10.10 // 11:05pm
The Luxembourg gardens, spread out before Luxembourg Palace in southern Paris, were easily in the top three most beautiful things seen today. The afternoon sun enflamed the drying and dying leaves of the trees: yellow at the very rounded tops, then orange in the middle, and straggling greens at the bottom. Many of the branches were already bare black, while still others continued to hold on stubbornly to their green leaves. On the white pebbles and vibrant lawn, the dried rust-colored leaves piled on top one another, crackling under the boot-encased or padded feet of masters and dogs. Children ran far from earshot of their parents. I perched on a bench for a bit while my friends ran to the restroom, and watched three children build a fort of leaves. The blond girl, maybe eight years old, did most of the work, carefully hauling over handful after handful of crunchy leaves. As soon as the fort was finished, though, her two male playmates bodily pushed her from the fort. She managed to talk her way back into their game, but I wanted to tell her, "Welcome to life."
The palace was as beautifully white as the sky was blue, as the leaves were red. A large fountain with dirty green water had small sailboats being steered around its calm waters from the ledge by children with controls; ducks floated in between like the guardians of the deep, carefully avoiding the paths of the little sailboats, which all fly French colors. What else should I have expected?
The clouds had mostly cleared from directly overhead, but tall white statues and large shrubs still cast their shadows over a beautiful array of blossoms --beds of flowers colored tangerine, lavendar, marigold, and apple red. Tables and chairs were scattered along a pathway encircling the fountain and garden, and only a couple stood empty; people napped or read or sketched or chatted over cups of coffee and tea. Everyone was calm and lazy, as relaxed as the few clouds still drifting along. I would have liked to spend several more hours there, just watching people stroll about, trying to catch what I could of their French conversations. It seemed to be more locals than tourists that sat; tourists have no patience for sitting in beautiful gardens when there's a city to see. It's their loss, I think.
