cathedrals in the hearts of the people that i know

J'apercois la fin qui arrive, et ça fait peur un peu. En fait, ce n'est pas la fin qui fait peur mais l'inconnu qui m'attend de l'autre côté de l'atlantique. La nostalgie pour ma vie en France existe déjà...je regarde autour de moi et je vois la beauté, ma famille bizarre et internationale, les habitudes que j'ai....un petit café l'après-midi, le matin sur la terrace sous le rosier, tout ce qui est vieux, plus vieux que mon pays entier...

Bon bref, tout ce qui m'attend est aussi beau. Mon coeur est plein de musique...une musique qui est venue avec moi en France et qui va repartir avec moi quand je partirai. Je peux espèrer que je ne perdrai la musique de la langue. Certes, il y a d'autres langues qui m'attendent....

Ce matin je suis allée à la messe pour la première fois depuis décembre ou janvier, et partout dans la cathédrale il y avait des enfants qui faisaient n'importe quoi, et ils avaient tous des feuilles de palmier puisque c'est le dimanche des rameaux....et moi je suis un enfant, feuille de palmier dans la main, admirant le mystère autour de moi...

D and L and I are calling this the "Mega-mystery Tour." Life is a mega-mystery. What else can I say? They arrived here late Monday night, and our first week together has been a joy. Singing with them again is like coming home. I'm amazed at how little difficulty we encountered piecing our voices together again for the first time in six months. People's response to the music so far has been interesting and really varied. We played our first show in Toulouse on Wednesday night at a "café culturel" that seems to have some pretty strange and intriguing regulars. I had been to a show there before, and that show was extraordinarily different from our own....at the one I went to before, the bar was really crowded and loud and all the lights were on, and some people were listening but most were just having their Friday night entre amis. At our show, they turned down the lights and it was completely silent the entire show. I was so surprised...not at all what I expected. It was really good though, especially for certain songs that are quieter and more subtle...our second show was nearly the opposite. We left out any quiet songs because there was so much noise that no one would have been able to hear them. The noise was caused mostly by a fountain though, not necessarily by people. It was a beautiful show, nonetheless. I don't think I've ever sung that loud in my whole life. Belting=not my strong point. Yet.

In other news, last weekend I went on a really wonderful day-road-trip with Pierre, Brent, and Neill to Carcassonne. We listened to some Ryan Adams with the windows down and ate some cassoulet (for the first and probably last time...I think that was the most fat I have ever consumed in a single sitting), got slightly lost in Castelnaudary, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. I will tell you more about it with some pictures.