Monday, July 07, 2008
The trip of a lifetime
Ray Stubblefield
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From the RoundTable blog
All of us have dreams, dreams of things we would like to do, dreams of places we would like to see before we die.
Back in the '60s my dad was in the Navy, and my family got to live on the French Riviera in the little town of Villefranche sur Mer. And this summer I got to fulfill a lifelong dream and return. I wrote about Villefranche last March. (www.roanoke.com/editorials/stubblefield/wb/154899)
After 43 years, I was finally getting to walk the streets and swim on the same beaches I did as a young boy. It shouldn't have taken so long to get back there, but we had kids to raise and bills to pay.
Not that it was cheap, this trip, mind you. Gas was $9.24 a gallon, and 1 euro was worth $1.57. Ouch! But you know this before you go, so you pay it and don't complain too much. I'll rekindle fond memories each month as I pay the Visa bill, but it was worth every euro.
When we first arrived in Villefranche, I was emotional and had to push back tears throughout the day. It didn't help any to know that my mom wouldn't get to see any of my pictures. She passed away last August. But my wife and kids were patient as I toured them around my old stomping grounds. I still knew every street and every turn.
"Here's the soccer field we played in, the bocce ball courts, the park with nude sculptures and classy benches. Over there is the castle we played in. The bakery and market are still here. And these stairs lead to our street. And here's the apartment we lived in."
It was all there as if I had left it only yesterday. Amazingly, I still remembered everything so clearly, but more amazing was how little things had changed.
Besides the artificial turf they had put down on the soccer field, everything else was exactly as I had left it all those years ago. Even the curved, modern-looking metal park benches were still there. They were there 20 years before I got there in 1965, and would be there in another 20. In Europe, they make things to last.
That rarely happens in this country. Try going back to your old neighborhood after 43 years and see how much it has changed.
Europe is old and crowded, so it's not unusual for homes and shops to be hundreds of years old. There's no room to expand, and they don't tear things down willy nilly to make room for a new parking garage or shopping mall. The big box stores are not how they do things in Europe. There is a respect for antiquity, and they work with what they've got.
After the tour, we finally made it down to the beach. It was hot, and we were all ready for a swim.
French beaches take a little getting used to. They don't have the fine sand you would normally expect but small, smooth river stones. It's a little hard to walk on, but you wear sandals and you don't bring loads of sand home with you in your shoes and towels at the end of the day.
My wife and daughter commented on how quickly and how dark they tanned. After three days, they had as much tan as they would after the entire summer here in Virginia. I told them it was the low humidity of Mediterranean climate.
They were there only three days; imagine how dark you get after a year. When our family left in the summer of 1966, we were so dark, the flight attendants spoke Spanish to us when we first boarded the plane.
And the water is cool and refreshing, not bathwater temperature like it gets at our Southern beaches. The Mediterranean Sea is also very salty, so you find yourself floating with no effort.
But the biggest difference is the topless, female bathers. The French aren't all uptight about nudity. It's a way of life and is as natural to them as rain. My daughter thought it was "disgusting." My son and I had a different view. And on our last day, I joked with my wife and told her she was missing her big opportunity. She didn't laugh.
We are home now, and the glow of the trip is slowly fading. And I have to admit, I'm a little down. I finally got to do my trip of a lifetime, so what's left?
There's Alaska, skiing in the Andes, and I've always wanted to climb Everest.
Stubblefield, who teaches earth science at Franklin County High School, is a Roanoke Times columnist.
