Thoughts on Power

On our fourth day in Europe my mom and I trekked to Versailles. And when I say "trekked" I do mean "trekked." As we were walking up to the Palace in the pouring rain my mom remarked that it did look quite a bit like the peasants' Bread March. Hundreds of tourists unloaded from the train station, paid exorbitant prices for umbrellas, and flocked toward the Palace at 10 am.

The Palace of Versailles is far beyond the realm of adequate description. Ostentatious doesn't even do it justice. Paris was ostentatious, Versailles exceeded even that. I was disgusted, I couldn't even imagine the sheer repulsion of the peasant women who'd known only their dingy little hovels until the day they stormed this monstrosity.

I began to see that this family truly became imprisoned in their excesses. A part of me pities Marie-Antoinette. I wonder if she married in unawares, or more likely, she didn't really have a choice. Now a truly courageous woman would have stood up to her husband and the excesses of the empire. She took the less honorable route, retreating to her make-believe village to escape the absurdities of her life by enshrouding it in even greater absurdity.

Throughout the day at Versailles I couldn't help but start to wonder what happens to a person's psyche when they are thrust into power. Louis XIV was born into power and his sons afterward. Thus, the dementia of power just compounded and spiraled throughout each generation. Frenchmen vied for the honor of being Valet de Chambre, rising the Sun King in the morning and putting him to bed at night. But wouldn't it be terrible to live without the freedom to go to bed when you wished, the privacy to dress oneself, or to change plans on a whim? In some ways I wonder if the peasants really were freer. They were not slaves to their lives of excess. But still, I guess they were slaves to their hunger.

As we walked for hours all over Versailles, taking in the expanse of the tuilleries and grounds, I began to wonder how much the kings and queens that lived there could really enjoy all that it had to offer. There was so much of it, they couldn't possibly have had enough time to really make all of the little terraces, walkways, and the three palaces worth the trouble. Perhaps if Marie had done a bit more walking around her estate she would have been a bit slimmer.

By the end of the day we were exhausted from walking miles through Versailles. It would have been nearly impossible for us to stay upright long enough to eat in the one of those lovely French cafes. To stave off the impending grouchiness that accompanies a drop in blood sugar, I picked up my favorite French meal from the local patisserie - a simple baguette with ham and cheese. Perhaps one day I'll return to Paris and allocate enough physical stamina to be truly cosmopolitan and eat fine cheese and wine at 10pm. But by the end of our second day there I think we were just happy for the freedom to go to bed early in our budget hotel, unhindered by excess but full of baguettes, and unencumbered by the mental illnesses that saturate the powerful.