France   7/7/1999

 Well, finally after all these years I was about to see what France 

was like. It was a gray day in Paris and the view from the plane 

reminded me of Minnesota, flat and agricultural. When Grad school 

started in 95 I was shown a large group of the press with lights 

and microphones. Then he said, "and do think you can deal with it", 

and I would shake like a leaf and cringe a little at the thought 

of it. I wanted to come in the back door and just show up and let 

it start from Salon de Provence. One thing was for sure I was 

coming in by the back door and the only question now is which door 

would I leave by and when.

 After renting a car I set out for Domremy to see where Joan of 

Arc was born and raised. I could relate to her since she was 

spoken to and told to do some pretty incredible things. Imagine 

a poor peasant teenage girl going to the leadership and basically 

telling them to get some backbone and deal with the problems, as 

in fight the British, She even goes on to help the men fight and 

is wounded in one of the battles. When she is captured she is 

burned at the stake. What a brave girl she was, and what a bunch

of gut less, back stabbing, self serving fools were in charge of

things back then, well I guess some things haven't changed much.

 I got as far as Nancy the first night and walked into a bar to 

find out where a cheap hotel was. Someone bought me a beer and 

took me to a nice place on the edge of the old part of the city. 

I walked around looking at the architecture which was ornate. 

All the sidewalk cafe's looked romantic but that will have to 

wait for another day if ever. So I went back to the hotel and 

wrote the rough draft for the flight over.

 The next day I went to Domremy and walked around the house Joan 

was born in and lit a couple of candles and said a few prayers to 

our Father, Mary and the Master our Lord Jesus Christ and asked 

Them and her (Joan) for help, in the chapel next to her house 

where she used to pray as a child almost 600 years ago. There is 

a huge Cathedral just down the road a few miles but I didn't stop

on this trip, I was headed for Salon. While I was in Domremy two

empty army transports came by and the meaning wasn't lost even 

without the cold chill They sent down my spine. That is to make

all military transports empty.

Then it was off to Salon de Provence for my birthday and to go 

to Mass at St. Laurent and to find the house of Nostradamus. 

Well with the speed limits or lack of them I made it to Salon 

late in the afternoon. So I went to the old part of the city 

and found the church and went in and found Nostradamus's tomb 

and lit a couple candles and prayed, not to him but to the 

Master, Our Lord Jesus Christ and our Father. Then I went in 

search of his house. I found it, but it was now a museum that 

I walked around and it was quite large especially for his day 

and time.

 I had roughed out a Quatrain in Nancy about an earthquake in 

Seattle. So I wrote it up, and the next day I gave it to the 

gals running the museum and briefly said I was so and so and 

this and that in the Quatrains. They looked at me like I was 

nuts as I said I'd be back next week after the quake, if there 

was one. So I strolled around town for a few days and went to 

the church every day to say my prayers and light a couple 

candles. Met a nice guy at the Cyber Cafe where I did a little 

work. I also got very sick for a couple of days, on my birthday, 

wasn't surprised by that at all. On my birthday the sweat was 

dripping off me as I said the Rosary in St Laurent.

 Well my birthday came and went and I left for Paris and a flight 

home, another bluff as they like to call it. I got upset in Paris 

but there is nothing you can do to the wind except call it names 

which really doesn't do much good and I suppose may even make the 

situation worse. As a matter of fact I called him a lying sack of 

shit as in Bullshit. Then you've got to pull it back together and 

get on with it, of course not really knowing what it is, though one 

thing was very clear I was flat broke and the limit on the card 

wasn't to far away, plus all the bills I rung up over the last 

couple years weren't going away so one thing was clear I needed to 

do something with a positive cash flow. So I guess I'm not done 

being a carpenter and I'm out of here. I never learned French but 

I did learn one word while I was there, sorte, which means exit,

which was exactly what I was looking for, the way out of here and 

back home.

But I don't know, this whole thing is crazy, I sometimes just want 

to scream. I did spend my last afternoon in Paris at the Louvre 

and saw some of the works of Michelangelo and Leonardo. The 

Venus del Milo looks pretty good for a piece of marble. You also 

get an understanding that there were some pompous folks in the 

Royal classes of Europe.

 It cost too much to fly out of Paris, so I went up to London to 

catch a flight and try to put this behind me. Instead of renting 

a hotel room, I decided to wander the streets of London and then 

go to the train station for the last couple of hours. I had a 

really good beer at one pub and a lot of come ons from the pimps 

in Soho. While hanging around listening to a young black street 

musician, around Swiss Court, he had his electric guitar plugged 

into a small amp outside the Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet. He 

just kept playing one song over and over, an old Led Zeppelin 

tune, Stairway to Heaven.

 The evening was surreal as I was also hearing and "look out at 

all these people, if I was to come and only leave the righteous 

this place would be virtually empty. Most of these people never 

talk to me so I don't know them anymore. It is your job to bring 

them to me again, as many as you can". I'm thinking and what 

should I do go out in the street and start preaching or 

something. I need your HELP, you know better than I how hard 

this is going to be. 

I just want to go home and get on with my life that is in the toilet, 

but with some work could be resurrected. I got to the train station 

around 3:00 AM and no benches or open toilets, even the storage 

lockers were closed so I couldn't get my stuff and head out to the 

airport. The floor is rather hard and after a couple hours of that I 

bought a round trip ticket on the train out to the airport and found 

some benches to crash on for an hour or so. The taxicab driver's 

of London, were excellent though.

 Finally I'm on the plane and I'm out of here and washing my 

hands of this whole deal and getting back to reality. I landed 

in Newark only to get put right back into this story, when I heard 

the bad news that JFK Jr was missing. I had heard he may not be 

long for this world about a month before. Then when I got to 

Seattle some friends who I hadn't seen since 95 came and picked 

me up and told me of their dreams. Everyone is a part of this 

story but she is special and is one of two others who should 

have been with me, also the Pope should have been involved, 

but he hides behind the walls of the Vatican. They will all have to 

pay a price for there actions or lack of them. I didn't say 

anything as I had known what they meant for a couple of years. 

We decided not to talk about it and just spent the next day 

on light conversation and barbecuing up some Salmon. Then it 

was on a bus for the final leg of the journey home.

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