A few days before we leave we drive to a town called Alesia, a small town perched high up on a hill overlooking the hills and fields of Burgundy. Placed even higher than the town itself, on the very top, the unprotected crest of the hill, is a ruin. It is closed for winter so we sneak in through the back gate and as a fierce winter wind pulls and howls we wander among the Roman ruin. There is an amphitheater, its form still clearly visible although much is covered with earth. There are the foundations of houses and the columns that once outlined the center of government. We walk the outlines of streets and go into what remains of shrines to Jupiter and chapels to Christ. There is the ancient sunken form of a bathhouse which seems still to swirl with steam among its crumbling columns. It is all perfectly preserved, bursting with life and history and flickering images of the past. Looking down what was once a street, I convince myself that I am there, among people and noises and life and Roman brilliance, art and technology and innovation and government and theater and society. But then the north wind drags such images away and I am left standing on a hill-top surrounded by ruins.


Afterwards we drive to a vast heroic statue of Vercyngetrix, the Gaul warlord who almost stopped the Roman invasion of Gaul, but was crushed like so many others. he stands forlornly with his hand on his sword, gazing down into the valley. As we stand in awe below, we are approached by a French gentleman, clearly an academic and, we learn, guardian of the historic ruins who wants to know if it was us that tresspassed. But of course Monsewer, we do not speak French, we did not know that it was closed and thought it natural to us an abandoned back gate. We are terribly remorseful but we remind him that it is actually His fault for not stopping us, besides we are poor grandchildren who have come all the way from America to see this ruin. Bashful and outmaneuvered, the Frenchman retreats and we return, victorious and satisfied, to Grimault.