First In Line...

Well, I really don't know if I will be first, but I certainly want to say LOUD and CLEAR--HAPPY BIRTHDAY, baby brother.

My younger(much younger) sister, my brother, and me

It all began 60 years ago. I was just 5 years old (OK, math whizzes, figure it out quickly). My pregnant mother and another missionary woman, along with me, were encamped at Victoria Falls. We were awaiting the birth of . . .a baby something. Brother? Sister? Who knew? In the middle of the night, my mother went into labor. They loaded me, mostly asleep, into the car, and drove to the hospital. The missionary woman helped my mother into the hospital, leaving me asleep in the car. When I awoke, I was alone.

That's how I first experienced what life would be like with this new baby in my life--a brother, as it turns out. I know I have written about this traumatic introduction to my brother before. but it's a great story to trot out in celebration of his 60 years on this earth.

So, in honor of this event, I will forego any sibling stories. I will simply say, again, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, brother.

My brother and his wife (then to be) 30 years ago, and my brother and my sister-in-law, last summer at their son's wedding.

Wolf at the Door

Years ago, when my son was still a little boy and I was reading stories to him, I read him the wonderful children's novel Julie of the Wolves. I have previously written about this, so I won't dwell on it, except to say that the novel features wolves in an absolutely positive light, and humans not so much so. In fact, before I had ever even heard of Sarah Palin and the abhorrent practice of shooting wolves from fixed wing aircraft, I was completely distraught to read about it in Julie of the Wolves.

Perhaps no other animal has been so vilified in human literature and expression. The title of this blog is but one of many expressions--the supposed origin for the expression "wolf at the door" that you will find on the Internet suggests it comes from the children's story "Three Little Pigs." Hmmm--I suspect the origin goes further back into human mythology.

If you should happen to be teaching a class on literature for children, you could try this exercise. Surprising how many children's stories use the wolf as villain.

But, I am not really thinking about wolves in children's literature or even in common expressions. The wolf I have buzzing around my head right now is the novel I am currently reading: Wolf Hall. I may write another blog about this work when I am finished. Suffice it to say that it is a most engrossing read. I didn't realize to what the title referred until I perused the handy guide just inside the novel's cover: Wolf Hall is the name of the Seymour family home which existed mid-1500s in England. No such residence stands today, the place having long ago fallen into disrepair. The novel centers on Thomas Cromwell, advisor to Henry VIII throughout a major portion of his reign.

Simultaneous to reading Wolf Hall, I encountered another wolf this weekend. My husband and I attended a production of Gilbert & Sullivan's comic opera The Mikado, which was performed at Wolf Trap. If you have never been there--and if you live in some proximity to Washington, DC, it is a treat of a place to visit. I admit it is the most tenuous of links--the word "wolf" in the novel title and the place name. Sorry about that.

Back to the various wolf expressions we use. "Wolf at the door" means to keep hunger or poverty at bay. The current economic times certainly have many people busily working to keep away the wolf at the door.

I had an interesting conversation this past week--I went to my hairdresser for a haircut. In an effort to engage in small talk--something at which I am woeful--I asked: so how's business been? Fantastic, she said. This week things have really picked up. Then, she observed, that the hair business is one of the last ones to be affected when the economy slows down, and one of the first to pick up, when the economy recovers. Maybe, the wolf will be kept from the door. Unless, he needs a hair cut!

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Cover photo of the "The True Story of The 3 Little Pigs"--this delightful book was a birthday gift I received from a friend several years ago--a reworking of the traditional child's fairy tale, told from the wolf's perspective.

On Not Going to the Movies. . .

For long-time readers of this blog, you know that I love going to the movies. Would you believe there was a time when I stopped going altogether?

Why, you might ask? Well, I went through a (ahem) religious period during my college years when I was attending a small liberal arts Christian college. The teaching at the time was that movies were at the very least questionable. In fact, they just might be. . .immoral.
Anyway.

One incident from my childhood illustrates this antipathy toward movies. When I was about 8 years old, my parents and I (and younger brother) were staying with my paternal grandparents. At the time, my favorite aunt was living near by, and she had me with her for a day of entertainment. Somehow, she decided to take us to the movies. She swore me to absolute secrecy, as my grandfather sternly disapproved of "the movies."

I have NO recollection what the movie might have been. She might remember. Whatever it was, it thrilled my small girl self. And, the moment we returned to my grandparents' house, my promise of secrecy went right out the window. As my aunt recalls it, we got back to the house and I ran inside and PROMPTLY announced--guess what, Grandpa, we went to the movies!

My sternly disapproving grandfather sternly disapproved indeed.

That antipathy did not really spill over into my personal choosing to see movies. I recall seeing the Walt Disney movie "Fantasia" when my parents and I (and younger brother) visited California, during this same time. And, as a student attending boarding school when we returned to (then) Rhodesia, I went to see movies on our Saturday outings.

But, for some reason, when I began as a freshman at college, I was seized with the conviction that movies were immoral. I eschewed them for quite some time. And, then the movie "The Cardinal" came out. Some of my college girlfriends were going. Did I want to go? Did I?

I must have worked around in my reasoning, because I decided--OK, after all the subject matter is religious. I went. I found the movie most entertaining, if not somewhat maudlin. What I particularly remember about this movie is one scene where the central character, who is by now a cardinal (hence the title), learns that his sister is pregnant. When she is due to deliver her child, she learns that the baby's head is too large for the mother to safely deliver. The cardinal is faced with a decision. Give permission for the fetus's head to be crushed, and the sister thereby saved OR refuse permission in which case his sister will die.

He chooses the latter course. At the time, I was thunderstruck. How could someone make such a choice? Choose an unknown infant's life over the life of his own sister? As a confirmed Protestant, I was also quite relieved to not have that burden as part of my own religious understanding. I might give up movies for a time, but giving up your own sister? Never.

So, what triggered this rather peculiar memory and walk down memory lane? The current news--that's what.

Herewith, the barest of details: a 27 year old woman was admitted to a Catholic hospital. She was eleven weeks pregnant with her fifth child. She was diagnosed with right heart failure, and doctors told her that she had 100 percent likelihood of fatality if she continued with the pregnancy. A hospital administrator who was a nun, Sister Margaret McBride, gave approval for an abortion to be performed, as permissible under Catholic guidelines that allow some procedures that may result in a fetus' death to save a maternal life. When the bishop heard about it, he AUTOMATICALLY excommunicated the nun.

That story yanked me back in memory to my reaction in seeing the scene from the movie "The Cardinal."

With all due respect to faithful and deeply sincere Catholics everywhere, what kind of morality is it that instantly excommunicates someone who exercised her best judgment within the confines of her religion in order to save a life? And, further, how is it that the particular bishop could instantly render swift retribution when we read daily of other bishops who dither and dally and seemingly are unable to do anything about persistent and endemic abuse of children by priests?

My short-lived determination that movies were not moral has long since ended. Most things are neutral--it is the use in the particular instance that is moral or not. I make no claim to have the moral fortitude that Sister Margaret McBride has. Her decision has cost her a life-long call. My decision to forgo movies only cost me a season of new movie releases.

In Vino Veritas

What visit to France could overlook wine? While wine was not a primary reason for our trip, we did participate in several wine tastings--something I have never done before in a schooled way.

Throughout history, humans have used wine. Once again, it is not my intent to try to convey the history of wine-making, and wine tasting--but if you want to learn more, here's an interesting site to explore. The earliest evidence of wine dates back to 7000 B.C. In some ways, it is not at all mysterious why humans would have continually made and consumed wine--or other forms of alcohol, such as beer--frankly, with water not being pure, and in fact many times being contaminated, wine was a safe drink.

The U.S. has a checkered relationship with alcohol in general, and specifically with wine. Obviously, the zenith or nadir (depending on your point of view) regarding alcohol occurred when the 18th amendment was passed, prohibiting the manufacture, sale, or transportation of alcohol. Interestingly, it did NOT prohibit the consumption of alcohol. Prohibition lasted all of 13 years.

The history of wine in the U.S. has undergone changes. One of the founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson, was a most enthusiastic oenophile--so enthusiastic that John Adams once complained about having had dinner with Jefferson, and having to listen to yet another boring paean to wine. Jefferson imported French wines, and tried to establish vineyards in Virginia to help nudge along wine-making in the infant United States. That enthusiasm must have been short-lived, as Americans developed wine amnesia and, for almost 2 centuries, completely forsook an educated wine palette.

Our wine tastings in France took place in three very different venues. One was in the basement of a former monastery, a second was in a family owned winery in the Beaujolais region, and the third in what had once been the special project of the Pope--the fabled Chateauneuf-du-Pape.

The setting of the first tasting--in Beaune--was at Marche aux Vins. The location is immediately adjacent to the fabled Hotel Dieu with its fantastic tiled roof.



We descended into the cellar where wine barrels lined the sides. However, our guide told us the barrels were "just for show." While the wines we tasted were "interesting," nothing said--send a case back to the U.S. There is an annual auction of wines sold here every year to benefit charity. Certainly a unique way to raise money for charity.





Since our river cruise took us down the Rhone, we were in prime wine country. Many wines in the area bear the "Cote du Rhone" appellation, as wineries dot the hills all along the river. Our second tasting was of Beaujolais. This wine, frequently associated with new wine, is the specialty of many vineyards. Beaujolais nouveau is wine that is fermented for just a few weeks, and sold on the third Thursday of November. Because it is a young wine, it is light, and not at all nuanced. Perhaps that is one reason many oenophiles eschew it.

Our tasting was at a family owned business, where wine-making had been the business for generations. The current owner had recently switched to all organic farming, and had been at it long enough to receive the requisite certification of an organic grower. He was clearly proud of that accomplishment.



Our final tasting was just outside Avignon. When the papacy was moved from Rome to Avignon, the presence of the popes in the area helped boost what was already a flourishing wine-growing area. Pope John XXII seems to have made wines from Chateauneuf (which means "new castle") the virtual house wine, and granted the appellation of "vin du Pape" which morphed into Chateauneuf du Pape.





The wine growing conditions seem almost totally inhospitable. The soil in the area is--STONES. It was most surprising to see the vines, all trimmed for a season's worth of growth, rooted in this stony soil. Further, while we were in Avignon, we experienced a touch of the infamous mistral wind. How on earth vines can produce grapes is a mystery. Even more surprising (at least to me) was the fact that vines are allowed to produce strictly limited clusters. For top wines, only 6 bunches of grapes. Some vines are allowed to have 8 or 10 bunches, but under no circumstances more than that.



There are various vineyards all growing grapes in this area, all of which can be labeled "Chateauneuf du Pape." The wines, whether white or red, are all blends. For red, the base grape is grenache. Other varieties of red grapes are used in the blend, depending on the harvest, the taste of the various grapes in a given year. There are 13 varieties that may be used in the blend for reds. For white, there are only 6 varieties that may be used.

After 3 different wine-tastings, I felt a little better informed. But I would not for a minute hold myself out as an expert.

What I did come away with is a greater appreciation for wine, wine making and wine tasting. Such an appreciation is not a common thing in the U.S. By that, I do not mean to imply that there are not people who understand what wine varieties there are, or even what is involved with tasting. I do mean to suggest that the general attitude to alcohol, in general, seems to tilt too much to abuse of alcohol. College students, make that high school students who seem to think that getting roaring drunk is a rite of passage.

But, ranting is not the purpose of this brief reprise of sipping some wine in France. Maybe in a future post.

It's Complicated

Today is Mother's Day and, while I am happy to celebrate it, and even to receive cards and gifts from my children, I approach Mother's Day with a somewhat rueful attitude. Yes, it is a day to celebrate, but it's also a complicated day.

Here's why.

My mother died on Mother's Day, so at the same time I celebrate and call up with deep gratitude the memory of my mother, I also feel a frisson of grief.

Since Mother's Day is celebrated, in the U.S., on the second Sunday in May, the specific date moves around. While the actual date my mother died is May 12, I think of her death twice--on Mother's Day. . .and again on May 12.

I am certainly not alone. Obviously, there are my siblings--my brother and my sister. We all experienced the same event, and therefore have the same thoughts--recalling our mother on Mother's Day AND recalling her death.

But more than that--I had a co-worker who had gone through the exact same loss. I was working at the Pennsylvania Department of Health. The two of us were executive assistants to the Secretary of Health. This woman was particularly close to her mother--more than a mother/ daughter relationship. More like best friends. The mother lived in the Washington, D.C. area, and had driven to central Pennsylvania to visit with her daughter on Mother's Day. She then drove back south to D.C. On the way, for inexplicable reasons, she crossed the center line on a four-lane highway (without center barriers) and crashed head long into an on-coming car. She was killed outright, as was the mother in the other car. On Mother's Day. At the time, I was so struck with the sad irony of losing your mother on Mother's Day.

I recall reading a book, some years ago, by Robert Fulghum. He is a minister, and wrote--in his book It Was On Fire When I Lay Down on It--about the conundrum of preaching year after year on Mother's Day. Part of his dilemma arose from the fact that he is not a mother--so how to preach about the wonderfulness of being a mother. But beyond that, he pointed out that not everyone has a wonderful mother. So, he posed some hypothetical questions. Here's the toughest one:

" How many of you find Mother's Day painful, especially when it involves thoughts and memories of such matters as adoption, abortion, divorce, suicide, rejection, alcoholism, alienation, abuse, incest, sorrow, loss, and words like stepmother, mother-in-law, and unspeakable obscene references to motherhood?" (p. 100)

Well, you can imagine the reaction he got. He said the congregation got very quiet; he also looked out and saw the pain. Also, predictably perhaps, he was attacked as members left the service--by at least one person: "Shame, shame, shame for spoiling this day."

I find that anecdote searing in its honesty. Not everyone has (or had) a wonderful mother. For people who were abused by mothers, what does Mother's Day mean to them? For women who are failing as mothers, what do they feel?

See--it's complicated.

But, this day--I rejoice to have been blessed with having a wonderful mother. My memories are the source of joy for me--even sufficient joy to take away the sting for its also being the anniversary of her death.

And, as I wrote last year--beyond my mother as mother, I am also blessed to have had other marvelous nurturing women in my life--my stepmother, my aunts, and my mother-in-law. Nothing complicated about that.

The Religious Wars

No, this is not going to be a post about the current culture clash in the U.S. wherein some people of a particular Christian persuasion and belief believe they have figured out TRUTH for all of us. To them, I say--go read Winesburg, Ohio. We can all know truth (lower case t) but if we believe we have Truth (upper case T) we are most likely wrong.

OK--enough of that.

Almost everywhere we went with city guides and local guides in France, we heard some reference to the religious wars. At first, I was thinking--huh? Religious extremism has taken hold in France? Well, yes and no. No, not currently. Yes, in the past. I find the denouement of France's religious wars somewhat instructive, perhaps even for U.S. history.

Many parts of Europe went through volcanic struggles as Christianity moved from "one true faith"--Catholicism--to dual expressions of faith in Catholicism and Protestantism. Frankly, I am far more familiar with England's struggles--bound up as it is in Henry VIII's marriages--than any other part of Europe. I had an inkling of knowledge about Germany's struggle, of course including Luther and his connection to peasant uprisings. I even had a bit of knowledge about Spain, where religious struggles focused more on the driving out Muslim invaders by "los reyes Catolicas" (Ferdinand and Isabella) and on exiling Jews from Spain--same monarchs.

But France? Religious wars? Nope--nothing--no knowledge.

I will not for a minute try to cover the sweep of French history that the religious wars encompass. It is enough to say that, in general, these wars had to do with a century of fighting between Catholics and Protestants. Naturally, powers aligned with each side, so frequently the subject at hand had to do with who would inherit the throne, or who had just inherited the throne, or who people did not want to inherit the throne. Some hot religious topic, right?

The map below, from http://www.lepg.org/wars.htm, gives you some sense of the deep divide within France that these wars caused.

Basically, areas marked in red were Catholic controlled, areas marked in pink were Protestant controlled. The Huguenots were the lead advocates of Protestantism.

Before all the conflict resulting from Catholic vs. Protestant, France was also the scene of an internecine religious war, when the Avignon papacy arose. Once again, the genesis of the religious conflict arose out of a struggle for power. French kings exercised their control over papal selection. When the pope died in 1304, the French cardinals and the Italian cardinals fought over who would dominate and elect the pope. For a year, the papal throne was unfilled. Finally, Pope Clement V was elected--and tipped the balance toward France.

To demonstrate that power shift, the seat of the papacy was eventually moved to Avignon, France, and remained there for 70 years.

Papal seal in Avignon Papal Palace

We visited Avignon and saw the now long abandoned Papal palace. It is a huge cavernous unoccupied building. I couldn't help but think of Shelley's poem "Ozymandias." Admittedly, this poem talks of temporal power. But, even popes die and their kingdoms fade away. Here's the visual evidence of that.

Exterior of Avignon Papal Palace

Ceiling of Papal Dining Hall

Painted walls in Papal bedroom

Interior courtyard of Papal Palace

Simple stained glass windows

The Avignon papacy ended when Pope Gregory XI moved back to Rome, but the schism in the Catholic church continued.

When Napoleon rose to power, 4 centuries later, he added to this convoluted religious history. Coming after the French Revolution, as he did, Napoleon benefited from some of the ways in which France had changed. The power structure, of church holding sway over things temporal, had shifted. But Napoleon was still unhappy with the extent of temporal power the church retained. So, Napoleon set about demoting various cathedrals--now you have a cardinal and have a cathedral; now you don't. By simple decree, Napoleon undid much of the church's power structure in France.

Back to our guides and their assertions--actually more than assertions. They would say "religious wars" with almost a note of horror in their voices. Today's France is the heir to this demonstrable separation of church and state. Our guides indicated that no French politician would use his or her religious stance as a means to garner support. The French simply wouldn't stand for it.

I came away from this part of our trip to France wondering. The U.S. has experienced a civil war. Will we be wise enough to steer away from repeating that history? Will we escape the turmoil that a country divided over religion experiences? Will we ever reach the enlightened state where we would have politicians who would NOT use their religious stance as a means of garnering support? I wonder, I wonder, I wonder. . .

We'll Always Have Paris

Remember those olde tyme movies when the romantic couple, who were doomed to be separated, turn to each other, and say plaintively--we'll always have Paris.

I've always wanted to say that!

And, with our most recent trip--now I can. Of course, it will just sound silly as an off-the-cuff-unrelated-to-anything comment.

There were many high points in our recent trip. I loved Lyon. While it was very early in the season, Provence was charming. One striking place was Les Baux. This small town takes it name from the word "Baou" which is the Provençal word for a prominent protruding rock. In turn, Les Baux gave its name to bauxite (aluminum ore), which was discovered first there in 1821.

Here are two photos that show ever so briefly the stunning vistas that we saw at Les Baux.



But, enough about the provinces--let's celebrate Paris.

We had been in Paris about 10 years ago, and had an extensive tour of the Eiffel Tower, including riding the elevators as high as they go. On this visit, we approached the Eiffel Tower from the right bank. Perhaps predictably, this was one of the most crowded places--the obligatory visit to Eiffel Tower.

We went to other sites we had not seen 10 years ago--The church at Les Invalides above.

The Palais du Luxembourg is a lovely palace built for Marie de Medici who missed her Italian homeland. She was the second wife of Henry IV, king of France. His first marriage had been annulled and he married Marie de Medici, of the Tuscan Medici family, in 1600. She was more than he bargained for, however, as she did not like his lead mistress. When the king died in 1610, she became regent. She began building the palace in 1615.

Here she is in all her stony glory.

I thought the fountain in the gardens at the Palais du Luxembourg quite lovely.

Another major site we had not seen was the whole Montmartre area. To get there, we rode this "petit train", bouncing all the way up and down the hills of Montmartre. This area has a history interwoven with artists. For a long time, it was outside the official city limits of Paris, so it became a popular gathering place, without the taxes imposed within Paris. The area was slated for destruction when Paris was undergoing its urban renewal, and was saved by artists who helped preserve its unique character.

Renoir's painting "Bal du moulin de la Galette" celebrates a summer afternoon with people gathered in Montmartre near the Moulin de la Galette. Below, you can see the actual windmill that lent its name to the location.



Another artistic site is a restaurant named La Maison Rose, a place painted by various artists, including Utrillo.

We walked around Place des Tertres, where today's artists have license to exhibit paintings. Frankly, we saw no budding Picassos or Dalis or Renoirs. The area was even more crowded than the area around the Eiffel Tower. Since we were there in early spring, presumably we were there when crowds were light. Can't imagine what it is like in the summer--although I am happy to miss the crowds.

One other find was a Wallace fountain. We had learned of them from the guide who took us around Montmartre. The fountain name derives not from the designer but from Richard Wallace who underwrote the cost to have hundreds of these fountains placed around Paris.

The crowning glory of Montmartre is the Basilica of Sacré-Cœur. This 19th century site was built to commemorate deaths suffered in the Franco-Prussian War and the resulting uprising of working classes in Paris in the Paris Commune.

In addition to the over-the-top architecture of the basilica, its location at the height of Montmartre gives it a commanding view of Paris.

Perhaps you are wondering about some of the other iconic Parisian sights that I have not mentioned. Well, 10 years ago we toured Notre Dame, spent some time in the Louvre, and drove along the Avenue des Champs-Élysées, including stopping at the Arc de Triomphe.

So, that leaves quite a few places we have not yet seen. Oh, we need more time. . .

Until then, we can just say--we'll always have Paris. . .to go back to someday.

The Art of Conversation

Subtitled: Table Talk at Table No. 10

I have a neighbor--I will call her Eunice--who is woeful at conversation. I saw her recently and asked: so, are you doing much overseas travel lately. She works for the military-industrial-defense complex in this country, and had been traveling overseas quite frequently. I asked because I thought maybe she had experienced the recent travel travails that people all over the world encountered with the Iceland volcano acting petulant. No, she said. I stopped traveling some time ago.

Period. Full stop. End of conversation.

OK, so much for small talk with my neighbor. She has an absolute gift for squelching any pleasantry exchanges.

Such was not the case on our recent trip to France. The bulk of the trip was spent on a river cruise, courtesy of Avalon Waterways. The company did a fine job of getting us from one French town to another. In fact, part of the excitement of the trip (we had no prescience of the volcano exploding, so we didn't know what REAL excitement is) was whether or not we would clear the various bridges as we sailed down the Saône and the Rhone. We were delayed part of a day due to high water as we approached Lyon.

The tour director said--we needed to have the river level go down some 20 to 30 centimeters before we could sail. When we finally did sail, we went slowly under the bridges of Lyon with maybe 2 or so centimeters to spare. I awoke at 5 a.m. one morning just as we were sailing, and we watched the progress on the in-house television. We glided under bridge after bridge with hardly room to spare.

(photo of Passerelle Masaryk from Wikipedia)

Anyway, back to the art of conversation. The first night we had dinner on the river we ended up at Table No. 10 along with four other passengers. The general idea--at least as articulated by the cruise director--was to rotate among tables so that by the end of the journey, you have shared table talk with all the other passengers. However, my husband and I are somewhat introverted--small talk is irrelevant if not painful. So night after night we gravitated back to the same small group with whom we had bonded.

Our group included a senior retired couple from California--he had been an art instructor in high school, and then the head of the art department for the school. She did not tell us what she had done, until maybe the third evening when I said--point blank--and what did you do in your working life? Well, she said, I was a clinical psychologist. Oooooooh!

So, I asked, what was your most interesting or challenging patient? Oh, she said, there was this one guy who liked to look at women's underwear, and he asked to see mine. I declined, but I often wondered if I should have let him see mine.

OK--pause in the conversation.

The other two people were a father and daughter traveling together. The father was a career Air Force man had been widowed a year before, and the daughter was helping him get through the difficult anniversary of his wife's death. I very much resonated with her experience, as I too had gone through helping my father cope with my mother's death. When it turned out that she , who had been trained as a librarian, had read as many (if not more) books than I, that she knew a lot about art and history, and that she too wrote AND has been published--well, that's a trifecta. I can't ask for more in a traveling companion.

Our table talk ranged widely every night. Over the days, we learned that we shared political sensitivities--all of us having somewhat more liberal leanings. We didn't see everything exactly the same--but why would we? And how boring would that be anyway.

I recognize that our experience demonstrates a general tendency among humans--we generally like to return to the same nesting spot. Having had a pleasant experience in our first evening of conversation, we were quite happy to return to Table No. 10. This tendency is one on which I rely to learn student names--I know that by the third day of class, students are going to sit in the same spot they sat in on day 1 and day 2, so I jot down their names on a seating chart, and then call on them by name as we have class discussions.

Ah, Table No. 10. Part of what made this trip to France very special. And while it is unlikely that we will see these traveling companions again, I will think of them all, wonder how they are doing, wonder what new challenges they have met, and I will wish I could hold a conversation with them.

Learning in Lyon

At the confluence of the Saône and Rhone Rivers lies the city of Lyon. After Paris, Lyon is the next largest city in France. With a completely different character, Lyon was altogether fascinating, and the source of much new learning for me.

Guide books will tell you that Lyon is the gastronomic center of France. That may be--but we found other things of interest. The Lyonnais must enjoy humor--note all the people standing on balconies on this building. Notice anything unusual? YES--they are painted on the building. A marvelous example of a trompe l'oeil mural. The painting is called La Fresque des Lyonnais. Our guide pointed out the names of the various people depicted, including dead and living famous Lyonnais. Sorry--I don't recall any of the names now (but the link above will tell you...if you read French). Apparently, this wall is one of several around the city, all painted to fool the viewer.

Next stop for learning was La Maison des Canuts; canuts were the Lyonnais silk workers. Now, I recall having raised silkworms as a kid. Didn't we all? Anyway, growing up in then Northern Rhodesia, I had a shoebox with silkworms in it, while I attended boarding school. The silkworm moths laid eggs, which hatched into tiny worms which fed voraciously on mulberry leaves--only mulberry leaves. Then, when the worms were fully grown, they spun a cocoon with the fine silk. I can even remember the process of taking a cocoon, and unwinding it--a long strand of silk.

That recollection came flooding back as we toured La Maison des Canuts, a kind of working museum. We had a demonstration of weaving before and after--silk looms, before and after Joseph Marie Jacquard invented a programmable loom. "Before" looms looked the one shown below--a confusing tangle of threads, which to a silk weaver (a canut) would dictate the pattern. Looms required two workers to operate, one to apply pressure on pedals to raise the mechanism that separate the parallel threads that made up the warp, and the other to throw the shuttle for the weft--the bobbins with the actual colored silk for the design--back and forth. Understandably, it was a tedious process. A day's work might yield an inch or two of patterned silk.

Weaving was largely a cottage industry. Workers lived and worked in the same space. The primary requirement was a ceiling high enough to accommodate the size of the loom. What Jacquard did for silk weaving was make it possible to have a programmable pattern. He studied some early efforts to achieve this goal, and developed a loom that revolutionized silk weaving. With his invention, production output soared. Napoleon was so pleased with Jacquard's invention that he gave him an absolute monopoly on loom production, solidifying Lyon as the silk center of his empire.

Look at the photo above. If you have been around computers for a long time, it may look hauntingly familiar. While we were listening to the woman in the silk museum as she demonstrated the Jacquard loom, I kept staring at the program cloth. It looked so much like an old time computer program that I kept thinking--the Jacquard loom must be a pre-cursor to the earliest computers. Of course, I had to wait until I got home to check it out--and, voila, here is an explanation. In fact, Jacquard's invention was inspiration for Babbage's machine, and--as they say--"the rest is history."

Once a bolt of silk was woven, it had to be taken to the control board for weighing. NO moisture was the goal, partly because moisture adversely affects silk--as anyone who has ever been caught in the rain wearing a silk blouse knows--and partly because the buyer did not want to pay for water.

Solution? Covered passageways for canuts to hurry through, carrying their silk down to the river for sale. These passageways, while not unique in European cities, have a particular character in Lyon. They are called traboules.

Not all of the passageways are covered, but they all seemed to have steps. Since the silk industry was centered in the Croix-Rousse hill, steps were a necessity to get from the top of the hill to the bottom where the river was.

Many of the passageways are hidden--a seasoned Lyonnais would know where the passageway entrances are. I asked our guide if these passageways featured in the French resistance--absolutely. With Lyon a center for Nazi activity--remember Klaus Barbie--the French resistance used the traboules effectively as they were pursued by the SS.

One last word on the canuts--these hardworking weavers mounted what might be seen as one of the first job actions in work history. Actually, there were three separate revolts by the Canuts.

Working conditions were difficult at best, and salaries were dropping. The silk workers tried to establish a fixed price for their goods. In what was almost a classic worker/ management standoff, the workers united in solidarity. Their rallying cry: Live free working, or die fighting...

Certainly has a modern ring to it, doesn't it.