AHH, Paris in January. I have an image of myself strolling down the left bank of the Seine in a black pea coat (collar turned up), a bruised paperback edition of Sartre's Nausea in my back pocket and a baguette under my arm, while puffing nonchalantly on a Gauloise. Like a still from a Jean-Luc Godard film, this image is the stuff that French romance is made of. The reality, of course, is far different, as I roll off the end of the moving walkway into the main terminal at Charles de Gaulle airport bedecked in Berghaus gear, and holding my son's cuddly yellow duck. I'm in France not to play a concert, but on babysitting duties, while my wife and her band play at the Tendance Festival held in the Maison de la Culture which translates, if my Higher French serves me correctly, as the Culture House.
Unfortunately the concert is not actually in Paris, but 80 miles north in the city of Amiens. France is having its coldest snap for years, and it's minus five as we hit the road north. The taxi ride is going well until the driver takes both hands off the wheel on the motorway to try and shut his broken window. Everyone else has fallen asleep, but I think it's my gasp of alarm that prompts him to reluctantly pull over in the next lay-by to fix it, while he mutters away in French. He's probably talking about me but I can't understand a word, so I pretend he's cursing the sky in true existentialist style.
Endless fields fill the view towards Amiens; fields where the first world war was fought. Arriving in the city with a few hours to kill we head for the old part of town to visit Amiens Cathedral. It's colder in here than it is outside, but that adds to the crystal echo, the click of heels on the marble, and the murmurs of tourists. This is France's largest Gothic cathedral and the scale is daunting; it's hard to imagine that men built it, in the 11th century. Above the nave, the roof stretches longingly towards the sky, and I suppose (for those who believe in it) heaven. This must have been the intention when the cathedral was built, and the motivation of those building it: to play their part in creating something divine, grand and important.
According to my guide leaflet, the impetus for building the cathedral was to house the head of John the Baptist. It's unclear whether it is still here. A 19th-century replica is still a focus for prayer, says the leaflet, so I don't know what happened to the original head. I decide to light a candle, but don't have any euros, so I leave £1 (surely there is no currency in heaven). I leave, thankfully avoiding being struck by a lightning bolt.
Back at the venue, I settle into the backstage babysitter routine, pushing the pram around the dressing room, while downstairs the band rock out in front of French teenagers. I get the odd disparaging look from a French roadie. But, as the old cliché goes - c'est la vie. I knew my French would come in handy eventually.
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