Charteau de Versailles, continued

I discussed my first day at the chateau after I made this long journey from Scottsdale to Paris, and finally achieved one of my life's current ambitions, and that is to see the Versailles for myself.

Believe it or not, while I am willing to discuss all this business of finding one's self in time as I seem to have done, it has continued to be a problem which perplexes me no end. I love to talk about it, obviously, as it is like a new love. At first, I felt like Doris Day's song Once I had a secret love, for that is how I wanted to discuss it so much over and over again and again. I could hardly believe it myself.

It is a very heady, exhiliarating feeling to know that one can go back in time and to discover something that is stored somewhere, and I do not pretend to know exactly where this is. I am the world's most notorious skeptic, believing in most of the junk told to us as so much nonsense designed only to pad someone's pocketbook. The world is full of gullible, insanely stupid people.

And I refuse to be considered one of those. But when I myself am able to see and relive these moments, I honestly know that they are true. It is like a promise of Jesus's coming true: Ask and ye shall receive.

I was not impressed with the king himself or his life as such but with the fact that I could find it so well and that it is so well recorded and so true. I later became impressed with him as I learned more and more about him. I did not know one thing about him at first, and to me, he was a bit of a strange person as told by historians. He is a man who one encyclopedia called a Bigot. He is accused of excess and extravagance.

Because all this so called excess and extravagance is something that I have seen and learned to appreciate I have a much better understanding of this man's thinking and desire to be the best and to achieve it. He used well his architects, artists, writers, soldiers, and merchants around him. He knew how to build a kingdom that has since stood as a model for other kingdoms, despite the few who hated him for it.

It is because I am rewarded now to be able to go back into time as I had done that I fully appreciate all this too. I value more today than when I first learned of it all the beautiful and exquisite artwork that was accomplished in that time period.

But I digressed from my intention to say that on the second day at the chateau, I walked into the main building whereupon the exhibit was not yet ready to be seen so that I made my way into the other apartments that are on display and had quite an experience then. I did not take any photographs at all that day as I was too busy trying to see everything since it is my first time in this lifetime to set foot there.

Many thoughts come to mind when one is taking this tour of the King's apartments, and one of the things that I most wanted to see was his bedroom as I have spent time on his bed there and seen things from that point of view that I wanted to see if I could find again. I admit that I will return to that chateau whenever I can find the time to do it, hopefully for a longer time in Europe than the first, and I did find one thing that I had set out to learn.

So while the wall had been my inspiration for the trip, I had seen many other things that were known probably only to me (unless someone can and does see into my mind) and so I looked for them. Because this chateau is now a museum, things can change very quickly as I soon learned. But I did find the bedroom, the fixture that I knew could not be altered, and made a point to see the object that I wanted to see. There are two things in Louis's own bedroom that are significant to me, and which are original as when first built. Objects which would have been there probably had been taken to the exhibit hall. But as I said I was looking for something that could be seen from his bed vantage point. Sleeping in the king's bed is one of the small pleasures I had had when going back into his time period.

Because my main interest is in Louis XIV, when asked at the hotel where I stayed if it is Antoinette, I murmured yes. I would not explain that I had come for the exhibit. I did not know what would be in store.

Naturally, I also saw the Queen's bedroom which at the time of Louis XIV would have been his wife's bedroom, Queen Marie Therese, but it is now known more for Queen Marie Antoinette than the two previous queens who have slept there. The Queens' bedroom has special appointments of its own as well, but my memory is of the King and his bedroom, not that of the Queen's.

I was very touched by something that occurred there when I was looking through all these apartments as many portraits are on the walls of members of the family. They all seemed to be smiling and happy to see me there. I could feel it. That will sound strange, but there seemed to come through for me a big welcome back attitude as though I were doing something good for the entire family. That really impacted me a lot.

I was back home where I belonged in a sense and I felt it.