Cosette: Home At Last

 

Young Cosette

While doing research for this article, I discovered the sad reality that although there can be found a wide plethora of Eponine amd Fantine videos, there was scant amount for dear Cosette.  Admittedly, I have been less impressed with Cosette in my past while spending hours playing and replaying the songs of Eponine while I acting them out in my childhood basement.  Like many, I found the tragic and unrequited love of Eponine to fit in with my Hollywood and romantic novel desirable life I was spoon-fed by the media and society since before I can even recall.  Like many, at best, I pitied Cosette for her naïve belief that love was simple, outwardly scoffed at her for merely running to the man freely all while inwardly feeling the pang of jealousy towards her.  All this and my need to linger in the pain of being an Eponine led me away from examining the true story and worth of being a Cosette, so much that until this minute I did not realize that the beautiful, blonde haired, blue eyed girl that is the symbol of Les Misérables is, actually, Cosette.

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Cosette, born Euphrasie by her destitute and abandoned mother, Fantine (See her story here: https://artistthriving.blogspot.com/2021/02/fantine-dark-night-of-soul.html),  who does everything in her power to protect, love, and secure her daughter's well-being, from losing her job at the factory, then prostitution, then selling her hair, finally dying of heartbreak and disease orphaning her Euphrasie.  Her last wish as she lays in Jean Valjean's arms is that her Euphrasie would be cared for and he promises to do just that.  It is Jean Valjean then that gives her the name of Cosette, as if to separate her from her traumatic beginning, socially as well as emotionally.  With Valjean, Cosette can truly start over and is given the life she deserves. 

Here's the essential factor with Cosette that both her mother, Fantine, despite her struggles, and Jean Valjean, do whatever they can to care for her and provided her with the security of the knowledge that she is loved and that she matters.

This truly runs opposite to the experience of that of Fantine as well as Eponine and in that knowledge dwells an internal strength and sense of hope no matter how dire the circumstance.  As a child, she dreams of her castle on the cloud and it becoming a reality, of such, only affirms her inner peace of self.  

Although he battles with his own demons both inner and outer,  Jean Valjean continues his promise to Fantine by doing what he can to give Cosette a sense of stability in all aspects of her life.  Because of this, she wants for nothing, not just on a superficial physical level, but more so in the realm of her understanding of herself and her wellbeing.  As she grows, her relationship with her dear papa is also one of confidante, she feels comfortable approaching him with her concerns and does not feel any bitterness towards him if he doesn't give a favorable answer.  She trusts him as she trusts herself, within her is an abiding sense of serenity.  She is not lonely when by herself rather she is truly happy and okay  being by herself.  Yet at the same time, she does not lose herself in others nor does she seek external validation from another for her self worth.  When she meets Marius and falls in love with him, it is from this place of inner security, not seeking for his rescue, but as a strong woman in her own right, with much to offer the relationship based on her time developing her own character.

This is how it should be and the end result in our years struggling through our Eponine and Fantine phases.  As we pass through the aching pining away of Eponine into the dark night of the soul of Fantine, we awaken to the light of the beautiful sunrise morning of Cosette, with hope in our heart that we can prevail, we can endure, our security, stability, sense of self worthiness of love firmly grasped, and in no need to seek outward for the gratification of our needs.

As I set out to create this blog, as I performed the songs of Cosette, increasingly I found her so much more enjoyable than others.  I felt a sense of lightness of being embodying me that was absent in the heaviness of the other two.  The reality is, at one point I lived with the fullness of the heaviness of Eponine, the constant longing for a love to rescue who never would or could, then the heartbreak and loss of idealism in my Fantine phase, that now at last I find myself as I deepen further into my recovery and emotional healing, the lightness of being that is Cosette.  As I shed more and more my dependency on another, as I forgive and release the toxic and those that harmed, I find strength within and peace abiding, finally home at last within and without.  Thus, I approach relationship of any variety not from a place of lack but increasingly from a place of fullness.

Grown Cosette