Day 299. Joe's Garage. (26/10/13)

One last, brief, missive from the now departed Parisian nights before I move on to home affairs again. Two brief points to make; one slightly doomy, one somewhat glorious.

We were in Pere LaChaise, we'd seen Jim's final resting place and Tom and I had decided to search for Chopin as J and Matt headed toward the exit (we never did get to Piaf or Marcel Marceau although a brilliantly enthusiastic Frenchman had informed the four of us - and principally Matty - that we should seek out the French mime as he had tutored Michael Jackson). We were at a crossroads (literally, not metaphorically) consulting 'Le plan du Cimeterie' for our destination when I turned to realise exactly what we were standing in front of.

In a random, momentary, halt in a ridiculously large, sprawling city of those that have passed we were standing immediately before a crypt dedicated to 'La Famille Salmon'.

"It's not that big a deal" said Tom, "It's not that unusual a name"

"It's fairly unusual" I replied "'specially in France I'd imagine" (the French word for Salmon is Saumon, a misspelling that we're yet to have in this country)

There is possibly a great deal to be said about how such an encounter could (and perhaps should) reinforce our understanding of our own mortality, of how small we are in the universe, of how we all have one destination in common.

I just thought that it was really cool.

Thursday night. The kids had gone up to their room after tea (about 10pm) J and I had a couple of glasses of wine alfresco at the pavement tables of the restaurant opposite our hotel (full view of the lads' bedroom window at all times) then stepped inside to pay.

As we settled the bill (€26 for four very fine glasses of Sancerre) a well dressed French gent at the end of the bar heard our voices and asked where we were from.

We told him Liverpool and he followed with the obvious rejoinder 'John Lennon! Paul McCartney!'

He told us (in an English that was far better than I could ever dream of my rudimentary O level standard French being) that he thought that, of all music, Lennon and McCartney were the peak, that they towered over everybody else in the field.

He then asked if we knew of Edgar Winter? Johnny Winter?

J didn't, I don't know a huge amount of their work but I grew up in an era when The Old Grey Whistle Test was still showing footage of the two on an almost weekly basis. The gent that we were talking to played with them in Paris in the early 70s. 'I played with them, on my Stratocaster' he explained. I obviously mentioned that I too had a Strat.

'Frank Zappa' he continued 'George Duke' I wasn't entirely sure whether he had played with them or just liked them, if he'd played with Zappa then he had clearly been a hell of a musician.

He was 61 now but didn't look it. Dapper, refined, dignified, worked for an American bank. Just another businessman from an office in the fairly business oriented area that we were staying, somebody that you may not pay a second glance to.

I'm a well known miserable bugger. I don't make small talk, don't build relations with strangers on holiday, J is much better at that than I am. There's another change to make then, there are so many fascinating people out there.

I wish that we'd caught his name.