A Cold Night in December in France (true story)

[Cordellia Amethyste Rose]

I don’t know what just made me think of this, but it’s a true story about a great event I got to witness many years go.

 

I lived in downtown Poitiers and was pretty bored and lonely.  I kept praying to do something with my life and have some positive impact on someone.  It was a relatively safe neighborhood, so I’d often go out walking around downtown in the middle of the night.  There were pedestrian streets across from a big square where people would gather for events.  I went walking alone in the cold night, as usual.  I walked around the pedestrian streets and made my way back across the square and sat on a bench.  

 

Around 1am, a middle-aged gentleman who was obviously poor came walking up to me with his little dog.  He was nice and clearly harmless.  He asked to sit with me and just talk.  He told me a long tale, most of which I forget today, but it took about an hour.  I believe his name was Pascal.  He told me a long tale about how he had lived in Africa for many years.  There, he had many animals, which he adored including a snake and some monkeys.  He fell in love with the wife of a prominent government official, and she loved him back.  The government official was a bad man, and Pascal knew he could never be with this woman.  He told me of another woman who had been gravely ill.  She had many diseases, which prompted her to just walk and walk, all around.  She inspired him greatly.  He couldn’t stand being in Africa anymore and not be with the woman he loved.  He found good homes for all his animals.  He bragged that one of his monkeys had become head of a monkey tribe in an animal sanctuary.  He left and came back home to France.  Since he had been in France, he had felt cold and lonely.  He said people were so different there.  In Africa, everyone was friendly and would greet you, but in France, people were distant and cold.   He adopted a little puppy just to have some company.  He had wandered down to Poitiers from Paris and was about to spend his first night on the street on this very cold December night.  He felt lost and hopeless.  He had almost no possessions and only a few cigarettes, yet he insisted on giving me one.  I felt bad but had no advice for him.  I just listened to him talk. 

 

Then, around 2am, the bars closed.  There were a row of bars across the square from where we were sitting.  Out of the bar directly across the square from us, came 2 young women.  They made their way towards us without noticing us at first.  Then, when one of the young women saw who I was sitting with, he got up, and they both started screaming.  “Pascal, is that you?” she screamed?  They started hugging and screaming out of joy.  I never found out how they knew each other, but I got the feeling they had been very close but hadn’t seen each other in a very long time.  She introduced him to her friend, and they were all screaming and hugging.  They passed the dog around and hugged the dog.  They hugged me.  Then, he turned to me and thanked me.  He said that if I hadn’t been sitting there on that bench, he would have kept walking, and he and this woman never would have reunited.  He asked her if he could stay with her, and she screamed, “Of course!”  Then, they all went off happily across the square, arm in arm. 

 

I don’t know who they were or whatever happened to them, but that night started out badly but ended very happily for this kind-hearted man and this nice young woman. 

 

The end.

[Cordellia Amethyste Rose]

No, she was young and French.  

[The1andonlyAbber]

Cool story. The woman was probably the wife of the government official.