A Builder’s Dream

Time for another entry in Friday Fictioneers challenge, courtesy of Rochelle Wisoff-Fields. If you want to give it a try, check the info on her blog. 100 words more or less, inspired by a photo, here we go….

 Copyright –   Sandra Crook

May the 17th, 1325.

It is done. After so many years, it is hard to believe the last stone is in its place. I grew up and grew old building my church. Someday the whiteness of the walls will turn into different shades of gray and the roof tiles will lose their boldness.

But I hope the pointed arches and the ribbed vaults will survive and serve as mementos when my time is long forgotten.

I hope someone will stand here thousand years from now and think: They were capable of greatness, after all.

That would be enough.

Pierre de Chelles

 

A little bit of investigation and a big stretch of my imagination brought me this story. When I figured out it is the photo of Cathédrale Saint-Bénigne de Dijon, it took me to the 13th and 14th century France. I found the notes that Pierre de Chelles may have been a son or nephew of Jean de Chelles, master mason and sculptor who was one of the architects at the Cathedral of Nôtre Dame de Paris. There are no records of actual builders of Cathédrale Saint-Bénigne de Dijon, but I stretched it and stretched it and connected it to my story.