Sands of Time.

I wandered through those halls supported by frail or massive columns … spires which looked like rockets starting for the sky, and to that marvelous assemblage of towers, of gargoyles, of slender and charming ornaments, a regular fireworks of stone, granite lace, a masterpiece of colossal and delicate architecture. – “Legend of Mont St. Michel” by Guy de Maupassant

It is magnificent.

The rolling fields and weathered stone villages have vanished into the night and all that stretches out below the fading full moon are miles of liquid grey tidal flats. Leaning out beyond the window sill as the wind howl s and rain falls on my face, I feel alive in this ghostly place.

We are staying in a centuries-old hotel knit tightly into cobblestone pathways that wind through a medieval town wrapped around the foundations of a towering abbey, the first stones for which were laid a thousand years ago. The history embedded in this place is fascinating – thousands of souls whose names are long since forgotten walked the dark halls of this holy castle in worship while others rotted in its bowels. I am fascinated by old buildings, both preserved and crumbling. It’s the stories we know that draw us in, but it is the stories captured in the mortar and lost in time that fascinate.  

For all of its bleakness, there is something magical about this cold and barren place.

Watching the moonlight’s shimmery dance across the sand, I wonder what lies beneath it. If we scraped it back would we find the roots of this rock? Would we find the remains of the unlucky ones who disappeared into the quicksand while others watched from the shelter of this stone refuge as their footprints faded with the slow weep of the tide?

Or would it run through our fingers like time slipping away?

I want to stay here and climb under the covers with the windows thrown open, sleeping away time as though it would somehow return to me the moments lost in the mortar of our life. Here I could linger – without regret and anger and sadness and impatience – in that middle ground between rest and awake where we let down our guard. Here, surrounded by stone awash in a sea of shifting sand, I could simply linger.

While the sands of time lost run through my memory.

Please, Take Your Seat.

Buzz about the Pan Am-era aside, I’ve never understood the excitement of air travel. If there’s glitz to be found, it must be in the other terminal. The one I’m not flying in or out of. I’ve been on airplanes for as long as I can remember, racing the sun as it sets on the horizon. 

As a child a rattling DC3 – more tin can than twin engine – was the only way in or out of our little town. While other kids learned how to navigate bus routes and subway stations, I learned the most efficient way to maneuver through airports in various cities and towns, what to pack and what to carry. As an adult, I refined the art. I once flew to Washington, D.C. to sit through a meeting before flying to New Jersey for a presentation and then back to Arizona for an important event. In 24 hours.

For me, a plane doesn’t mean exotic places and breathtaking landscapes. It is simply a means to an end. There is, however, one thing that never disappoints. The boarding process.

It’s like playing Roulette – you never know what you’re going to get when you spin the wheel.  

In five minutes, this airplane is supposed to taxi down the runway and lift me up and away for nine days. But while everyone is seated, the woman directly in front of me has yet to park her disheveled rump. I’m secretly hoping the flight attendant will man up but watching her blatantly ignore him, I am resigned to the fact that we simply aren’t leaving the tarmac anytime soon.

“Lafayette? I have your duty-free merchandise.”

“I’m not Lafayette. I’m Rucher.”

“Ma’am, do you have a seat on this airplane?”

“I do, but it is at the back of the plane and they just boarded.”

“That doesn’t matter. You have a seat assignment and so do they. And you are in theirs. I have to ask you to move to your seat immediately so that you don’t delay our departure any longer.”

I’m headed to France not because it was my first choice, but because the girlfriend I arm twisted into going with me wanted Italy and I wanted Scotland and neither of us wanted England. But, the more I Googled the more I ogled. Ancient abbeys, opulent castles and towering cathedrals. Bucolic countryside and gardens bursting with color. Crepes, cheeses, wines and breads. A history so deep you could spend a lifetime swimming in it. Landscapes both pastoral and powerful. Looking up to see who "they" are, I can’t help but smile. The guidebooks were right.

French architecture is spectacular.

Rules of the Road.

If we weren’t in a Babylon standoff, this would be a good time to make casual mention of the professional camaraderie he shares with my late husband. Even mentioning the fact that he is my “late” husband might be helpful. Except that right now it doesn’t really matter what I have tucked away in my arsenal of feminine wiles because it is clear that he is not amused. 

At all.

And yet here I am, standing in the middle of a medieval cobblestone street wedged between the tiny car zipping us around Northern France and the irritated gendarmes glowering up at me from their unimpressive car of official importance. Irritated gendarmes who happened to turn down this tiny cobblestone street lined with tightly knit and not-quite-straight medieval buildings at the same time that we did. 

Going the wrong way.   

We have managed to ride the Paris underground, drive the city’s maze of fast-moving one-way streets and navigate small villages bursting with flowers, husbandry and centuries-old manor houses and cottages. We didn’t sink in fabled quicksand, jumped a car parked so close to the French Coast that if the wind blew any harder it would have gone into the French Coast and we’ve proven that tow trucks are no faster on this side of the pond than they are on the other. But it is here, in the labyrinth of this windblown seaside town’s walled and winding streets, that Fodors, Vodafone and good behavior have abandoned us.

I’ve asked a garbage man, an electrician and a surly waiter. We stopped in the middle of a road and accosted a lady out for a stroll. And I am fairly certain that when she turned to look for traffic and my face filled her window, the woman in the parking lot locked her car doors. The man parked in the alley was in my direction-seeking sights until we pulled close and realized he appeared to be busy with his toolbox. Which is why standing in the middle of this road with the long arm of the law glaring at me is on par with the American thunderstorm brewing in the little Twingo behind me.

“Vous parlez anglaise?”

“Non.”

“Ah.”

If you’ve been following along, you know that while challenges do not become me they also don’t get the best of me. And getting back in the car without a well-defined route to the beachfront retreat that is the entire – and only – reason we are lost is not an option. Mentally evaluating my options as I stand in the intersection of foreign irritation and friendly fire, I have no choice.

A smile. A flutter. “Directions, s’il vous plait?” Return to the smile. Flutter again. Movements that are as comfortable as a wet sweater or a pair of shoes two sizes too small. Watching his gestures and listening to his partner’s laughter I realize that no matter what happens in life, there are some things that never change. Like the way a smile can stop traffic.

And get you a police escort to the front door.