Street Scenes

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One of the joys of travel has always been the moments of pure connection that arise, seemingly out of nowhere, along the way. Tonight I had one of those experiences walking behind the city hall in Arles. I was headed to get an evening drink–my parents were watching my son–when there they were: a half dozen and three singing, dancing, and strumming a guitar. Two young women pulled me in, walked up and asked me where I was from, and invited me to join the impromptu party of strangers: a old French woman missing teeth, three young Arab immigrants, an Irish republican (who later explained, “Bastille Day is when they gave the king and queen the chop, like we ought to do with Queen Elizabeth. No more nobles!”), the two art school students from the Alps who beckoned me to stand with them, a retired drunken Canadian woman, and a slightly bearded young guitarist. The Irishman was singing “Dirty Old Town” by the Pogues. When he finished the guitarist began to strum a rhythmic tune. One of the young Arab women–she couldn’t have been more than seventeen–took off her shoes and began to dance–an energetic, imperfect, ballet, a poem in motion, dark blur of bending, twisting feet, leaping against the cobbles of the street before coming to rest bent upon the ground. Soon it was the art school students turn. One of them, a blonde with a floral tattoo on each arm, took the guitar and in a thin voice that grew bolder, thicker, with every passing syllable began to sing American pop songs, Nirvana, Sting, and then French ballads. There was love and a bit of comedy–a cowboy song from the Alps with the lyric “Yippee ki yay.” I even shyly shared a couple of folk hymns, “Simple Gifts” and “Down to the River to Pray.” Everyone was dancing.

Eventually it ended. This person had to go to bed. That person had to meet their friends. But while it lasted it was a moment of pure connection: beyond the horrors of the hour, beyond the difficulties of language, beyond… just beyond the ordinary.

If there is hope for humanity I am pretty sure it lies in such moments. Instances where the boundaries that separate people disappear in the experience of common connection: shared music, dance, and unexpected joy.

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