The View From My Window…Dimanche des Rameaux

Well, I’m still wrestling with computer issues. For now, I think the computer itself is functioning, but the keyboard has suddenly decided to go haywire….and at the moment, there is absolutely no correlation between which key is pressed and what symbol appears!
So less words…more pictures.
Early in the morning…à table in our fourth-floor, walk-up pied à terre…this was the view from my window last Sunday…
It’s not terribly unusual for us to hear music from la rue down below…strains of Piaf from an accordion player on the corner…or an impromptu jazz trio on the bridge that connects us to “the other island”…but this time, there was a definite difference in what we heard.

What the…?  Ah, yes…it was Palm Sunday. Only here it’s called  Dimanche des Rameaux…Branch Sunday…and while there was one palm leaf…

…held aloft by the prêtre…be-splendid in an embroidered crimson velvet cloak…

…the other participants are holding branches of buis or boxwood…
The parishioners follow…
  …forming a procession of faithful…that sings its way toward our neighborhood church. We can smell the mixture of incense, candles, and foliage. With each participant carrying a branch, from our vantage point, it’s sort of like a horizontal bush chanting its way up the street.

Different types of branches are used in different parts of France. Here, it’s boxwood, but other regions might use laurel branches…in Provence, an olive branch is carried as a symbol of peace and abundance. It’s all part of a custom that dates back to the ninth century.  Once the procession reaches its destination and is inside the church, the branches are ceremoniously blessed to signify vitality. Some are then placed on the graves of the departed and others are kept at home…until the following year, when they are brought back to the church to be burned as part of the ceremonies for Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent.
Where does one find all that boxwood?

Buxus sempervirens is its botanical name…

     …and throughout Europe it has been used for centuries in various handicrafts…carved into countless chess pieces or…duh…boxes.
Even though we are in the middle of the big city, it was not difficult to find boxwood branches…boxwood is a common component of a traditional French garden and we were lucky enough to befriend the gardeners at the nearby Bibliotèque Forney…an amazing library devoted to the Decorative Arts…
…as well as a wonderful place to sit and admire the architecture of the building in which it is housed…constructed between 1475 and 1507 as the Parisian residence of the Archbishop of Sens.

A French garden often consists of low hedges that form a decorative pattern…
…and, in keeping with that old saying…one man’s hedge clippings is another man’s symbol of vitality…
Ahhhh…Paris in the Springtime…who needs words, anyway?
Stay tuned for more behind the scenes adventures of The Meadows Collection…or check out the results at www.meadowscollection.com