Happily, Paris has transformed into a balmy spring paradise, or close enough. Well-tuned eyes will find not only arms and legs newly liberated from weighty winter wool clothes, but puffy white and pink blooms busting joyfully out of branches and busy bees about their work.
Suddenly, since temperatures have risen and color has returned to us all, my near-daily morning trips to the little park behind the apartment with Ionaelle have become much more enjoyable than the obligation they had been these last months.
Part of this is simply that it’s my nearest source of “nature” beyond the rosemary plant clinging to life on our cramped balcony. If I focus, really focus, on the fuzz of the sage plant, or the ochre-yellow sycamore-bud casings, it’s possible to forget that cement and asphalt and metal are on every side. I remember that the Lord is such a quirky, creative maker, and that there’s goodness in everything, and this simple reminder is like blood in my veins.
The city itself is not without goodness, though, in spite of its innate grayness; we must take into consideration that it is rich with the divine comedies that are our human lives and the intricacies of their intertwinings. In fact, I honor this city as a place where people-watching is a valued activity, and quite well-practiced. It might be Paris’ strongest suit.
At the park, thankfully, I don’t have to sit back and passively watch all the time like most grown-up Parisians spend their time doing. Kids have a marvelous way of pulling adults into their worlds, but also of breaking down walls between those who care for them.
For months, Ionaelle and I have been hanging out at the park behind the house with a four-year-old stud named Hugo, and he’s just my favorite. I love how he brags about his bike and leaks personal information about his home life. I love how he exasperates his Indian nanny by wanting to stay longer, always longer. I love the way he speaks to us in funny, somewhat lispy, British-French-Kid English, the way he wants to play “catch-catch,” and counts super loud—sometimes while banging on something metal. Most of all, I love the tender hunger for love and approval that pulls beneath the surface.
One particularly springy morning last week, Hugo broke the law by picking the heads off of some daffodils. When his nanny scolded him, he told her they were for me (“la dame,” the lady, he called me). I have to admit that it warmed my heart even though it was probably just to get himself out of trouble. After all, it’s not every day a lady receives flowers from a handsome Frenchman.
A couple of days ago, we had another sweet, only-with-kids moment. Lilia, our friends’ daughter that we watch on Tuesdays, was with Ionaelle and I. She’s got a particularly innocent, almost fairy-tale quality to her. That day, as soon as we entered the park, Lilia ran to a group of three pre-teen girls from the rough local school that were hanging out on a bench. In her little magenta coat, she just stood there and watched them with delight. Each of them began to interact with her, and then with me as I walked over to join them. The same thing happened with two other groups of tough older students; I was amazed to see how they responded—baffled but flattered, I think—to her silent but close observation. It felt like her free curiosity opened a door that I was able to walk through and offer the gentle grace of Jesus that I carry in me, as well.
Oh, bless springtime! Bless it because it melts the ice. Bless it because it warms what was frozen and wakes what was dead. Bless it because it quickens activity; bless it because it awakens love. And bless the little children, because the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as these.
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