, have become the preeminent philanthropic institution in the world. So far they have donated over $28 billion in their lifetime making them likely the most generous givers in the world, according to the online publication, The Chronicle of PHILANTHROPY.



"THE GOSPEL OF WEALTH"

Warren Buffett has succeeded in giving away over $8.3 billion. Buffett is an American business magnate, investor and philanthropist and has been called the most successful investor of the 20th century. As CEO of the diversified holding company, Berkshire-Hathaway, he announced in 2006 that he would be committing 85 percent of his fortune to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

If all of these monetary sums appear staggering to you, well.....they should. Not many of us will see the likes of them in our own lifetime. However, I can almost guarantee that each of us will eventually reap the benefits from every dollar that is invested into the betterment of mankind around the world. One example might be the act of educating all nations on how clean, drinkable water for the masses is a prudent step in the direction of better health and the future wellbeing of everyone.

Recently, philanthropic banners fly overhead emblazoned by dollar signs and sporting a striking background of red, white, and blue and all due to one man, David Rubenstein, billionaire investor and founder of The Carlyle Group, a global asset management firm. Eleanor Clift of The Daily BEAST quotes Mr. Rubenstein as saying, "I have made more money than I can consume intelligently or than my children should ever have, so I decided to give it away. A large part of my philanthropy goes back to this country."


According to Clift, "He calls it patriotic philanthropy and he defines it as giving money to projects that government would be doing if it had the resources." His multi-million dollar gifts include the restoration of the home of James Madison, the refurbishing of the Virginia home of Robert E. Lee, half of the $15 million tab to rebuild the Washington Monument after the 2011 earthquake, and his copy of the Emancipation Proclamation that is on loan to the White House. Mr. Rubenstein has recently placed on loan to the National Archives the only copy of the 1297 document of the Magna Carta in existence in the United States which he purchased to save it from being sold and taken out of the country.

Clift writes that as though to reassure skeptics that good can come from unbridled capitalism, Rubenstein says when he hires he looks for people "who don't think there is anything wrong with making money, and know what to do with it when they have it."

He has taken the "Giving Pledge," under which billionaires like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Mark Zuckerberg and others dedicate more than half their wealth to philanthropy.

Instead of helping to create new monuments....it appears that the goal of Mr. Rubenstein is to protect and maintain existing monuments and documents located throughout our nation and keep them safe for every generation to enjoy.  This is something I find quite admirable.
Born from humble beginnings in Baltimore with parents who encouraged his education but could give him only their unconditional love, he worked hard. And, via scholarships to Duke University and the University of Chicago Law School, he paved his own way into the corporate world. He doesn't give money to politicians and he is profoundly grateful to the country that gave him so much opportunity, writes Clift.

PHILANTHROPIST DAVID RUBENSTEIN GIVES
NATIONAL PARK FOUNDATION $5 MILLION
TO REFURBISH IWO JIMA STATUE

Even though Rubenstein gives generously to medical research and education, recently, patriotic philanthropy has gotten the most attention in this multi-million dollar gift bag of generosity and 'paying it forward.' This is most probably because not many people are doing it. I, for one, hope it catches on and filters over to other areas that have been greatly plaguing this country of late such as our nation's infrastructure! Wouldn't you agree?

I leave you with a quote by David Rubenstein that, for him, defines the word philanthropy. "Philanthropy is a Greek word that means 'love of humanity,' not rich people writing checks."

In the end, I believe that everyone comes out a winner!

After all......Anything is possible.

Copyright © 2015 by Jacqueline E. Hughes
All rights reserved