Vanilla painted brick walls rise up on all sides of me, with red doors to each apartment and red frames to the windows. The walls create a little grotto that is insulated from the sound of cars and mopeds and rattly strollers and suitcases on the cobbles outside the front window of the apartment. Instead, I only hear the pleasant tinkling of outdoor diners’ wine glasses and cutlery.
-June 2, 2025, Lille
We arrived safely in Lille on a train from Paris. Trains run frequently between the cities and the ride is a smidge over an hour, so it’s not hard to get back and forth. This was good for me to know — maybe I could go back to Paris after my husband and son left and I would be on my own in Lille.
Vieux Lille, the historic district we stayed in, is charming with different architecture from Paris. The apartment units are narrow, more like row houses, and the cobbled streets are smaller and narrower, too. Maybe the architecture is more Belgian-style — Lille is practically on the border and was once a part of Belgium — or maybe it’s just a smaller city.
Airbnb in Lille from the back, from the quiet of the Cathedral grounds
It is much calmer in Lille, and quieter and easier than Paris. In our immediate vicinity were a pasteis de nata patisserie called Dona Bica and a café we could see from our open window; a chocolatier and macaron shop a couple of doors down; a cheese shop and multiple boulangeries, beer gardens and waffles, a crêperie and a Cathedral all within a 2 minute walk; and the Grand Place central square and plenty of shopping for shoes, clothes, food, and wine within a 5 minute walk.
Views from our window
We all needed some alone time once we arrived in Lille. I went upstairs to unpack, and when I came back down, I found my husband asleep on the couch in the living room with his book on his chest. Our son retreated to his room for some quiet time as well. The washing machine tumbled round and round.
I took a snack and a glass of the Anjou wine to the little wooden table on the terrace. The wine was cold and crisp, though I did not need a cold crisp wine that day. The air was cool enough that I wore a sweater with my white peasant skirt. My toes were chilly but I liked the feel of the wood planks under my bare feet.
The terrace we shared with other apartments was filled with pots of red and white geraniums, purple salvia, pink and yellow petunias, bamboo and ivy. As I sipped my wine and wrote, I heard the gentle sound of a neighbor washing up the dishes in the kitchen sink after dinner: the clink of glasses, the rush of water from a faucet, hands dipping in and out of the stream. Silverware clinked together as they rinsed. Church bells chimed.
I liked it there in that little nook. I need quiet time with pen and paper to take care of myself. Bread and brie, flowers and wine, church bells don’t hurt, either.
I considered trying to see the Mona Lisa, but I got panicky in the crowds. I was in a great hall, a huge red room with paintings bigger than our living room walls, one row at eye-level part of the wall where one might hang a painting, and then another row stacked above so that you had to crane your neck to see them. I hardly looked. I felt suffocated by the swarming mass of people.
I escaped to a part of the Louvre in the Denon wing that preserved the ceiling to show off what the palace had looked like when it was a palace, and that was spectacular, and there was nobody in there, which was nice, but the clock was ticking and I felt pressure to move on and understand the building so I could see more, hopefully with fewer crowds, in the 1 hour and 40 minutes I had left.
-Monday June 2, 2025
Before we left for Paris, friends who’d been told me, “If you go to the Louvre, be sure you go with a plan! Otherwise you will be overwhelmed. Do not expect to see all of it.”
By the time we’d sorted out amongst our family when we were going to do what in Paris, and we’d agreed to go to the Louvre on Sunday while our daughter was with us, there were no tickets left on Saturday or Sunday. The only reservations available were on our last day, Monday, after our daughter had left, at 4pm. Two hours before the museum closed for the day at 6pm. I grabbed three tickets before we lost that option as well. Our daughter could come back to Paris from Lille, but this was our only chance.
I studied the maps of the Louvre before we went and decided I’d focus on sculptures. Typically in the US I visit paintings when we go to art museums. This would be my opportunity to see art I can’t see at home. The Louvre contained names that seemed magical and unreachable and so far away when I learned them in childhood, when I heard them in every art class I’ve ever taken: Michelangelo, Venus de Milo.
Venus de Milo, ~100BCEMichelangelo’s Rebellious Slave, ~1515
Despite looking at maps of galleries ahead of time and trying to plan my strategy, I was totally overwhelmed once I was in the lobby under the glass pyramid of the museum. My husband, son, and I had decided to split up since we had so little time. Even with a map, I could never tell what level I was on or where I was going. With all the people and half stairwells, it was nearly impossible to get my bearings.
And then I would stumble into a hall of magnificent art.
I saw Michelangelo’s Rebellious Slave and Dying Slave, the Venus de Milo, The Three Graces, FlyingMercury by Giambologna. I saw lovers loving. I saw heroes conquering. I saw ancient goddesses radiate feminine strength and glory. I saw Greek marble carved 1800 to 2100 years ago.
I loved being able walk a complete circle around the sculptures to see them from every angle. I loved the way they were placed in the galleries such that natural light from the palace’s windows shone on them. Light is everything. It makes the stone glow. It highlights lines and curves, creates shadows and depth. With a painting, the light and colors and textures are mostly complete and laid on a flat surface by the artist; with a camera in hand, the best you can hope for is to capture the artwork accurately. With a sculpture, you can photograph it from different angles to change the composition of your photograph, and with different light to change the mood. You can extend the art and make additional art of it (not me, but great photographers could!).
Antonio Canova, Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss, ~1790
I saw Aphrodites and Venuses, Athena, and the incredible detail of the Caryatid columns from a Renaissance French palace. I saw the beauty of the human body glorified in marble and bronze, the ideal image of the human for these artists and their times, every woman’s and goddess’s breasts the exact same size and shape, every man’s and god’s chest, abs, and biceps muscular and hard and strong. The supermodel has been around for much longer than I realized.
In the sculptures that most captivated me, the marble was so smooth, it looked supple like skin. I snapped a photograph that I intended to capture the exterior of the building from inside the Louvre. When I looked at it after the trip, I thought, “Why is there a naked person in my photograph?” It is not a naked person. It’s a sculpture. That’s how fine the artistry is.
Stone that looks like skin
I was stunned by how perfect these sculptures were, in their shapes and proportions, their grace and details, their smoothness. I could not stop thinking about how mind-numbingly tedious it must have been to work so closely, so precisely, to chip away at the hard stone and make these human forms and ornate textures come out of it. The artists’ patience to suffer that tedium, and their persistence to push through it, resulted in something real, something permanent, something that lasts for all of humanity to experience. This is true of all artists — musicians, writers, painters, sculptors. I am grateful for their patience. I am grateful for their drive and tenacity and madness to make the millions of tiny choices, the millions of tiny marks, that create such wonder that we can still appreciate and enjoy 1 year or 2100 years later.
Caryatid column in Renaissance palace, ~1550
The craftsmanship was impeccable. Other sculptures look rough and crude now after seeing these perfect specimens.
A perfect foot
After spending time with these masterpieces, I still had about an hour left. Looking at a map afterward, I now see that I was on the level underneath the great galleries of paintings, including the Mona Lisa gallery, which was why each time I tried to climb the stairs to explore other areas, I met huge crowds. I could not figure out how to get out of the wing I was in to get away from the masses. I stumbled on an underground passage where you could walk through the Medieval foundations of the Louvre. It was refreshingly cool and empty down there, underground, with those ancient stone walls all around.
I finally found my way out of the Denon wing, which is where the Da Vinci paintings are — one name whose work I did not see — and where the largest crowds were. I exited and went to the Richelieu wing where I had originally intended to go, and where I rescanned my ticket for entrance.
I entered and wandered into the passage on the right. I emerged in a beautiful atrium filled with natural light from a high glass ceiling.
Richelieu Wing, Puget Court
I was surrounded by huge marble sculptures of gods and myths, and there were trees and light, and there were people but not crowds, and there was sunlight and lots of air, and it was glorious. I stood in the entry and felt the sunlight and the clean, open space recharge me. When I climbed the stairs, I was confronted with a spectacular sculpture catching sunbeams.
Pierre Puget, Perseus and Andromeda, 1684; ~5:10pm on June 1
The top of the stairs opened into a gallery streaming with light and that overlooked a serene indoor courtyard. The green of the trees was lovely against the white and cream stone, and it picked up the green of the bronze sculptures, creating a sense of harmony between these natural living beings and the human-made creations around them.
Richelieu Wing, Puget Court
I stood and watched people interact with the sculptures, looking up at them, photographing or having their photograph taken with them, like the goofy grinning man who had his picture made with the bronze Hercules conquering a serpent, as if he, too, could conquer such a beast.
Hercules Fighting Achelous Transformed into a SnakeTheseus fighting the Minotaur
I spent the rest of my time at the Louvre in this hall. I can’t get enough of this place. Of Paris, of the art, of France. I want to come back.
I’ve found a place in the shade in Luxembourg Gardens to sit and rest my feet. A cool green breeze blows. I hear birds twittering and wind in the leaves, and the air smells fresh and crisp. My eyes are soothed by the curves of the garden paths, the trees and flowers and sculptures, the people reclining in park chairs reading books with their feet up. I hear the crunch of feet on the gravel and sand path, and pigeons bob their heads in the dappled shade from the trees above me. Are these the horse chestnuts?
-Sunday June 1, 2025
Brian and I walked the empty city this morning, picking our way through the wreckage of last night’s Champions League win while cleanup crews swept loose garbage into piles to be hoovered by the mechanized street sweepers. Crews had already gotten to some streets, and those were pristine; other sidewalks barely had empty spots to put our feet without stepping on trash. Our destination was Notre Dame. We wanted to see it without the massive crowds. We didn’t go inside, the lines were too long even early in the morning, but the grounds weren’t crowded when we got there, the streets around it were clean, and we were able to spend some time with the cathedral, spellbound and in awe of the intricacy of it.
Notre Dame in the early morning
We went back to the apartment after our walk, and then I was ready for my One Thing in Paris: Jardin du Luxembourg.
I’m so happy here. The bird song and ivy air feel cleansing after the garbage water stench of the city on a hot day yesterday, the endless honking and emergency vehicles last night, and the streets littered with bottles, food wrappers, and cigarette butts this morning.
This garden is less about the flower beds and more about green spaces with sculptures and shade and wide paths to stroll on or sit beside. The sculptures are part of the garden, with greenery all around them. Sometimes they’re in a grassy area with a bed around them, sometimes they’re against the backdrop of a tree or shrubbery, sometimes they’re nestled in the green themselves, like a bust I saw peeking out a few minutes ago.
My husband and daughter stayed back at our Airbnb, but our son came with me to the garden. He wanted a quiet place to sit and read his book; he found a serene spot in the shade. I left him by the Medici fountain and will return to him soon.
Medici fountain: a nice spot to sit and read. Or eat. Or watch birds. Or really do anything.
I’m in a shady spot by the stag sculpture. In front of me under a tree, a silver haired gentleman leans his chair back and looks at his phone. He wears dark fitted jeans, brown loafers, a fitted grey lightweight crewneck sweater over a faded navy polo. To my right, two women sit side by side in the park’s green metal chairs under another tree. They turned their chairs to face a small flower bed filled with purple petunias, white begonias, and red geraniums. They chat in French. One wears a scarf around her neck. They laugh. The one on the left tells a story and reaches her right hand out to tap her friends elbow with the back of her hand, like can you believe that? A dapper white-haired man in a jaunty flat cap and a blue shirt with white polka dots just walked haltingly by; he looks like he might need a cane, but that doesn’t stop him from strolling in this tranquil green space.
There are chairs everywhere in this garden. You can sit in the shade along any of the garden paths. You can sit in the sun along the mall that leads up to the palace. You can sit in dappled shade seats around the stage pavilion where a jazz band currently plays. You can sit along the pool of the Medici fountain, surrounded by swags of ivy vines and shaded by giant maples that rose ringed parakeets swoop in and out of. You can picnic on the grassy expanses between the rows of horse chestnut trees.
A nice place to picnicSo many places to sit and enjoy the gardens
I’ve moved from my seat by the stag to a seat by my son. I’m shocked that there are empty chairs, this is such a perfect spot. The fountain splishes and music from the pavilion drifts on the air. The soundscape is soothing: water tinkling, sweet toddler voices and dad murmers, the crinkle of a wax paper sandwich wrapper, rustling leaves, a bird saying “whit whit.” People sit alongside the fountain reading, holding hands, or just gazing at it. Some eat on their laps, legs casually crossed with sandaled feet dangling.
Medici fountain
I could do this every day in retirement, come sit in this garden to read, write, watch the birds splash in the fountain, gaze at sculptures in different kinds of light, eat a crêpe or a croissant or a sandwich on a baguette, enjoy people strolling and lounging in this beautiful green space.
As we metroed toward the Eiffel Tower, two stations were closed, including the transfer station we needed, Charles de Gaulle Étoile, because they were broadcasting the match at the Parc des Princes which I guess is near the closed stations. Paris scored another goal while we were on the metro, and cheers went up on the train.
-May 31, 2025
The week before we left for Paris, my husband sent a text to our family group chat: “I just realized we’re going to be in Paris for this next weekend 😍.” He linked to the date and time of a soccer match: Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) and Milan Inter, Saturday May 31, 2025, playing in the finals in Munich to win the Champions League.
For those of us who don’t follow soccer, this is a huge deal. Like, a really really big deal.
The one thing our daughter wanted to do in Paris was see the Eiffel Tower lit up at night. The sun didn’t set until 10pm, so we’d eat a late dinner after our miles of wandering the city, then metro down towards the tower.
For whatever reason, seeing the Eiffel Tower didn’t mean anything to me. I know it’s an iconic symbol of Paris, of course, but it didn’t make anything happen in my heart to think of going to see it. I also knew nothing about why it would be amazing to see it lit up at night, but our daughter was excited about it, and it seemed like a fun adventure — something new! — so I was definitely game.
We ate at Corso, an Italian place near our apartment. As with most restaurants and bars we saw in Paris, all of the doors and windows were wide open so that the inside feels like outside, just with cover and shelter from wind. We sat inside in the open air with outdoor diners just a few feet away without any walls in between. What this means is that whatever is happening outside can be heard inside, and whatever is happening inside can be heard outside.
Every restaurant, every bistro, bar, and brasserie played the match on the TV behind the bar if they had a TV behind the bar. Each time Paris scored, cheering erupted from every one of them. Our TV must have been on a delay because we would hear the roar of cheers up and down the streets before we’d see the goal behind the bar on our TV, when then people in Corso would jump up from their tables with their hands in the air, hoorahing and clapping and grinning with excitement for their home team.
As we metroed toward our destination, two stations were closed, including the transfer station we needed, Charles de Gaulle Étoile, because they were showing the game at the Paris stadium near the station. Paris scored another goal while we were on the metro, and cheers went up on the train.
We got off at the Victor Hugo station, and on the walk to the Eiffel Tower, in the dark of night after 10pm, we walked by bars where people spilled out onto the street because they couldn’t all fit inside. They watched the match from the sidewalk, drinking and shooting off fireworks because at this point the score was 4 to nothing, and it was the second half, and PSG was likely going to win. As we walked by a ritzy hotel, the kind with uniformed doormen standing at attention by the door, I looked over and saw the uniformed doorman in the middle of the sidewalk in the dark, head bent over his phone, watching the match.
As we headed towards a bridge to cross the Seine, we happened upon a huge plaza, the Esplanade Joseph-Wresinski, on our side of the river where we had a perfect, unobstructed view of the Eiffel Tower. There it was, in all it’s glory, lit in the team’s colors of red and blue. People in the plaza played dance music, and the mood was festive and gay, and the Tower had “Allez Paris! lit on it.
Allez Paris!
I’ve often wondered at sports, and the fervor of fandom. About how wild people get over their teams winning, and why people care so much about what is ultimately just a game. But as we stood there surrounded by the excitement of the crowd as the match was in its final minutes, standing in full view of the city’s most iconic landmark, recognizable to anyone in the world, the symbol on the PSG team’s logo, I felt the excitement and joy and glee. They were so proud and happy! On one of my podcasts, probably Hidden Brain, I remember an episode that talks about the science of interpersonal synchrony, and how moving or being in harmony together has huge psychological benefits. It feels good to be in harmony. We’re sharing something when we’re in synch. We feel connected. We feel as one.
That’s what Paris was sharing the night of the Champions League match. I was grateful our daughter wanted to see the Eiffel Tower at night, because I absolutely got it once we were there. I felt big feelings and was so happy.
And then suddenly, the tower started sparkling. Sparkles! The crowd cheered, this time for the Eiffel Tower, and everyone got out their phones to video it, including me. I didn’t know it was going to sparkle! I got teary-eyed and fell in love with the city and the Eiffel Tower. I’m their biggest fan. Paris is already beautiful and magical, and then it takes another step, throws off its coat, and it SPARKLES! Like jazz hands. Like Cher. Like look at me, I have so much joy and beauty and magic already, and now I’m going to give you a treat because there’s even more here.
Fireworks exploded in neighborhoods across the city when the game ended, 5-0 Paris. The Tower changed from “Allez Paris!” to “Champi⚽️ns: Paris est Magique.”
I couldn’t stop smiling and laughing. My husband couldn’t stop smiling and laughing. As we walked away from the Tower, the crowd got more boisterous with the win. People hung out of sunroofs and car windows yelling and waving French flags and Paris football club flags. We reveled in all the cars honking as they went round and round the roundabout by the plaza. When we saw a drunk guy overturning garbage cans, pulling all the trash out and smashing bottles on the street, we knew we should probably book it home.
On our walk back to the metro station people sang in the streets. A guy on a moped weaved down the street, singing, tilting left then right then left, with his feet pushing off the ground like a kid on a pedalless bike. The acrid sweet smell of gunpowder hung in the air from all the home fireworks. We saw firemen rolling up a hose where they had just put out an actual dumpster fire by the first bar we’d passed on our way to the tower, the one with people shooting fireworks. The dumpster still smoked as we walked by.
On the metro on the way home, each time the doors opened, we could hear people singing in the stations. Clusters of fans in their PSG jerseys got on and off the train belting out the team song. All night, the city celebrated, singing, honking, drinking, accidentally setting dumpsters on fire.
I’m upstairs in the reading room at Shakespeare and Company while Owen shops downstairs. It’s quiet up here. The walls are lined with wooden bookshelves filled with English language hardbound books that aren’t for sale. Next to me is a reading nook, like a window seat in the corner, with a red velour cushion on it. I could sit there with my back against the honey wood wall and read if I were reading instead of writing. At the end of the hall in the room across from me, facing the window that looks out over the Seine and Notre Dame Cathedral, is a wooden table with an ancient typewriter with circle keys.
The floor is old cracked hexagonal tiles, brick red and faded terra cotta, wonderfully worn.The ceiling is wood beams, old old with gaps in the grain from swelling and shrinking. The ceiling is low. On the wall in the stairwell are black and white photos of authors: Virginia Woolf, Daphne du Maurier, Sylvia Plath. Maurice Sendak. James Baldwin. Other authors, like Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald, are painted in line illustrations in the stairwell beneath the photos. A piano sits in the corner. Photos of more authors adorn the walls around it. Walt Whitman. Toni Morrison.
Painted over the door is “Be not inhospitable to strangers lest they be angels in disguise.”
Painted on the stairs, “I wish I could show you when you are lonely or in darkness the astonishing light of your own being.”
–May 31, 2025, 3:20pm
On our first full day in the city, I got to spend time alone with each person in my family doing something cool in Paris.
My husband and I were up before the kids, as we always are. We walked the Montmartre neighborhood again, this time in the cool of morning before the streets were clogged with tourists. We climbed the more than 200 steps to Basilique du Sacré-Cœur while runners with hydration vests ran down the steep cobbles beside the stone stairs. From the basilica, which sits at the top of Montmartre hill, you can see the whole of Paris.
After our walk, he and I had pastries and coffee at a little boulangerie around the corner, Chez Carla, where as I stood in line, I watched as they slid batches of fresh croissants off a pan into the display case. The croissants made a sound like stuffed dry leaves as they tumbled, flaky light and substantial at the same time.
Once the kids were awake, the four of us tried to figure out how to manage all of our desires. We each had a different One Thing we wanted to do in Paris. My husband wanted to head towards the river, maybe see Notre Dame. Our son’s one thing was the Shakespeare and Company book store. Our daughter wanted to shop, but her real one thing was to see the Eiffel Tower at night. I wanted to do it all. Plus Luxembourg Gardens.
We committed to shopping since our daughter’s time with us was limited.
We ventured out of our neighborhood, down Rue Marguerite de Rochechouart towards the Seine. We weren’t 5 minutes from our apartment when I grabbed a photo of what delighted me as a quintessential Parisian scene: flower boxes and window shutters above a fromagerie (cheese shop), with a chic woman walking through the frame just as I snapped the shot.
On our meanderings, our daughter and I stopped into a multi-level Zara next door to the Palais Garnier Opera House. The time we spent waiting in a sweltering line for sweltering fitting rooms ultimately paid off — she found a dress she loved. While we were in Zara, my husband and son sat on the palace stairs and listened to a street musician. Our son said later that that was one of his favorite moments from the trip, just sitting there taking in the guitar player, the busy streets, the palaces.
We walked by ritzy shops and through Jardin des Tuileries before standing on one of the more than a dozen bridges that crosses the Seine. At this point, the Left Bank, where Shakespeare and Company is, was right there, just a few steps further. I knew our son really wanted to go to the book store. I asked, do you want to go now? I do. We can split up.
So we split up. He and I walked the mile or more along the Seine, past the book vendors that I’ve read about so many times in so many books, including Hemingway’s A Movable Feast from his time in Paris more than100 years ago.
When we arrived, there was a line to get into the shop. There were lines for everything that day. The sidewalks were packed. The restaurants and cafés and museums and shops were packed.
Once inside, Shakespeare and Company was not packed; the purpose of the line was to control how many people are in the store at any given time. Once you’re in, you can breathe and feel the coziness of being in a really special book store, where beloved English language authors have found kindred spirits in their time in Paris, borrowed literature when they couldn’t afford to buy it, leaned on the shop owner to find rare books; they’ve read, written, thought, and found shelter.
I loved being with our son there. I loved that I got to go with him and experience it together. He picked up several books, put some back, picked up more, put more back. He’d brought his backpack so he could carry any books he bought. Ultimately, he took home The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky and Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami. I bought Devotionals by Mary Oliver. We said yes when asked if we wanted our books stamped with the Shakespeare and Company stamp.
After the book store, we waited in the leafy cover of the Marché aux Fleurs (flower market) for my husband and daughter. Our son wanted to go back to the apartment. Our daughter wanted to shop more.
I went with our daughter, even though I was hot and hungry.
As soon as we started walking in the sun, she wilted, too. I saw a brasserie with tables in the shade, Le Sarah Bernhardt, and when I asked about a seat, the waiter took us around to a much better set of tables — we’d gone to the quiet side, and he took us around front where the people-watching was spectacular. We got seats at a little round table outside, facing the bustling Place du Châtelet, and sighed with pleasure to get off our feet.
I convinced our daughter that what she wanted was an Aperol Spritz. “They’re so refreshing on a hot day.” I got one, too. Our waiter was fun and friendly, full of smiles in in his tanned and wrinkled face. He brought us olives, and ice for our water (we were hot and I misunderstood him when he asked “still?” for our water, and I said, “Yes, chilled please.”)
Annabelle and I refreshed ourselves in the shade. We sipped our Aperol Spritzes and iced water, shared a caprese salad, and watched the fantastic style on display on the cobbled sidewalks in front of us. We commented on all the fashion we saw, what we liked, “Ooh, I love those pants,” “Look at those shoes!” , “That bag is spectacular,” “I like whatever this trouser thing is some of the guys are doing,” “I love how everyone uses color,” “Look how she pulls that off.” She talked about how refreshing it is that all the college girls where she’s studying abroad don’t wear the same things as each other like they do at home — women have their own style and wear what they wear because they like it, because they put it together, because it’s them. They don’t just wear whatever they’re supposed to wear so that they fit in. She admires the confidence and is inspired by it. And she loves that people actually care about style.
My edges were relaxed and fuzzy after the Aperol Spritz, and I felt wonderfully happy. We were fortified for another round of shopping after our rest and refreshment, and so we were off to Bershka, a store we don’t have at home, and where she found success and bought dresses and tops.
I was so happy to have that time alone with our daughter, and before that, with our son, and before that, with my husband, in this beautiful city. Our first morning at a café with coffee and croissants with my husband, appreciating Shakespeare and Company with our son, and Aperol Spritzes and people watching with our daughter were three of my favorite moments in our time in Paris.
I am near the end of my stay in Europe. Our son went home Saturday, and my husband went home Monday. We travelled to Paris, Lille, Roubaix, Brussels, Bruges, and Ghent over the past 11 days, and I returned to Lille for a final three days before I go home to Virginia. I am grateful for the peace and beauty of it after whirlwind days of sightseeing. When I first arrived here yesterday on my own, I ached for my husband’s company. I felt lonely without him. I walked the cobbled streets of the old town, restless and not wanting to go back to the empty apartment I’d rented for my three nights.
Finally, at around 5pm, I climbed the steps to my loft. I craved a place to rest, away from people. I’d picked this place for the windows I could write in, and I had a lot of catching up to do in my journal. I’ve successfully written at least 1000 words a day in my 1000 words of summer notebook, but that’s the extent of what I’ve managed to squeeze in during our full days of eating, walking, seeing cities and art and architecture, trains and metros, grand plazas, chocolate and waffle shops, wine caves, cafés, crêperies and gelato shops, boulangeries and patisseries, brasseries, cobblestones and stone stairs, castles and cathedrals and book stores and pen shops. I haven’t drawn or reflected on my days. I haven’t blogged.
I wanted to go through photos and maps and my daily 1000 words to make entries in my sabbatical journal, but my apartment seemed so empty. Quiet in a disquieting way. I opened the windows and heard the sounds of the street below, the white noise of the voices of friends and families talking and laughing with wine and snacks at outdoor tables on a clear evening, of suitcases clunking over cobbled sidewalks, of mopeds zipping and bicycles rattling.
I didn’t want to go sit at a restaurant by myself, and the sound of glasses clinking made me want to create a nice evening in. Some cold wine, music, something no fuss to eat.
Luckily in France, bread and wine are easy to come by. Within 10 minutes, I had walked to the bakery on the corner and gotten a ham and brie sandwich on a baguette, then walked around the corner to a gourmet shop for a chilled bottle of white wine. Like so many people in France at 6pm, I walked the cobblestones home with a baguette in a paper bag in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other.
Back at the apartment, which has no means of making sounds — no TV, no stereo — I opened my laptop and played Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue. I found the corkscrew and wine glasses I had no doubt would be in the kitchen.
With music, a glass of wine, a baguette sandwich I could eat with one hand while writing with the other, and the distant background sound of diners’ glasses tinkling and bell towers’ bells ringing, I finally felt at ease after missing my people all the day long. I began going through my daily entries from the trip, my photographs from the Louvre and Lille, and before I knew it, it was midnight. Time to rest.
Butterfly Mind 