The doors of perception

Many years ago, wandering through the streets of Paris, my travel buddy and music aficionado insisted on visiting a particular cemetery.

Turns out Père Lachaise, named after King Louis XIV’s confessor, Father François d’Aix de La Chaise, is a massive cemetery in the northeast parts of Paris that is, well, home to over 800,000 souls, mostly unknown except to their near and dear ones, but a few whom we would have read, listened to, or watched, including Édith Piaf, Frédéric Chopin, Marcel Proust, and Oscar Wilde, among others.

It’s no surprise then that it is the most visited cemetery in the world, with more than three million checking it out annually. And their primary reason is to visit the grave of the frontman of The Doors, Jim Morrison.

My introduction to him was when I was supposedly in university. Friends would gather together in a smoke-filled room, and, over copious amounts of alcohol and smokes that were being passed around, listen and try to cleanse our doors of perception.

How far we succeeded, I have no clue. What does remain though is that over 50 years after Jim Morrison was found dead in a bathtub, his music lives on.

Till we all break on through the other side.

Note: Please don’t add to the useless statistics when visiting the cemetery. Try and remember to be respectful and mindful of the other visitors and the gravesites. And definitely don’t leave a mess behind.