As I walk to the metro from my apartment, the not-quite-full moon shines itself over Paris, sprinkling its eager light into reflections on the rainy streets. I hear beautiful music growing louder...a small, young woman passes me crossing the street, wearing a sleeveless dress in the chilly autumn air and singing breath-taking Italian music in full soprano. Her face is full of heart breaking emotion, dark eyes intense, dark curls waving...as she simply heads home from work. As I near the next block, I can still hear her gorgeous, operatic notes bouncing off the apartment buildings as they grow fainter in the distance...
The next evening I am on the Champs Elysee watching street performers draw a crowd as they breakdance on the sidewalk. L'Arc de Triumph stands nobly at a near distance and the full moon is enshrined in clouds above. Particularly enjoying the show among the multi-cultural crowd is a sheik, dressed all in white from turban to toe...laughing at every pantomime and antic the performers deliver. One of the dancers asks the audience to clear a path with one swift gesture...the crowd parts a bit to make room as the agile performer backs up dramatically, preparing for an acrobatic feat. He takes a running start, reaches the center circle and with impressive comedic timing fakes out the audience. Instead of delivering the back flip he has prepped, he grabs the sheik by the waist and starts dirty dancing. The audience erupts with laughter and the sheik willingly plays along, amused. Next, a tall, trendy, young Chinese tourist is pulled from the crowd and is demanded to imitate risqué and challenging dance moves by one of the performers. To everyone's surprise, this skinny, reserved Asian guy out does his opponent on every challenge, demonstrating the precision of one with many generations of martial arts masters behind him. He is surprisingly athletic, eager and ready for more.
Stripes are in again. On a Saturday night, I am led to a crowded, grungy local bar in the north of town, not far from City Hall and within view of Sacre Coeur. It has French beers on tap and is sprinkled with long-haired hippies and French hipsters in black and white striped shirts...unknowingly, they create a caricature, almost a mockery...at the very least, a cliche throw-back to the classic French pantomimes of old...while I wonder...where is Waldo?
I visit a back-street, authentic Italian pizzeria only a few blocks from the bar. The friendly, young Tuscan waitress hears that I am from NY and excitedly tells me it is her dream to one day go to the U.S. Charmed, I sling out my few Italian words and phrases with wild (wine-induced) abandon...Mainly, they consist of terms for food: "Pasta Primavera!", "Fettucini Alfredo!"...the waitress is genuinely delighted and calls over the chef and more of the wait staff to listen in. "Mille grazie senior, grazie para tudo gentileza!" I exclaim with emphatic hand gestures. They all respond with enthusiastic delight, as they continue on with their work. My French companion is impressed. "Wow, you seem to know a lot about the language," he says. I tell him confidentially that most of the Italian I know I learned from Monty Python (the Italian sketch). I am pleased that these whimsical lines have effectively found some real-life application...
In the metro on a Sunday afternoon, a well dressed young black man scoots over and graciously offers the vacant seat next to him to an older white woman on the crowded subway. She happily accepts. Unexpectedly, he then stands up and in what seems to me like a timeless moment, he offers his own seat to the older woman's white husband, with a sincere smile. The husband smiles back and politely refuses. Racism has lost its hold in this moment of cross-generational, cross-cultural respect among strangers on a train in Paris.
Sitting in the famous Cafe Flore, the haunt of Hemmingway and many a known philosopher and writer of classic literature, I enjoy a cappuccino and dessert while I ponder how much brighter the term "creme caramel" is than plain old "flan". One name conjures up a mouth watering image of delight...while the other simply hangs awkwardly off the tongue...I would rather be a creme caramel than a flan.
I walk along Boulevard St Germain with a 20-something Parisian friend who is dividing time between University and work in corporate business. As we stroll along talking, he suddenly comes to a full stop, looks around and takes a deep breath. "Isn't this city beautiful?" he says, looking up at the old architecture of apartment buildings he must have walked by a thousand times...I am glad I'm not the only one who falls deeper and deeper in love with this town!
I wake luxuriously at 10am on a Monday and bask in the knowing that the day is mine to spend exactly as I please. I am suddenly alarmed by the sound of the front door of my apartment rattling. Then an awkward banging sound. Someone is trying to break in! I hear the knob turning rapidly back and forth with urgency...then more rattling. "What the hell?" I wonder, half afraid, half angered as I spring out of bed and rush to the door knowing that I have no idea how to call the French police if I need to. ("Shit, what do I do?" I wonder.)
"Q'est que c'est?!" I demand from inside...trying to sound intimidating. I hear a man's deep voice reply rapidly in French...I can't understand a thing. Eventually, in his unintelligible-to-my-ears explanation, I hear my land lady's name mentioned. Ok, that is a good sign and his voice sounds non-threatening. I am relieved. It occurs to me that he might be the contractor friend she mentioned was planning to do some maintenance work in the apartment...it was just never clarified when exactly he was coming over...
With a slight hesitation, I bravely open the door and suddenly...standing before me is the most charming, adorable, unassuming old-world gentleman I have ever seen. He is tall and handsome with a friendly face, distinguished mustache, short gray hair and bright blue eyes. He is straight out of the movie "Gigi". He has on a checkered blazer with an elegant silk dickie, tailored pants and blue suede shoes. He looks to be in his late 60's but is spry and earnest. We sort out the mix up, he picks up the check and note that he came for and cheerfully goes on his way. A happy turn of events.
Late in the afternoon, I blissfully lose track of time meandering the winding cobblestone streets of St. Germaine, getting lost in the boutiques and bakeries along the way...the sun is shining, a band is playing old time jazz in the street, people are sipping beer and coffee in sidewalk cafes, flowers and fruit are spilling out of shops everywhere and it feels as though I've stepped onto a Woody Allen movie set. Summer has returned in late September and jubilation is in the air. As I wind my way to St. Michele, a young man calls out to me, offering a chair massage. The two women beside him are offering the same. They are all French and well dressed, so I pause, intrigued. I am a sucker for massage. The sign says (in French) "10 minute massage, pay what you please." I ask about the price and the guy confirms, "pay what you want." I glance to see if either of the women have a vacancy, assuming that would be the safer bet, but they are occupied. The guy gestures warmly, so I agreeably sit down on his stool and suddenly notice how good looking he is. He explains (in French) that he is going to massage my shoulders,arms, head, face and neck and to just relax. So I do. His touch is simultaneously soothing and invigorating. It is an excellent massage. At one point, he extends his leg out and leans my spine along his thigh, resting the back of my head on his stomach, as he very gently, almost tenderly, massages my face. I melt. I don't mind this handsome, Gallic stranger laying his hands on me at all.
I meet a friend in front of Hotel de Ville early in the morning and we walk to Place de Vosges. We choose some pastries and decadent cakes at Cafe Carette and order 2 coffees for a petit dejeuner picnic. Sitting in the city's oldest park, built by an early king, we watch with surprise as a hoard of Hispanic women, all dressed in identical clothes (tan pants, blue polo shirts and tan jackets), with identical long brown hair...and appearing to be clones...walk by in a large, streaming line. My friend comments humorously that we must be in a sci-fi film. It is baffling and eery how similar they all look. Next, an even larger group of Hispanic men in identical clothes and haircuts begin to flood the park. What is going on? As some of them pass by our bench, I ask in Spanish: Where are they from? Chile, they answer emphatically. Next, a large Chilean flag is pulled out and we watch, nibbling our pastries, as each clone takes turns posing in front of their flag in the French historic park. Paris is full of mysteries...
The more time I spend in Paris, the more time I want to spend here...it's a way of living in the present and many romantic eras of the past all at once. Black and white Converse sneakers, skinny jeans, and leggings with loose, over-sized shirts are the trend just like everywhere...but here they weave daily through meticulously maintained Gothic Cathedral plazas, centuries-old parks, cobble stone streets and avenues that have survived several hundred years of war and revolution...The aesthetic, the romance, the way that art weaves its way into every experience...
There is still so much to experience. I have never stayed up late writing and drinking at Cafe Flore like the philosophers of old...I have still never dined on a boat on the Seine, sipping Bordeaux as the famous monuments drift slowly by...I have not spent a rainy afternoon with my nose buried in books at Shakespeare and Company...or faithfully devoted an entire day at the Louvre...there is so much more always to explore, to enjoy, to take in...art in every form. It is a love affair with all urban and social aspects of myself in a bigger city context...so different than what most of my life experience has consisted of growing up in mountains. In one month's time it takes about two weeks to acclimate and adjust, two weeks to start to settle in...and then I'm gone again...but I will return again to discover new aspects of both this enchanting city...and myself...
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