Places, events, people

Yesterday, I learned that a place I last visited a decade ago, had dramatically changed.  It didn't wait for me, it didn't ask my opinion or permission, it just changed.

Somehow, places don't wait for us, don't long to see us, don't miss us.   You can hug and kiss the Eiffel Tower, but the Eiffel Tower won't hug and kiss you back because the Eiffel Tower doesn't know you and  doesn't care. People like to leave their palm or foot  prints on the freshly poured cement sidewalks to mark forever (they hope) their passing presence there, or they walk the paths that famous men walked years or centuries before them to feel what it was like, and still the places don't care.  Over the years, I watched a man living two streets over from me become old and die, his descendants then selling his house, and the neighbourhood forgetting he ever existed.  I may be now or soon will be the last person here remembering him.

A jazz festival is taking place in Bremen, Germany this weekend, Jazzahead it is called in English, and if you were there, come Sunday evening you'd have to pack up your things and head for home.  And if you weren't there, the festival would have gone on without you just the same, and would not miss your presence.   When I traveled to professional conferences, 3, 5 days in far away cities, I usually stayed at the conference venue until the last hour, attending the last sessions, after most of the participants had already departed for the airport, while I didn't want the conference to ever end.

If you've lived long enough in a metropolitan area somewhere on the planet, you might have acquired friends and acquaintances all over the world.  Presumably, they would be happy to see you where they live now, to buy you a drink, to show you around, and to tolerate your presence for a day or two. That's all fine, but you need someone to tolerate your presence all day every day.