City, Nature, In Between

I am constantly reminded of how close my little piece of nature is to the city. They overlap and intertwine, they are one and the same. It’s different than at home, at Wellesley or in Michigan. Here, there is always noise. Children playing and babies crying, the rumbling of city trucks and workers raking the first fall leaves. On the bench next to me, a man dressed all in black has an enormous bag of what I assume is pigeon food — the bag has silhouettes of pigeons on all sides — and is sprinkling it around him. Dozens of pigeons flap towards him raucously, simply unable to withhold their excitement. Two of them sit on the man’s backpack, eating directly out of his hand. He can be heard shushing the pigeons intermittently, whispering to them in French.

There is a slight breeze in the air here — it’s getting colder, slowly inching towards fall, although as I write this the Mediterranean sun is shining brightly through the leaves. Although it’s over 60 degrees Fahrenheit, everyone here is wearing scarves and jackets, proving to me, a Michigander, that I really am more accustomed to the cold. Today, as I sit on what I now think of as “my bench,” which I raced a group of tourists to get to, I am drawn to the manicured shrubs lining the walkways of the Pavillon Vendôme. These are the gardens of a hôtel particulier, a type of extremely fancy urban mansion similar to the brownstones of Boston. This hôtel particulier is now a museum, so in some ways, it feels less like nature and more like a spectacle, although I suppose it could be both. Personally, I’ll take what I can get, as I am smack-dab in the middle of a French city, which aren’t necessarily known for their natural areas. The shrubs that have drawn my attention today are a deep shade of green that reminds me of the pine trees we have everywhere in Michigan, a Christmas tree in the middle of a public park. They are clearly manicured, shaped into a curling shape all the same that remind me of a soft serve ice cream cone, something you get from Dairy Queen. These pine shrubs are intriguing, as it is rarely below freezing here in the south of France. They seem evergreen to me, which seems unnecessary for the climate, but maybe the French are simply overcautious of their gardens. As I get used to living here in Aix, I am trying to let myself feel a bit lost. I’m not sure it’s working — I’m not someone who likes being lost, per se. I’ll keep you updated.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *