Mom's Birthday
Today would have been my mom’s 84th birthday. Last week I was able to go to Geneva for the day, in part to honour her memory, as I know that was a City where she had the experiences that transformed her thinking and the life she wanted in so many ways.
It was good to see Geneva again, but like many big Western cities now, it has become similar to other big cities, filled in the downtown area with chain stores, although being Geneva it is mainly the high end stores, and banks and the brand names one can find everywhere. But tucked away in the older parts of town, the architecture of the traditional city remains, and the streets are narrower, and the pace slows down.
I was reminded of the experience of traveling from the US for the first time to live in Europe, and how the world opens up in ways that are hard to imagine until you do it. And wondering how JoAnn must have felt and how her world opened up then, and what she took away with her and held on to for all the years that followed.
Her experience in French-speaking Switzerland came alive for me years later during our time spent reading Le Petit Prince in french together when I was 12. She often talked about her year ‘abroad’ in between my efforts to understand the words penned so beautifully by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.
This spring when I was looking for ways to travel from Plymouth England to Lyon France (where Pete is on sabbatical) imagine my delight when I discovered the Airport is the Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Airport, and the city is his birthplace. Like my mother with Geneva, I have fallen in love with Lyon, and find the french I learned with her so long ago comes back easily here. The relaxed nature of the people in Lyon lure me into it’s orbit in a way I thought only London could do, once upon a time, many, many years ago.
So I was glad to spend a day last week in the city that transformed JoAnn’s world, much in the way that London originally changed mine. Because of JoAnn’s inspiration, I have taken the opportunity to change my home city to another country, and I will be ever grateful for that nugget she planted in those early days learning the lessons from Le Petit Prince.
“And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”