May 30, 2025
On the train from Brussels to Paris, ~1:30pm

Each time the door opens to let on new passengers, announcements in French drift into the carriage from the Brussels-Midi train platform. “Annonce de changement de voie. Le train 1:15 pour Amsterdam partira désormais de la voie 16…”

When the door closes again, I hear the muffled sound of voices nestled in red velour seats. Sitting on the track next to us is the face of a tremendous mustard yellow train with bugs splattered across its bullet nose. It’s moving past us now. It’s a double-decker. 

Now it’s gone, and here we still sit.

My stomach gurgles and churns, unsure what to do about a 9pm dinner on the plane, then a bagel snack at what would have been 1 am home time, then espresso and a train station croissant on an empty-but-coffee stomach at who knows what time. 10am local? 4 am home? My mouth is dry. My face is greasy.

“Mesdames et Messieurs, bonjour…” A chime just sounded, and now a beautiful, soothing voice speaks to us about the train and our journey. I cannot understand him even when he switches to English, but it doesn’t matter. I’m in a seat on the final leg of our travels. Oh wait, I understand. “The departure is delayed by a few minutes. We are waiting for the second part of the train which has a technical problem. We apologize for the inconvenience.”

The train hums and I feel cool air. My bracelet, the one with rose quarts beads my girlfriends gave me for my 40th clacks against the plastic tray table as I write. We’re going on 45 minutes delayed after already traveling for…hmmm… 20 hours?

The train has shut off now. It no longer hums. The lights are on, but no air blows. Pigeon feather fluff drifts like snow over the tracks.

Now the train has come back on. It hums. Now it’s shut off again and is silent. Another train to Paris-Nord, the same station we’re going to, has come and gone despite being scheduled to depart after ours. A baby cries. Something is beeping. 

They are literally turning the train off and turning it back on again, over and over, to try to resolve the technical issue. 

I stumbled through the automatic between-coach doors to get to the café. It’s not as romantic as the lounge car in Before Sunrise that had little tables and chairs and tablecloths, and menus next to the windows. Instead, it’s more like a concession stand with a couple of red plastic-top standing tables and two vending machines for drinks. I bought 3 bottles of water for 1.70€ each. My mouth is wet again! I can feel my cells plump as they rehydrate. 

We’ve left the station! The landscape rushes by. There goes a nuclear power plant. There go windmills.

Sun shines on my right arm. The scene out the window is green green green, soft green crops stretching over the gentlest rolling terrain. White windmills dot the landscape all the way to the horizon, scores of them with tall metal bases and impossibly long blades, probably as long as at least 3 school buses but tapering to what seems like a razor’s width. They do not spin today; they stand still as marble sculptures. The sky is blue with bedhead clouds, like shredded cotton balls.

I feel peaceful on the train. It is a smooth movement, like gliding.

---

Until I began traveling as an adult, I could never relate to references in novels about “weary travelers,” or that the first thing in olden times that hosts did when welcoming their guests was to give them a chance to wash themselves of the dust of the road. After that, they’d fill them with refreshments, then let them rest. Why were the travelers weary? They just sat all day.

I understand now. After about 24 hours of travel, of unfamiliar foods and drinks, of being stuck behind an accident getting to the airport, of being surrounded by other travelers, of lines, of newness, of constantly figuring out and wondering and not knowing, we finally arrived in Paris! We lugged our suitcases and backpacks up the four flights of stairs to the top floor of our apartment building in Montmartre. We opened all the windows to look out on the scene below, at the café and pharmacy and Gifi dotted square where Blvd. Marguerite de Rochechouart, Rue Marguerite de Rochechouart, Rue de Clingnancourt, and Rue Gérando all met. 

By the time we got situated, brushed our teeth, and washed our faces, it was about 4pm local time. Brian and I went walking to explore and get to know our surroundings while we waited for our daughter to arrive on a train from Lille, and while we waited for the sun to drop to a reasonable height for sleeping. We walked up and down the cobbled streets of Montmartre, past cafés and beautiful window boxes that made my heart sing. We were finally in France, and it was as beautiful as I’d hoped it would be.

As much as I wanted to see everything, and start doing everything everywhere all at once, this of course was not reasonable. My brain was full of fuzz and gum. I would have little memory of the day had I not written in my journal or snapped a couple of photographs with my phone.

Instead of immediately trying to see all of Paris, we rested at Le Vin au Vert, a small wine cellar on Rue de Dunkerque, close to our apartment. The stone wall inside was lined with wooden shelves of wine bottles. Hundreds of them. We sat and had a glass while we watched tiny cars, bicycles, and people enjoying the evening on foot. I had a chilled white that was crisp and refreshing. Patrons sat on either side of small round tables, facing the street, with their backs against the plate glass window, sipping wine and watching the world go by.

We knew we didn’t have the energy to find a restaurant and eat out for dinner. We had no brain cells left for making decisions. We asked our server about buying a bottle to take home with us, and did they have anything chilled, and the answer to both was yes. So we bought a bottle of cold wine, wandered until we passed a boulangerie to buy a baguette (we didn’t have to wander far), saw a shop — Les Saisonniers — with colorful fruit displayed on wood stands and glass-faced refrigerators of cheese, and filled a paper bag with apricots, strawberries, apples, and a soft cheese from the chilled case with the sliding glass doors.

Pleasantly softened by the wine, we climbed the four flights of stairs with our perfect dinner, which I knew our son would be excited about. He would not have wanted to leave the house again, walk, or sit at a restaurant. I put on jammies, our son put on Star Wars, and we finally took our rest at the end of our travel day.