Today would have been my cousin's 65 birthday.
Julie was a few months older than me, she led the way into the new year, and I would catch up in February.
Julie was our "person" at our wedding, as we did not have standing witnesses.
She is Sacha's godmother, but we called her "Buddha Mere" as she didn't want to be called Godmother, as she said at the time she was agnostic.
She was one of our first guests in our studio in Paris:
Here are Julie's favorite French words:
Poubelle – Garbage can
Gendarmes – Police
Pamplemousse – Grapefruit
Libellule – Dragonfly
We (Julie, my mother-in-law, Sacha, and I) were to go to Greece. We arrived at the airport and missed the plane because we were going to have a bite to eat. As I begged, argued, and tried to get the hostess to get us on the plane because it still had 50 minutes before taking off, Julie stood by me at the counter eating pizza UNFAZED. Later she said, "What was I thinking! We missed going to Greece!!"
All I could muster was, "You were eating Pizza!"
We laughed about that for years to come.
That blameful pizza, and it wasn’t that good.
We went to Egypt, where she paid a dollar for Chelsea and Sacha to ride camels. As they rode off with two guys we didn't know, I turned to Julie and said, "Maybe we should be concerned?"
She shrugged, "Why?"
"Well, they are 12 and 8 years old, with two guys we do not know, riding towards the horizon at a fast pace…"
"Oh, shit!" she laughed with that worried kind of laughter.
Years later, we went to Marakesh when we arrived at Jemaa el Fnaa completely in awe through every sense: the smell, the sight, the music, the hecklers, the snake charmer, the fire eater, the food; we wandered. There, I realized Julie had a lousy sense of direction and needed a drink in a country without readily available alcohol.
We illegally crawled through the underground in Paris, hours and miles through damp, weirdness, darkness, wild parties, and balancing on telephone wires with rubber boots, and trusted Yann's friend to get us out of there. Truly a mad experience that was amazing in that I wasn't afraid most likely because Julie was a nurse she and Yann saw adnveture as a healthy challenge were I saw it as the underbelly of what could happen if…
We sat on a church rooftop in Camargue, and Julie took beautiful photos of Chelsea and Sacha. She loved my children as if they were her own, and they loved Julie as if she was one of them.
When I moved to Paris, she cared for my seven-year-old goldfish called "Sweetlips." My goldfish was so depressed that Julie called me so I could perk him up by putting the phone to his bowl. She said he jumped when he heard my voice. "What?" I exclaimed. "Who is exaggerating now?"
She constantly claimed I exaggerated, and I swore that recalling memories or sharing about something and stories needed that, or they were just words utter. We went round and round about it. Julie and her facts, me, and my imagination came together in a place called admiration.
Julie was a nurse, she was my go-to person wherever I wasn't feeling well. Being in France and not speaking the language well, Julie was my living "Google" she knew how to calm my fear and put me on the right path to healing. As a nurse, it seemed nothing razzled her, but within that sensitive soul,, she carried a tremendous amount of sadness. Watching people suffer is only for the brave and those with a steadiness of trust. Julie called the ambulance when she felt within her the signs of a stroke.
She hated Grey's Anatomy and loved Taylor Swift, and I liked Grey's Anatomy and thought One Direction boy "Harry" was better than her Taylor… all said to get her goat.
"Taylor Swift's "Folklore" has off-the-chart lyrics, she is a genius at expressing depth. Have you listened to it? Her words are easy to relate to…" she went on and on about this album.
When I arrived in SF (as Chelsea, Sacha, and I did as we always stayed with Julie the night or two before we headed back to Paris- Oh God, I dreaded lugging our six suitcases at 72 pounds each up her fifty straight up stairway!) Julie was downstairs helping us unload our luggage. She sang, "My Lady Lumps from Black Eyed Peas" I stared at her, "Are you talking about your butt or boobs in front of Chelsea and Sacha?" Just then, she started to slap her butt at the beat. Julie's love for popular music was beyond the scope.
Julie made us music tapes, then CDs of music, and we were thrilled to receive them.
Fat Boy Slim https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruAi4VBoBSM
God, we danced a lot to that song!
"We've come a long, long way together
Through the hard times and the good
I have to celebrate you, baby
I have to praise you like I should
Through the hard times and the good
I have to celebrate you, baby
I have to praise you like I should
"
We've come a long, long way together
Through the hard times and the good
I have to celebrate you, baby
I have to praise you like I should
Through the hard times and the good
I have to celebrate you, baby
I have to praise you like I should
I have to praise you
I have to praise you
I have to praise you
I have to praise you like I should
I have to praise you
I have to praise you
I have to praise you like I should
I have to praise you
I have to praise you
I have to praise you
I have to praise you
I have to praise you
We've come a long, long way together
Through the hard times and the good
I have to celebrate you, baby
I have to praise you like I should…"
Through the hard times and the good
I have to celebrate you, baby
I have to praise you like I should…"
So many fucking memories, bringing them up, tears well in my eyes. My earliest memories are from childhood when we would play under the Weeping Willow tree.
Today is your birthday, and I am celebrating you as I should.
—
Our best bicycle race from my childhood home to hers was five minutes flat out between my house and hers. But maybe I am exaggerating. But I am not. We were young and robust.
In my mind’s eye, my cousin Julie and I are riding bicycles again on county road P.
We are about 13 years old.
The sky is blue,
the rice fields are waving that brilliant green,
our long brown hair wiping around our faces as the wind is at our backs …
we let go of the handlebars throwing our arms into the air,
we look at each other, laughing!
We let the wind take us home.
Missing you has become a new normal. Thankfully, I can still hear your easy laugh, hear your voice in songs you sent us, and feel your love caressing my face.
When someone we love leaves us
Life around us shifts, and changes, leaving us with an empty space.
A seed of their life roots slowly within us, in that inner space, often invisible, over time leading us to a relationship with our memory and usually a spiritual connection. There, the space is renewed, and the one we loved/love blooms.
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